REVIEW OF BOOKS

George Axelrod on Gore, a novelette without parts

He was born at the age of nineteen, springing, as it were, full-blown from the pages of Life

magazine. The setting for the parturition was a picture story dealing with the new crop of fledgling writers just emerging from the womb of the Second World War. His pho tograph (he was good, even then, at the dust-jacket photograph — today, of course, he is a World Master) showed a handsome, crew-cut young man, appealingly toughlooking in a kind of goyish-John Garfield way, slouching against the elements, wearing some sort of jacket (collar up-turned) that appeared to be of vaguely military origin. It was just

the right look for a young first-novelist

shortly home from the wars. And as a photograph, it was a hell of a lot better than the

one Norman Mailer selected for the jacket of The Naked and the Dead. Norman's picture showed an effete, curly-haired young man, seated, indoors, in a business suit!

I remember being struck, at the time, not only by the photograph but by the name. "Gore Vidal," I remember thinking. "Jesus, what a neat name for a writer!" I had not yet met him, nor had I read, nor even heard of his book.

It has always been Mr Vidal's contention that his war novel was, and is, in fact, the Great American Novel of World War II. He has proclaimed this so often and for so long a time that many people have come to believe it. I think he has even come to believe it himself. To test his theory, may I offer a simple quiz? Here are the titles of several war (or at least war-like) novels, all published during roughly the same period and all almost equally well-received: The Gallery; Williwaw; A Walk in the Sun; A Bell for Adano; Mr Roberts; End As A Man; That Winter. You are not being asked to identify the authors of these books, merely to check the one you believe to have been written by Gore Vidal. Parenthetically, it turns out that the World War II Novel was none of these, nor was it even The Naked and the Dead, The Young Lions, nor From Here to Eternity. It appears to have been a slapstick comedy by Joseph Heller called Catch-22.

In any case, Williwaw (see — you missed it) by Gore Vidal was not the Great American World War II Novel. But it was something else. It was an almost classically perfect first novel. Perfect, at least, for a young man embarking upon a career in what is called (around the bar at Elaine's in New York anyway), "Serious Lit." It was short. It was modest. It was tidy. It was impeccably written in a naturalistic style well suited to the times. But it had something else too.

Reading it, you got the sense that (a little portentous musical underscoring, please) the author knew exactly what he was doing! Not for him the passionate ... tell it all! tell it all! . . . first-novel-outpouring that can frequently catapult the writer to instant Fame and Fortune and afterwards, when the passion is spent, and his greying hair spills across the

pillow in the moonlight, to a lifetime of trying to figure out how he did it that one time so long ago but can't seem to be able to do it no more baby blues.

Wisely, Mr Vidal did not, and had no intention of, shooting his bolt the first time out. There is a saying in American boxing circles (when, in the opening rounds, a fighter moves carefully, bobbing and weaving, scoring points, but taking no real chances), "Black trunks is looking to stay."

Mr Vidal (at one hundred and sixty-five pounds, wearing purple trunks) was looking to stay.

And so he did.

He knew not only how to write but what to do with it after it was written. Not unlike Mr Maugham's Alroy Kear, he made sure his book got to the right places. Williwaw, wrote Mrs Eleanor Roosevelt in The World Telegram, "is well told, the picture of the man and the events is vividly engrossing." And what she had writ was duly reprinted on the dust jacket of his second novel, In A Yellow Wood. On this one, the 'tough-guy' photograph had given way to a more soulful pose. And in it the straight, square young hero comes, rather surprisingly, into contact with one George Robert Lewis, a character closely patterned on one of the more flamboyant homosexual figures of the period. In prize ring parlance, once again, Mr Vidal was setting 'em up for his best shot.

In a world where Mr Brando prances around the giant screen (shockin', I say, the price of butter bein' wot it is today!), where

the boys in the band take bows and will the real Merle Miller please, for god's sake, get back in the closet — everything was so much nicer while you were in there, The City And The Pillar might seem rather tame. Well it wasn't. It was a beautifully writte.n story of a young man's quest to recapture his

first experience of tender love. That the object of Jim (the hero)'s passion

— now, three books in, Mr Vidal was ready. to let us have a glimpse of honest-to-God feeling if not exactly passion — was a dim-wit, is perfectly normal. We all (at one time, I hope) fell hopelessly in love with dumb blondes. Its

just that the dumb blonde (red head) in this case was another male.

Mr Vidal's reputation was made. Which is exactly what he intended.

Now, to another part of the forest. Mr Vidal has, in addition to his literary aspirations, always nursed a hankering for political power.

He came from a political family. Senator Gore was his grandfather. His father held a major ,1

cabinet post under Roosevelt. He himself ran, and damned near won, election to the House of Representatives from Duchess County.,

where President Roosevelt, whose home it was, had never received more than eleven

Finally, Mr Vidal's two principal pre-oc

cupations, literature and politics, have come together.

When I first heard rumours that the new project was to be a novel with Aaron Burr as

its hero, my immediate reaction was: what a perfect Gore idea!* For those readers whose

familiarity with or interest in things American

is minimal, let me quickly explain that Aar0.0 Burr is popularly regarded as the biggest shit

heel in the history of the Republic ever t? ' reach the office of Vice President. Until recently, that is.

Ask any American schoolboy about Burr and all he will be able to tell you is that Burr

was the man who shot Alexander Hamilton.

Alexander Hamilton was a good guy. Burr was a bad guy. Mr Vidal (who frequently poses as a bad guy himself) is wise enough te know that bad guys make much better copYSince Mr Vidal is (in addition to being a bad guy manqu6) a serious student of his, tory, it might be reasonably asked: why novel about Burr instead of a "serious biography?

The answer to that, of course, is that Mr Vidal is too serious a man ever to permit himself to be caught being "serious." It is his

pleasant custom to conceal his seriousness beneath a gitt-wrapping ot savage wit. Soine years ago (much impressed by his photograph and his name) I produced a play of his I.n which a visitor from outer space in a polite, if,

somewhat patronising attempt to make small talk with his primuve hosts cheerfullY, remarked, "Isn't hydrogen fun?"! Mr Vidal

comes to us from an intelligence operating in I another system. Mr Aaron Burr came to the simple folk of the nineteenth century in mucrl the same way.

It is Mr Vidal's pleasure to use Burr as 3 rear view mirror into history. Mr Vidal's sort of history. In it, George Washington appears as an inarticulate Eisenhower. Jefferson, who , is said by many to be the author of the Con"

stitution of the United States, is shown to be, through Burr's eyes, but vaguely literate.

And then Mr Vidal comes up with a master stroke of the novelists' art. Cumbersome though it may seem, he employs the use of fictitious first person narrator who is °stens!' bly engaged in assisting the ageing Burr in t 11,1 preparation of his memoirs. Crafty Mr Vidal' He gets to say any damned thing he wants about American history, not once but twice removed.

The central event of Burr's life was, verY probably, the duel with Hamilton. There is 110 way that Mr Vidal, as Mr Vidal, could have made this well-known footnote to American history either new or dramatically workablei Even Burr, recounting his version in firs, person narrative, could not have been as er fective as the tour de force which Gore brings, off by (and I know this sounds ridiculot1S).

*Burr Gore Vidal (Heinemann E2.75)

I

paving Burr re-enact the shooting for the ()rnefit of the narrator, playing both parts airnself. Burr has been, for endless weeks, at the top of the American best "seller list. There are ,excellent reasons for this. It is allegedly about .,American history', and therefore a safe book. it makes an excellent gift.

George Axelrod, the American writer, is trying

seek status and prestige by writing reviews dree this

r a paper like this.