Dave >Gore Vidal patriotic American? that is an oxymoron.
It seems I will not be allowed to rest until I find the right word to describe him.
He certainly has an esteemed pedigree:
>>>He was born at the military academy in West Point, New York, where his father was an instructor. He was raised near Washington, DC, in the house of his grandfather, Thomas P. Gore, a populist Democrat senator from Oklahoma. Vidal learned about political life from him and when he was a teenager he adopted the first name of Gore. Vidal also spent time on the Virginia estate of his stepfather, Hugh. D. Auchincloss. After graduating from Philips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, he served on an army supply ship in the Aleutian Islands, near Alaska. Much of his time in the Enlisted Reserve Corps he devoted to writing.<<<
He certainly has made a profound contribution to literature and culture, has served in the Armed Forces, defending his country, and has been active in politics, attempting to improve his country:
>>>Prolific American novelist, playwright, and essayist, one of the great stylists of contemporary American prose, who has been active in politics. Vidal made his debut as novelist with WILLIWAW at the age of 19, while still in US Army uniform.
As an essayist Vidal has dealt with a wide range of subjects from literary to issues of national interest, and people he has known. Vidal's family have provided him with a wealth of material, starting from his maternal grandfather, former senator Thomas Pryor Gore and his relation to Jackie Kennedy through one of his mother's marriages. Vidal has also met and worked with prominent people, using freely these connections in his essays. Readers learn the habits of such persons as John F. Kennedy - 'not much interested in giving pleasure to his partner - Henry James, Tennessee Williams, Anaïs Nin, and many others. He once [described] Ronald Reagan as "a triumph of the embalmer's art." Often Vidal has been pointedly controversial, as when he supported legalization of illegal drugs - it would remove the Mafia from the drug market.<<<
kirjasto.sci.fi
He certainly is controversial and is not afraid to speak his mind:
>>>"True wisdom is to know the extent of what you don't know quite as well as you know what you do know."<<<
I suppose some could take exception to that.
emory.edu
Some call him our greatest living man of letters:
isebrand.beliefnet.com
>>>Gore Vidal is probably the closest thing I've ever had to a hero. In careful and measured prose he confidently delivers some of the most compelling, insightful, and often sharply witty observations--on history, literature, and American politics--of any American writer alive.
More than merely a persistent political gadfly, Vidal is the quintessential insider, but observing from the outside. Despite his personal connections to major players in American political history, he has written about America mostly from Italy (Rome and Ravello)--always the observer, watching from afar what he calls "the United States of Amnesia."<<<
Ah! I see he calls himself "the gentleman bitch".
levity.com
>>>Vidal has made two failed bids for public office and in recent years has published a series of best-selling historical novels that analyze where he thinks America fell from grace. Few contemporary writers have generated as much controversy as Gore Vidal, who calls himself "the gentleman bitch" of American letters. "I am exactly as I appear. There is no warm, lovable person inside.<<<
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OK, I agree, Vidal may not be patriotic or much of an American (however one defines an American), but I think he's an outstanding person, an intellectual, a person who cares, a person who has guts and, indeed, one who has made a positive contribution to this world. All this is far more than one can say about most of the people he criticizes. |
