I don’t think life is absurd. I think we are all here for a huge purpose. I think we shrink from the immensity of the purpose we are here for.
Irish guys always liked Norman Mailer. About twenty five years ago Legs McNeil wrote, after doing an interview with Mailer, “nobody talks better than Norm”. Mailer reveled in words, and the man could talk. And punch. But our best-ever American literary talker-brawler won two Pulitzers, and was famous for writing alone by the age of 25. He died at age 84 on Friday after nearly 60 years on a pedestal he built and maintained himself. He could be a blow-hard, but he knew something important. Strong opinions put strongly–about writing, men, women, politics, modern life–isn’t about getting press. It’s a way to have the Conversation in the midst of conformity and complacency. Enemies?
