I’m not a huge Mailer fan by any means, but I did find The Executioner’s Song to be a particularly excellent work. I’m pretty sure Mailer was more restrained in his treatment of Gilmore than Kimball here offers up. He toys with the idea that there might have have been something more to Gilmore: maybe something a little heroic, maybe something a little tragic. To suggest he was “Heroic at best, malignant at worst” is pretty low-key for Mailer, and just doesn’t seem to fit the mosaic of bombast and megalomania painted by Kimball.

I tend to be disgusted by the vermin who crawl out of the woodwork to gnaw on a fresh corpse like this, but I’m not here to defend Mailer as a person. I know little about him. For those who haven’t read it, or any of his work, and are so quick to judge, however, I’d encourage you to give him one shot as a writer and read Executioner’s Song. Draw your own conclusions.