Untitled postscript to 'The Time of Her Time'
Mailer's 400-word polemical postscript written for the André Deutsch British edition of Advertisements for Myself (1961), after Deutsch's lawyers required the second part of 'The Time of Her Time' (20 of 26 pages) to be dropped on legal advice. Mailer challenges British writers to fight 'the censorship which hides behind good taste, caution, and the public trust.' The full text was restored only in the 1968 Panther softcover.
Untitled postscript to “The Time of Her Time” (original title: “Sergius and Denise”). Advertisements for Myself, London: André Deutsch, 29 September 1961, 418–19. Postscript-as-essay.
When Deutsch published the British edition of Advertisements for Myself (59.13), the second part of “The Time of Her Time” — twenty of its twenty-six pages — was dropped because, as Mailer puts it in his 400-word postscript, “it is the considered opinion of some of the best legal and literary names of the Realm” that “this piece cannot be printed in Britain” without holding up the book’s publication. The postscript then turns to a challenge: British writers must fight against the censorship that “hides behind ‘good taste, caution, and the public trust.’”
The full text of “The Time of Her Time” was restored in Britain only in the 1968 Panther softcover edition of Advertisements.
The press conference at Deutsch’s London offices generated “Peter Underwood Meets Norman Mailer” (61.16) and “Young American Rebel” (61.17).
Related pages
- 1961 | André Deutsch
- Advertisements for Myself | Peter Underwood Meets Norman Mailer | Young American Rebel: An Interview with Norman Mailer
- Norman Mailer: 'The Time of Her Time' (74.19) | The Time of Our Time (98.7)