An Open Letter to JFK and Fidel Castro
Mailer's paired open letters to John F. Kennedy and Fidel Castro — the Castro letter finished in November 1960, the JFK letter in April 1961 — refused, Mailer says, by the New York Times, the New York Herald Tribune, and the New York Post before the Village Voice ran them across its front page on 27 April; reprinted in City Lights' Journal for the Protection of All Beings No. 1 (the 'Love-Shot Issue') later in 1961, and again in The Presidential Papers (63.37).
“An Open Letter to JFK and Fidel Castro.” Village Voice, 27 April 1961, 1, 14–15. Essay (paired open letters).
The Castro letter, Mailer notes in “Appendix B — Projects and Places” of The Presidential Papers (63.37), was finished in November 1960; the Kennedy letter in April 1961. He submitted the package to the New York Times, the New York Herald Tribune, and the New York Post and was refused by all three before The Voice gave it the front page. The piece reads against “Superman Comes to the Supermarket” (60.9) and against the “Open Poem to John Fitzgerald Kennedy” of November 1961 (61.21) — Mailer’s three published addresses to the new president that year.
Reprints
Republished in Journal for the Protection of All Beings, No. 1 (the “Love-Shot Issue”), edited by Michael McClure, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and David Meltzer, and “published irregularly” by City Lights Books, San Francisco, 1961. The City Lights editors acknowledge in their note that “the letter originally appeared in Village Voice.” Partial reprint in 98.7 with Mailer’s comment on the timing of the letter’s appearance.
Related pages
- 1961 | The Village Voice | City Lights Books
- Open Poem to John Fitzgerald Kennedy | Superman Comes to the Supermarket | The Presidential Papers
- The Time of Our Time (98.7)