Bailey Alexander

Larry Kramer interviews Gore Vidal; to be or not to be 'gay' is not the question.

Had a chat with Gore Vidal last night. He never, ever disappoints. Reading the master is like sitting across from the lion, each of us seated in a high back chair, glass of Chivas in hand, relaxed.     

In Sexually Speaking, a series of essays on sex, GV opens his preface with a piece about Tennessee Williams, thinking Tennessee's gay critics cruel, sinister even, insisting everything outside the 'gay' condition must be marginalized. 

Gore admired Tennessee's response to this sort of dull bigotry: "Why should I limit my audience any more than it is already?"  Writers and artists first and foremost. Of course, if you wish to read about Tennessee's private life, you can, I did, it's graphic and honest. But it has little to do with his poetry, his plays. He was far more familiar with heterosexual life, especially in his early, fertile writing days. The heavy cruising came later on. 

GV ends his preface with a quote from Elaine May, "I love a moral problem so much more than a real problem." (where have these people gone...)

Candice Bergen in Gore Vidal's play "Best Man"

Just reading about Candice Bergen starring in Gore Vidal's play "Best Man" restores the faith and quietly calms the nerves; reminiscent of when celebrity inspired us to project our dreams onto their beauty. How could you not love her, I always did, 'specially when everyone else didn't...

Gore Vidal, my uber idol, America's biographer and prescient for over 6 decades, no wonder the plays' hitting a nerve.

Almost makes me want to go to New York, hit broadway and see the play.

Almost.

Maureen Down on Manskirts, manscara and guyliner, oh my!

Maureen Dowd does go on about Manskirts, manscara, guyliner and guylashes in her inimitable Irish-American girl fashion. Alas, before Priscilla Queen of the Desert dragged our collective conscious in that direction I was producing and directing my very own fabulous Drag Shows 2 decades back. Such articles and items fail to raise a well tended eye-brow. And, I'm terrifically happy to report a few of my recruits have gone on to wonderful careers in Vegas and stay connected and update me via Facebook, this gives joy.

However I'm with Gore Vidal per usual; forget Hetero or Homo there's just sexual acts.

RMONEY. As Dawn Powell said; Satire is people as they are...

Romney photo via Andycheninprogress. I quote Dawn Powell's quote as oft as possible, in fact she hangs on my living room wall.

Even Gore Vidal marveled ather level of humour, so evolved, so tender but brutally honest. His remarkable essay forced her novel back into print through sheer literary will; "for decades Dawn Powell was always just on the verge of ceasing to be a cult and becoming a major religion."

OWS, self sabotage and StopImperialism.com.

Occupy Wall Street's latest idea is a General Strike on May 1st, makes sense. Let's hope its more effective than last year's inspirational albeit short lived movement. 

Yet I'm more impressed by results and guys like Eric Draitser. His website Stop Imperialism rings right and he did try and incorporate a very critical organ to OWS; the POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC DEMANDS group.

Unfortunately for Eric the General Assembly was co-opted by the facilitators from AdBusters, Obama's Campaign (no wonder he's always smiling) and various anarchists and communist groups.

Communism as collective is fine but I'm too fastidious and their consensus model feels cumbersome and I fear self-sabotage is inevitable. 

Gore Vidal and Breitbart might have actually met, if only for a sec...

Update:

Apparently Matt Taibbi's piece really angered Breitbart's fans. So many muckrackers in our midst, tearing one another apart, deliciously interesting.

You have Matt Drudge and Breitbart, apart from their politics, boys that did and do continue with deeply subservice tactics, too bad the left doesn't get it.

I'll watch is from the sidelines with Gore Vidal the master, as it burns...

Dawn Powell said, "Satire is people as they are..."

Tiabbi update: Well done, Breitbart fans, well done! In less than 24 hours you’ve hacked into my Wiki page, published my telephone number on Twitter, called the Rolling Stone offices pretending to be outraged “advertisers” (anonymous ones, who hung up before we could figure out which “ads” to pull), and then spent all night calling and texting my phone with various threats and insults, many of them directed at my family. “Better grow eyes in the back of your head,” was one; “I’m going to take a shit on your mother’s grave,” was another; a third called my wife a “piece of shit like you,” and many others called me a “pile of human excrement.

Pleasure and pain...

Life is being awfully kind at present as I get to spend another week in Paris. This trip combines biz and romance; separate biz, romance very much ensemble avec mon mari.  Prior pics from our prior address in Paris; a city that inspires like no other, other than Roma....

However, one has to balance the practical with the sublime and visiting la lumiere feels more fun; banking and business is easier in Amsterdam, which brings us to the banking crisis, naturally.

Italy's taking a beating, listening to outside analysis is pointless, no one understands Italy but Italy, we shall see...but its hard to watch the markets pound them at 7.8%. Comparing Italy, which is not bankrupt, to Greece and co, which is, appears pointless. Ireland wasn't, but they were forced to sign up to their banks debt, but banks, being banks, refuse to accepts losses.

Protests, nomads, seasons and cycles...

October is a wonderful month to visually feel life's cycles. Mother nature works her magic through leaves as we witness death and decay everywhere as if to capture how change and transition feel as necessary as life itself. 

For many, death isn't just a concept, especially when seen up close. The cost of a front row seat may allow one to embrace the grief. If you don't and deny the cycle you just may miss the show. 

Gore Vidal was softly shocked by Dawn Powell

GV's essays are brilliant mini intellectual breakdowns, particularly fine when focusing on a fellow writer and their collected work. Vidal efficiently digests it whole, like a snake, and regurgitates it back in finer form, far more elegant in its reincarnation. In this, he's very much alone.  

One of my favorite essays is the one devoted to Dawn Powell, arguably America's premier writer of satire; forever. No wonder she'll never cease being a cult and become a religion. We're not fond of the truth, we're not much for mirrors, it's a rather cruel culture, solidarity is not necessarily our strength.  

Dawn was all about strength. Of mind, of spirit, a genius. Hemingway knew it, Diane Trilling knew it, everyone who was anyone in the literary world knew it, but refused to give her fame because she refused to live by their rules. She could not write about women in a romantic way, nor the war. And the rare moment she did write of war, it was without romance. 

Language can be magical, it can also be a curse.

The Grand Dame of the Adriatic...

From moody blues and misty to simply stunning, Riva's as lovely as ever.

The rhythm's calm, as are most of Italy's resort towns, seasonal, enclosed, elegant. 

From Riva my travels take me to Lignano, from Trentino to Veneto; two regions of twenty that create the state of mind that is Italy.

Citizens loyal to family, community, then region...cannot even recall the last time I met a patriotic Italian, perhaps football, that's all, maybe not even then, for long. 

Prior to the major move to Amsterdam I have to check in at Lignano, kinda surprised as it was my home for several months. I'm greeted by warmth, I'm the only American that's ever docked let alone lived there yet it feels so stark, solemn, not only cold but hallowed out.

Those ethereal Alps so crisp and clearly outlined, so comforting when I pop my head out in the early morn...drawing the curtains to let the quiet light in...they murmur and whisper, I can barely hear their surround sound. They are far away in the cold winter, still, yet suddenly the weather can be quite windy and dangerous, Bora winds are not a trifle, in fact I found a fish on my deck upon arrival.

Most boats now covered, quiet, left until March, even April. Seattle's so different, the weather is generally mild, no Bora there, but here, oh yes, I felt the loud hissing, until it passed last night, tucked under blankets, Colette and Godot wrapped into their bodies next to mine, heaters at full blast, soft lamps, then silence and deep sleep.

Funny to watch the Italians empty out what appears to be just about everything circa September, October....these people really don't like to be denied the sun. Their boats are left very much alone.

Noi?  Hey, we're happy to post out boat is still floating, in good health, a great sign, especially in these times. And then a quick trip to Venice, the grand dame of the Adriatic, twice as precious this time of year as she's calm, tranquil even, quiet almost if you know where to go, which I do...no tourists to see, no mirror, just that color, rosa, that water, that deep blue green
She is the grand dame, the grown up, built by man, on water, quite unlike any other...Venezia, la serenissima...

Obama's Tragi-Comedy: “Honey, I Shrunk The Presidency”

Robert Becker's article incorporates 'prescient Gore Vidal' with a few moves of his own.  'From the pulpit, he can't bully anyone...Obama's not only risk-averse, he's power averse. Mr. President, if you capitulate in advance, you surrender, game over, and your political capital evaporates.'

Makes one wonder whether he'll have enough to get re-elected.

Perpetual war for perpetual peace...

"Harry S. (for nothing) Truman created the National Security State,  institutionalized the Cold War, placed us on a permanent wartime footing and started that vast hemorrhage of debt which now is $4 trillion and growing by $1 billion each day." 

So said Gore Vidal circa '92, our biographer, our last gasp of consistent, comprehensive thought, the man who was at the crucible.

Driving thru the Dolomites

 
 

BMJ, Bilderberg, Computers and Chaos in general.

Quel surprise,The British Medical Journal (BMJ) found WHO's guidelines on the use of antiviral drugs were prepared by experts receiving consulting fees from top two manufacturers of these drugs, Roche and GlaxoSmithKline.

Words written to move, morph and fly like the Glorious Bird...

When reading Gore Vidal you feel the control, the captain is at the helm, his reference points wide and learned.  Why then does modern thought read narrow as if strapped by fetish like behavior.  Therapy, meditation, anything but giving ideas the wider more playful berth they deserve.

Nothing more luxurious than listening to Gore Vidal

Surfed for some G.V. before sitting down to his second memoir. Found some lovely new bon mots including a podcast w/ Bob Edwards after moving backfrom his beloved Villa La Rondinaia in Ravello, a place I stalked more than once while down south. 

The sun then set as his voice carried me comfortably into his life and times, navigating from strength to strength in Point to Point Navigation. Not quite like Palimpsest, but the latter half of  life is never as intense, nostalgic bits with Carson were wonderful.  Interesting to note that his family originally comes from this region, specifically Fruili, a Roman/Austrian blend, certo, makes sense.

G. V. has so few hang ups; he never played reactionary like the other posers, he did not 'flirt with' ideas, then flip.  He was constant, focused, critical, philosophical, he never had to pretend. 

Gore Vidal ponders the improbability of getting the pillars back...

Gore Vidal says "Republics don't restore themselves".  Capito, and note bene popolo, the pillars of the Constitution are gone, gone, gone the way of Habeas Corpus and Magna Carta. Kinda like how 'bells don't get un-rung', like watching Presidents grope with institutions corrupted long before they were born, like watching Barry don his military uniform so effortlessly, like a jump-shot, boh! we're bombing another sovereign state...like watching another supreme court nominee feel the need to keep their opinions private, non grazie, signore e signori...

Dawn Powell on Gore Vidal, "not to be fit in any fashion"

Sig.Vidal's sun is setting and he may be grieving for a circle and country long gone but while we overlook Lignano this October eve his views prove as probable and prescient as ever.

I love Vidal, read him often, but must rely on Dawn Powell's acute observation circa '54: "Something of a Disraeli, a high patrician like Solomon in judgment and philosophic power with wit, poetry and music.  Not to be fit in any fashion, but will outlive them all, like the great ones."

Gore Vidal doesn't look so good...

Long before America decided to embrace their biographer, before 'thrilling critics' pretended to admire him, to admire Dawn Powell, which made him laugh in disdain...I was in love. 

Gore Vidal does encompass, for me, at least, the finest chapter of America's history.  It is the chapter my novel addresses, so obsessive I shall stay, in vain, for I'm a byproduct, n'est pas?

Obama is beautiful, in possession of keen intellect, discipline, Michelle blows me away, but I can't know what they could mean in such a society I no longer domicile within.  

I dread Gore's passing and fear every fall I now must read about, when checking in, online, just to make sure he's keeping us honest.  Never met him, but did stalk his estate more than twice down South in Ravello.  Never had the nerve to know whether the master was in residence...sometimes the idol should reside in the mind.

I walked by his address in Rome, often, decades after he'd lived in the eternal city, fantasizing about having a luncheon, know of one or two friends that did, but the joy was never meant for me.

Alas, after watching him on the beeb election nite, listening to the round table laugh at his inability to 'bond' with the presenter via video, I now must accept the grand lion has thinned, finally, verily, in mind, body and soul; he's no longer irritated with America, now he's just irritated and old and tired of both tedious facts.

But what a lion, like no other...and who better to capture the man on paper, having met Gore in person, circa 1954.  Reflecting adroitly in her diaries, "...he has more character, manliness, power, manner and general good breeding, intelligence...like other young men, capacity to work, in spite of perfect capacity for climbing as the others have..customary charm and ambition.  Latter has driven him to do too much and without direction..."

I've read some of his fiction, not a poetic writer, a gifted writer, like his friend Tennessee Williams, but then who was/is...Dawn goes on, validating why his essays are written like no other, as if you're sitting across from him, chivas in hand, relaxed, soothed even as he speaks with such strong language, warning....

 "Read Gore Vidal's Messiah. more impressed by the writer than the book, which was engaging enough, but the trouble with being a clear, sharply cut, extraordinary individual with a rich articulate gift is that no characters can equal the author himself, whose muscular skill directs most complicated interplay of plots, guides contrapuntal themes with suave, veiled power and a doom like rhythm that compels and lulls.

A genuine novelist-power at the wheel, a rich, regal, original mind with unlimited treasures and the serene generosity of one who knows he will come into more and more. 

Something of Disraeli-a high, patrician, Solomon-like judgment and philosophic power, with wit, poetry and music. 

Not to be fit in any fashion, but will outlive them all, like the great ones."

Oh, I hope he continues to do so...