An American Dream: Timeline of Events, 1962–1966
A chronology of the years surrounding An American Dream (1962–1966), compiled for the An American Dream Expanded digital project (ed. Gerald R. Lucas, 2019). Tracks the novel's genesis from the Esquire serial through the Dial revision, publication, reception, and the 1966 film, against Mailer's life and the era's events.
A chronology of the years surrounding An American Dream, drawn from the An American Dream Expanded digital project (ed. Gerald R. Lucas, 2019). World and national events are italicized as context.
1962
- January 30 — Mailer’s first poetry volume, Deaths for the Ladies (and Other Disasters), is published by Putnam’s.
- Late March — Mailer divorces Adele Morales in Juárez, Mexico.
- April — Mailer marries Lady Jeanne Campbell; they move into 142 Columbia Heights, Brooklyn.
- Mid-August — Mailer submits the first of fourteen “The Big Bite” columns for the November Esquire.
- August 18 — Mailer’s third daughter, Kate, is born to Lady Jeanne.
- September 22 — Mailer debates William F. Buckley, Jr. on “The Role of the Right Wing” before 4,000 in Chicago.
- September 25 — Mailer covers the Patterson–Liston heavyweight fight in Chicago.
- October–November — Cuban Missile Crisis.
- Late fall — Mailer separates from Lady Jeanne.
- December — Mailer publishes the first of six columns on Martin Buber’s Tales of the Hasidim in Commentary.
- December 20 — “An Open Letter to JFK from Norman Mailer” appears in the Village Voice.
1963
- January–February — Playboy publishes the Mailer–Buckley debate in two parts.
- February — “Ten Thousand Words a Minute,” Mailer’s account of the first Patterson–Liston fight, appears in Esquire.
- March — Mailer meets Beverly Bentley.
- March 24 — Mailer speaks on existentialism and psychoanalysis at Harvard.
- May 31 — Mailer presents “An Existential Evening” at Carnegie Hall.
- Summer — “The First Presidential Paper” is published in Dissent.
- July–August — Mailer and Beverly drive cross-country and back (Arkansas, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Georgia).
- August 28 — Martin Luther King, Jr. delivers “I Have a Dream” at the March on Washington.
- Late summer — Scott Meredith becomes Mailer’s agent and brokers the sale of an unwritten novel to Dial and Dell; Esquire agrees to serialize it January–August 1964.
- September 29 — Mailer’s review of Victor Lasky’s J.F.K.: The Man and the Myth appears in Book Week.
- Mid-October — Mailer turns in the first of eight installments to Esquire.
- November 8 — Putnam’s publishes The Presidential Papers.
- Mid-November — The December Esquire (Mailer’s final “Big Bite”) announces An American Dream, to run in eight installments from January 1964.
- November 22 — President Kennedy is assassinated; Vice President Johnson is sworn in.
- November 27 — Mailer begins the third installment.
- December 26 — Mailer contributes to a New York Review of Books symposium on JFK.
- Late December — Mailer marries Beverly Bentley in New York. (The Expanded timeline dates this “November 16”; the project’s Days, following the published Lennon chronology, give the Juárez divorce from Lady Jeanne as 16 December 1963 and the Beverly marriage as 29 December 1963 — see Beverly Bentley and Lady Jeanne Campbell. The November date appears to be an error in the source.)
1964
- Mid-January — The fourth installment is completed.
- Late January — Mailer debates Buckley in New York on a taped television program.
- February 3 — The Beatles arrive in America.
- February 11 — The fifth installment is completed.
- February 25 — Mailer is in the audience in Miami when Muhammad Ali defeats Liston for the title.
- March 17 — Beverly gives birth to Michael Burks Mailer, Mailer’s first son, about when he completes the sixth installment.
- April 20 — The seventh installment is completed.
- Late May — Warner Brothers buys an option on the film rights to An American Dream.
- Early June — The final installment is completed; the Mailers go to Provincetown, where Mailer revises the Esquire version for book publication.
- July 2 — President Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act.
- Mid-July — Mailer breaks off the revision to cover the Republican Convention in San Francisco (“In the Red Light,” November Esquire).
- August 7 — Congress passes the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.
- September — The Free Speech Movement begins at Berkeley.
- October 12 — An advertisement for the book in Publishers’ Weekly gives a January 1965 publication date.
- November 3 — Johnson elected President.
- December 20 — Working on the Dial galleys, Mailer completes a second revision.
1965
- Early January — Mailer testifies for William Burroughs’s Naked Lunch at its Boston obscenity trial.
- January 27 — Mailer writes to his Japanese translator that Warner Brothers has bought the film rights for $200,000.
- February 21 — Malcolm X is assassinated.
- March — U.S. troops arrive in force in Vietnam.
- March 14 — Tom Wolfe‘s negative review appears in Book Week.
- March 15 — Official publication of An American Dream by Dial Press.
- March 19 — John W. Aldridge‘s favorable “The Big Comeback of Norman Mailer” appears in Life; Mailer later pays to reprint its heart in Partisan Review to “accompany” Elizabeth Hardwick‘s negative review.
- March 27 — The novel reaches No. 4 on the Chicago Daily News bestseller list.
- April 1 — Mailer visits the University of Alaska (impressions later used in Why Are We in Vietnam?).
- April 11 — The novel reaches No. 8 on the New York Times Book Review list.
- April 20 — Mailer arrives in London to promote the André Deutsch edition (published 26 April).
- May 21 — Mailer speaks against the Vietnam War at Berkeley.
- July 15 — Mailer speaks at a Harvard teach-in against the war.
- Late July — Mailer travels to Puerto Rico for the José Torres–Tom McNeeley fight and meets Muhammad Ali.
- August 6 — Voting Rights Act of 1965 signed.
- August 11 — Watts riots in Los Angeles.
- Fall — Mailer contributes to a Partisan Review symposium, “On Vietnam.”
- September 24 — Brock Brower‘s biographical article appears in Life.
- Late December — Mailer addresses the Modern Language Association in Chicago on the American novel (published March 1966 in Commentary).
1966
- March — The Dell paperback of An American Dream is published.
- March 10 — Mailer’s second son, Stephen McLeod Mailer, is born to Beverly.
- June — Mailer buys a house at 565 Commercial Street, Provincetown.
- August — The first stage version of The Deer Park (Beverly Bentley as Lulu Meyers) is presented at Act IV, Provincetown.
- August 26 — The film version of An American Dream premieres.
- August 28 — Mailer’s review of Mark Lane’s Rush to Judgment appears in Book Week.
- August 29 — Dial publishes Cannibals and Christians.
- October 29 — The National Organization for Women is established.
Related pages
- An American Dream | An American Dream: Reception and Reviews, 1965 | An American Dream: A Critical Bibliography | An American Dream: Word-Count Comparison, Esquire and Dial Editions | Norman Mailer's Letters on An American Dream, 1963–1969