Literary lion Norman Mailer dies at 84

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Literary lion Norman Mailer dies at 84

By DAN CRYER and AILEEN JACOBSON
Newsday

Norman Mailer, the prince of American letters who reigned as the country’s literary conscience and provocateur, died of renal failure Saturday. He was 84.


* Norman Mailer: A blend of beauty and the boast

NEW YORK | Norman Mailer, the author whose name was synonymous with literary celebrity in the second half of the 20th century, died Saturday at the age of 84. Mailer died of renal failure at Mount Sinai Hospital, said J. Michael Lennon, his biographer.

Mailer’s death represents “the loss of a literary giant who was 100 percent American,” said Dick Cavett. Cavett presided over a legendary name-calling battle between Mailer and fellow writer Gore Vidal in 1971 on “The Dick Cavett Show.” During the show, Mailer and Cavett also traded insults, but, Cavett said, “that was just show business.”

In 1948, with the publication of his first novel, The Naked and the Dead, which drew on his wartime experience in the Philippines, Mailer was hailed as a novelist of great potential. He was only 25.


snip

about the book the two of them co-wrote. What a brilliant man.

Studs Terkel will not be with us much longer either :(