And Norman Mailer, in his NYRB review of Tom Wolfe's
novel
_A Man in Full_, started by quoting from one of his own
books...
What ensued was very funny, because Wolfe, of all people,
made the mistake of arguing with his critics (not only Mailer
but Updike and John Irving). Not only that, but he actually
published an *essay* attacking his critics. The man has no
class (well, Horowitz tried to argue with music critic Virgil
Thomson...).
What's funny to me is that Mailer's review was
exemplary
(apart from quoting himself) and praised Wolfe's work while
pointing out that his characters were superficial, an
*obvious truth* to anyone who has read the book slowly. He
also called him a reporter.
By the way, the story of _A Man in Full_ would have made a
great hardboiled novel, a much shorter one. What Wolfe should
have done is research it, give it to Mailer to write and have
Updike do the editing. What a loss.
Best regards,
MrT
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