A Sinister Occupation
Mailer's essay on the 'spooky' psychology of writing - reviews, royalties, ego, early success, and the fear of failure - the foundation of the longer 1985 essay 'The Hazards and Sources of Writing.'
“A Sinister Occupation,” an essay in Book Digest Magazine (April 1981) on the “spooky” psychology of writing — its comment ranging over reviews, royalties, ego, early success, and the fear of failure. Mailer ends by confessing that at fifty-seven he is “still getting up my nerve … to take a deep breath and tell the only personal story that any of us ever have, the true story of my own life and its curious turns.” This little-known essay — much changed, including the excision of that closing sentence — is the foundation of the longer “The Hazards and Sources of Writing” (85.4).