Gore Vidal's America / Dennis Altman.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Altman, Dennis, 1943-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Vidal, Gore, 1925-2012.

Vidal, Gore.

United States--History--1945-.

United States.

History.

United States--Politics and government--20th century.

Politics and government.

United States--Intellectual life--20th century.

Intellectual life.

Genre:

Biographies.

Physical Description:

x, 216 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Cambridge ; Malden, MA : Polity, 2005.

Summary:

Gore Vidal is one of the most significant American writers of the second half of the twentieth century, having produced a large number of best-selling novels, essays, plays and pamphlets which have impacted on major political and social debates for fifty years. He is a serious writer and also a television and movie celebrity, whose increasingly acerbic picture of the United States guarantees he is both revered and reviled. Gore Vidal's America examines the ways in which Vidal's writings on history, politics, sex and religion throw into focus our understandings of the United States, but also recognizes his versatility and inventiveness as a creative writer, some of whose novels - Julian; Myra Breckinridge; Lincoln; Duluth - are among the important literary works of their time. Ranging from Vidal's early defence of homosexuality in The City and the Pillar (1948) to his most recent writings on the war in Iraq, this book provides a unique perspective on the evolution of post-World War II American society, politics and literature. As Altman writes: "Difficult not to see in the results of the 2004 elections, where the Republican right gained in both the White House and the Senate, proof of Vidal's worst fears, namely that the impact of imperial adventure, big money and religious moralism would increasingly imperil the American Republic."

Contents:

Preface: The Writer as Social Critic vii

1 Vidal's Life 6

2 Celebrity 17

3 America and Its History 29

Gore Vidal's American Chronicles 32

The growth of American empire 47

Masculinity and empire 59

4 Politics 64

Vidal and America in the twenty-first century 81

Gore Vidal and "political correctness" 99

5 Vidal as Writer 111

6 Sex 127

Gore Vidal and queer theory 149

7 Hollywood 155

8 Religion 163

9 Gore Vidal's America 173.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 191-193) and indexes.

ISBN:

0745633625

0745633633

OCLC:

60965051