Norman Mailer: Works and Days

In Prose or in Person, Still the Tough Guy

Susan Salter Reynolds's Los Angeles Times interview (27 May 1998); Mailer on his mother's 'blind loyalty,' his father, the 'gene stream,' and his readiness, after seven years, to write the Harlot's Ghost sequel.

Read an excerpt (rights pending)

“In Prose or in Person, Still the Tough Guy,” Susan Salter Reynolds’s Los Angeles Times interview (27 May 1998, E1). Mailer reflects on his mother’s “blind loyalty,” his father’s “Jamesian” letters and the “continuation of dreams over generations, in the gene stream,” and says that he is at last ready, after seven years, to write the Harlot’s Ghost sequel: “There’s no sense writing a second volume if it’s not as good; it’s like a broken promise.” Reprinted in the New Hampshire Sunday News, 7 June (98.12).

A full transcription, held in the working archive pending rights clearance, is at full text.

First published: 1998-05-27
Form: interview
Lennon & Lennon: 98.11b
Cite as: /works/1998-05-27-still-the-tough-guy
Last updated: 2026-06-06