Eugene Luther Gore Vidal (/vɪˈdɑːl/vih-DAHL; born Eugene Louis Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) was an American writer and public intellectual known for his epigrammatic wit. His novels and essays interrogated the social and sexual norms he perceived as driving American life. Vidal was heavily involved in politics, and unsuccessfully sought office twice as a Democratic Party candidate, first in 1960 to the U.S. House of Representatives (for New York), and later in 1982 to the U.S. Senate (for California).
A grandson of U.S. Senator Thomas Gore, Vidal was born into an upper-class political family. As a political commentator and essayist, Vidal's primary focus was the history and society of the United States, especially how a militaristic foreign policy reduced the country to a decadent empire.[1] His political and cultural essays were published in The Nation, the New Statesman, the New York Review of Books, and Esquire magazines. As a public intellectual, Gore Vidal's topical debates on sex, politics, and religion with other intellectuals and writers occasionally turned into quarrels with the likes of William F. Buckley Jr. and Norman Mailer.
As a novelist, Vidal explored the nature of corruption in public and private life. His style of narration evoked the time and place of his stories, and delineated the psychology of his characters.[2] His third novel, The City and the Pillar (1948), offended the literary, political, and moral sensibilities of conservative book reviewers, the plot being about a dispassionately presented male homosexual relationship.[3]
In the historical novel genre, Vidal recreated the imperial world of Julian the Apostate (r. AD 361–363) in Julian (1964). Julian was the Roman emperor who attempted to re-establish Roman polytheism to counter Christianity.[4] In social satire, Myra Breckinridge (1968) explores the mutability of gender roles and sexual orientation as being social constructs established by social mores.[5]: 94–100 In Burr (1973) and Lincoln (1984), both part of his Narratives of Empire series of novels, each protagonist is presented as "A Man of the People" and as "A Man" in a narrative exploration of how the public and private facets of personality affect the national politics of the United States.[6]: 439 [5]: 75–85
^Vidal, Gore (April 1, 2013). I Told You So: Gore Vidal Talks Politics: Interviews with Jon Wiener. Catapult. pp. 54–55. ISBN 978-1-61902-212-6.
Eugene Luther GoreVidal (/vɪˈdɑːl/ vih-DAHL; born Eugene Louis Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) was an American writer and public intellectual...
GoreVidal was an American writer and screenwriter who worked in a wide variety of genres. Rocking the Boat (1963) Reflections Upon a Sinking Ship (1969)...
Franklin D. Roosevelt. Gore lost his eyesight during his youth. He was the maternal grandfather of noted author GoreVidal. Gore was born on December 10...
of these claims, Netflix cut ties with Spacey, shelving his biopic of GoreVidal and removing him from the last season of House of Cards. His completed...
Steers, half-sister of GoreVidal, step-sister of First Lady Jacqueline Onassis and socialite Princess Lee Radziwill. Nina Gore Auchincloss was born in...
Look up gore in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. Gore may refer to: Gore, Queensland Gore Creek (New South Wales) Gore Island (Queensland) Gore, Nova Scotia...
1929 – September 22, 2003) was the longtime companion of American writer GoreVidal. They were together for 53 years, until Austen's death. Austen was born...
nemesis GoreVidal, Capote arranged a return visit to Stanley Siegel's show, delivering a bizarrely comic performance revealing an incident wherein Vidal was...
Time noted: "Eugene Vidal, 73, pioneer promoter of civil aviation and father of author GoreVidal; in Los Angeles, California. Vidal starred in football...
American writer GoreVidal and his partner Howard Austen, from 1972 to 2006, who added a pool and sauna in 1984. While he owned the villa, Vidal hosted Paul...
played Colonel Thayer in a 2005 staged reading of a revival of another GoreVidal play, the 1961 drama On the March to the Sea, presented by Theater Previews...
include Igby Goes Down (2002) and 17 Again (2009). He is a nephew of writer GoreVidal. Steers was born in Washington, D.C. His father, Newton Ivan Steers, Jr...
portraitist, writer and teacher known for his portrait paintings, including GoreVidal and Billy Wilder. Newley's father was actor and songwriter Anthony Newley...
polemicist GoreVidal was apt to speak of Hitchens as his "dauphin" or "heir". In 2010 Hitchens attacked Vidal in a Vanity Fair piece headlined "Vidal Loco"...
Best Music Film. His documentary Best of Enemies, on the debates between GoreVidal and William F. Buckley, was shortlisted for the 2016 Academy Award and...
Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc. pp. 43–44. Vidal, Gore (2008). The Selected Essays of GoreVidal. New York: Doubleday. pp. 18. ISBN 978-0-385-52484-1...
Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman with Jude Law, Loren Dean, Ernest Borgnine, GoreVidal, and Alan Arkin appearing in supporting roles. The film presents a future...
January 2010. He then played Senator Cantwell in a Broadway revival of GoreVidal's play The Best Man from July to September 2012, replacing Eric McCormack...
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