Norman Mailer passes at 84

He was a feisty man, who gave as good as he got. His writings included The Naked and the Dead, The Armies of the Night, The Executioner's Song, Miami and the Siege of Chicago and his 2003 Why are we at War?.

He loved life but hated feminism. He was married 6 times and won two Pulitzers. He attended Harvard where he got a degree in, of all things, engineering. He also smoked POT. :)

While Life magazine called his book, "An American Dream", "the big comeback of Norman Mailer," the author-journalist was chronicling major events of the day: an anti-war march on Washington, the 1968 political conventions, the Ali-Patterson fight, an Apollo moon shot.

His book Armies of the Night, was about the 1968 Pentagon Protests, which of course endeared him to me, inspite of his sexism. He won a Pulitzer for it as well. He also testified at the trial of the Chicago Seven. Some of his personal views below, courtesy of MSNBC:

The '70s: "the decade in which image became preeminent because nothing deeper was going on."
Poetry: A "natural activity ... a poem comes to one," whereas prose required making "an appointment with one's mind to write a few thousand words."
Journalism: irresponsible. "You can't be too certain about what happened."
Technology: "insidious, debilitating and depressing," and nobody in politics had an answer to "its impact on our spiritual well-being."

He had five daughters, three sons and a stepson. In early 2007 he released The Castle in the Forest, a novel about Hitler's early years, which interestingly enough was narrated by.. Satan.

He was a hard-drinking, hard-living man. Goodbye Mr. Mailer, thank you for your books and words..

Tags: Norman Mailer