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Title: The Big Empty
Subtitle: Dialogues on Politics, Sex, God, Boxing, Morality, Myth, Poker and Bad Conscience in America
Author: Norman Mailer, John Buffalo Mailer
Narrator: John Buffalo Mailer, Stephen Mailer
Format: Unabridged
Length: 3 hrs and 56 mins
Language: English
Release date: 11-15-16
Publisher: Brilliance Audio
Genres: Bios & Memoirs, Artists, Writers, & Musicians
Publisher's Summary:
"Questions are posed," writes Norman Mailer, "in the hope they will open into richer insights, which in turn will bring forth sharper questions." In this series of conversations, John Buffalo Mailer, 27, poses a series of questions to his father, challenging the reflections and insights of the man who has dominated and defined much of American letters for the past sixty years.
Their wide-ranging discussions take place over the course of a year, beginning in July 2004. Set against the backdrop of George W. Bush's re-election campaign and the war in Iraq, each considers what it means to live in America today. John asks his father to look back to World War II, and explore the parallels that can - and cannot - be drawn between that time and our current post-9/11 consciousness.
As their conversations develop, the topics shift from the political to the personal to the political again, as they duck and weave around one another. They explore their shared admiration of boxing and poker, the nature of marriage and love, television, movies, writing, and what it means to be a part of this extraordinary family.
Members Reviews:
Flawed But Interesting Interviews with Legendary Writer
Norman Mailer was a great writer who often offered interesting and memorable interviews. Most books involving conversations with Mailer are generally worth a look at. But "The Big Empty" rings a bit hollow. John Buffalo Mailer is the interviewer and he does not quite seem to be as sharp a questioner as others in the role (I'm thinking Michael Lennon in particular here). While Mailer offers some of his usual insights on politics, boxing, God and other matters, some of this book already seems dated in ways that other of his works on current events do not. Half of this book is spent pondering Iraq, the presidential ambitions of John Kerry and the presidency of George W. Bush. Mailer's thoughts on some of these topics can be found elsewhere. While Mailer fans will enjoy the work, there are better books on his thoughts on Iraq and God that also take the forms of conversations. There are enough nuggets here on boxing, poker and businesses to redeem the book but "The Big Empty" does not rank as one of Mailer's best books
Twisted, Funky, Funny, Brilliant...
Mailer always manages to twist in a corkscrew of unexpected words and pop the BS cork off of a rich wine of pungent insight. Lots of fun.
bo
coming from a math/physics , obviously non-literary , background i was looking
for a nice overview of mailer's work.
unfortunatley, this is simply a series of conversations in the present ( circa2004) with his much younger son. includes a tremendous amount of anti-republican and
pro-democrat harping. even if you agree with him, it seems to wear thing pretty quickly. certainly mr mailer has more important and meaningful
work to display in a collection.
not much meat , or even potatoes, here
Perhaps one of our few chances left...
Growing up in the sixties, I guess I took Norman Mailer for granted.
Boy, I'll never do that, again.
After all, there was a time when people like Mailer, Joan Didion and her husband, John Gregory Dunne, actually had a regular column, each month, in places like Esquire magazine.