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The Executioner's Song

by Norman Mailer

4.04 · rating details · 4,344 ratings · 397 reviews

Winner of the 1980 Pulitzer Prize

In what is arguably his greatest book, America's most heroically ambitious writer follows the short, blighted career of Gary Gilmore, an intractably violent product of America's prisons who became notorious for two reasons: first, for robbing two men in 1976, then killing them in cold blood; and, second, after being tried and convicted, for...more

Paperback, 1056 pages

Published April 28th 1998 by Vintage

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Jul 11, 2010

Matt rated it

This book is something. Yup, it surely is.

The Executioner's Song is one of those oxymoronically-named "non-fiction novels." In a non-fiction novel - the classic of the genre being Truman Capote's In Cold Blood - a journalist takes his research as far as humanly possible, right up to the boundary of unknown human thought, and then fills those gaps with reasoned speculation. It's kind of shady. Well, it's really shady, especially since it's never clear what is hard-fact and ...more

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Mar 12, 2008

gaby rated it

Recommends it for: lovers of lovers, epics, convicts, murder, and the hollywood exploitation of it all

Shelves: crime, biography, nonfiction, new-journalism

I can't resist the deliciously apparent metaphor provided by the circumstance that it took me pretty much exactly from Christmas to Easter to read this epic, 1100 page book about the life and death of Gary Gilmore.

1100 pages! I've only read one longer book in my life, The Glass Bead Game, which was so good it took less than a week to read. Obviously, this book wasn't in the same league.

But it was much better than expected, since I'd otherwise been nursing a nascent hatre...moreI can't resist the deliciously apparent metaphor provided by the circumstance that it took me pretty much exactly from Christmas to Easter to read this epic, 1100 page book about the life and death of Gary Gilmore.

1100 pages! I've only read one longer book in my life, The Glass Bead Game, which was so good it took less than a week to read. Obviously, this book wasn't in the same league.

But it was much better than expected, since I'd otherwise been nursing a nascent hatred of Mailer initially spawned by my dissatisfaction with the wretched Armies of the Night. I figured I'd give him another shot though, I mean, people fucking worship Mailer. So, why not try the OTHER book he won a Pulitzer for?

And indeed, The Executioner's Song was well played and well deserving of that honor. The book is actually broken into two separate books - the first is, at its core, an intact and insulated lovestory set in rural Utah between a recently-sprung life-long convict and his new lady love. The first book never hints at a larger world -- it is a completely zoomed-in microcosm that never really roams farther than a couple of blocks of a single small town. There's a small cast, and the reader feels a sense of security in the smallness of the story, and the finite boundaries of its physical and emotional domains.

The second book is an instant and complete paradigm shift. It zooms out on the first paragraph from small-town Utah to the broader country and watches the firestorms that are set off when Gilmore refuses to appeal his death sentence after being tried for murders to which he admits. Extremely suddenly, the sense of nearly idyllic security provided by having just read 500 pages about 4 or 5 people in a single town is exploded by the introduction of all of the big-time journalists (Geraldo Rivera, Barbara Walters), politicians (the Supreme Court, the president), Hollywood producers (big names in the 70's, though lost on me today), and celebrities (when Johnny Cash calls, Gilmore says, "Is this the real Johnny Cash? Oh yeah? Well this is the real Gary Gilmore!") who swoop down into Provo, Utah, to capitalize on the sensationalism of capital punishment.

It was a nerdy delight to discover that much of the second book is really an exercise in the minutae of civil and criminal procedure in the federal courts, as Gilmore's lawyers wrangled with the ACLU and other civil rights groups for Gilmore's "right to die." Gilmore was the first person executed in the US after the Supreme Court issued and then rescinded a moratorium on the death penalty. As if the issue of capital punishment wasn't thorny enough in 1970's politics, Gilmore threw the wrench of WANTING to be executed, and of wanting the right NOT to appeal. From a legal standpoint, it was a mess of tangled and conflicting jurisprudence, and everyone from the local magistrate in Provo to the District Court to the Tenth Circuit to the Supreme Court weighed in - numerous times!

Through much of the first half, I figured this was Mailer's FUCK YOU to Capote for In Cold Blood. This was Mailer's response, and if you're going to take on In Cold Blood, it might as well be 1100 pages. But I was wrong. This book does a whole lot more - it encapsulates In Cold Blood, in a sense. It tells that story - a small town rocked by murders, and the boys who done it, and the execution. But Mailer tells the other story too, and it turns out to be just as compelling - the legal wrangling, the movie deals, the fancy New York lawyers who fly in with the contracts, the Hollywood bigwigs who move in for the kill (literally, into the TraveLodge by the prison).

In good conscience I can recommend this book without reservation. But, it IS 1100 pages........

And now, on to Fear & Loathing on the Campaign Trail. When will this "New Journalism" streak end?????(less)

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Jul 13, 2011

Mariel rated it

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Recommends it for: nothing like the sun

Recommended to Mariel by: invisible sun

Shelves: handofglory, thebighouse, babywecouldbefamous, rubber-ring, wishitlastedforever, thedaytoday

Gary Gilmore's died in photographs are black and white. They are all mugshots. Gray faced still if they were to be in color mug shots of crimes of who knows what. Living or dead. Gray smirks and flat lines and nothing reaching the eyes because they are always somewhere else. Some live to get to heaven and another hopes it won't be as bad the next go around... Crimes to be and crimes of the soul. The photograph captions might say, "We always knew he'd be up to no good." The inside capti...more

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Mar 04, 2010

Jack added it

I should start out by admitting that I'm wary of inordinately long books. I decided that this, my first Mailer, had a reputation such that I would give it a shot.
Then, a few days ago, a sensation akin to exasperation and/or fatigue set in which I don't think related to the quality of Mailer's prose. I was on page 802, and had a moment of terrifying clarity in which it became real for me that I still had another 250 pages to go. Thereafter, I started to find it difficult to maintain th...moreI should start out by admitting that I'm wary of inordinately long books. I decided that this, my first Mailer, had a reputation such that I would give it a shot.
Then, a few days ago, a sensation akin to exasperation and/or fatigue set in which I don't think related to the quality of Mailer's prose. I was on page 802, and had a moment of terrifying clarity in which it became real for me that I still had another 250 pages to go. Thereafter, I started to find it difficult to maintain the proper perspective on precisely how well written this book is.

But I maintain that this book would be hard to evaluate anyway. The quality of the research is amazing, and with Gary Gilmore especially Mailer creates a wonderful literary portrait. Gilmore comes across as a psychopath, but still a human. Even when repulsed by Gilmore's motivations and actions, the reader can understand them. And although I personally never felt a great surge of sympathy for Gilmore, this portrait makes the second half of the book, when the media and the legal system engage in a truly nauseating liason to exploit Gilmore's pending execution, all the more effective. And here too, I felt like I understood the people involved even as their actions made me physically wince.

I couldn't shake the feeling though, that as mailer so meticulously reconstructs the pertinent actions and backgrounds of virtually EVERYBODY important to his subject, the discussion of Gilmore's victims felt kind of tacked on. He discusses their lives and the trauma to their families, but, for example, Gary's cousins and uncle both get more attention. In fairness, this disparity could well just be because Gilmore's side cooperated with Mailer on the book.

Similarly, I was a little disappointed that Gilmore's girlfriend Nicole - to whom Mailer devotes about as much attention as Gilmore and paints as compelling a portrait - just kind of disappears at the end. She spent much of the book seeming like a co-star in Mailer's story, and a very intriguing one, given that she WASN'T a heartless killer, but was in love with one. But after Gilmore's death, she just kind of disappears, nothwistanding some extremely sad omens that she's just going to continue her self destructive patterns. Some other material could have have been clipped, and these kind of issues addressed, to create a conclusion more consistent to the text without adding length.

All in all though, the book is remarkable simply because I'm not sure I've read anything quite like it. It's certainly reminiscent of In Cold Blood, but seeks out a more comprehensive effort to document everything about the time period between Gilmore's parole for one crime and his execution only nine months later. The breadth of subjects interviewed and the scope of the narrative is astonishing.(less)

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Jun 29, 2007

Ira rated it

Mailer dug into the world of Gary Gilmore and it's a none to happy place. He must have had just a plethora of access to this guy. This is Mailer's attempt to do the Capote non-fiction as narrative and he pulls it off. As stark and alarming as In Cold Blood is, Mailer's gift for the English language, his attention to detail, the length of the novel (it's a long one) and the subject matter make Executioner's Song the "classic of the this genre."

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Sep 02, 2007

Dave rated it

Recommends it for: readers who like to read about bad things happening to mediocre people

Boy was this a read, up there with prairyerth on shoe size. i felt if i didn't finish this extended case history of one man's journey through the court, parole and prison systems of america then mailer was going to punch my ears. once gilmore does the double deed and ends up in the pokey the yarn stretches a bit thin (much like THE ONION FIELD) with court details that start to veer into true crime territory. What keeps it interesting from start to finish is the relationship between Gary Gilmore ...moreBoy was this a read, up there with prairyerth on shoe size. i felt if i didn't finish this extended case history of one man's journey through the court, parole and prison systems of america then mailer was going to punch my ears. once gilmore does the double deed and ends up in the pokey the yarn stretches a bit thin (much like THE ONION FIELD) with court details that start to veer into true crime territory. What keeps it interesting from start to finish is the relationship between Gary Gilmore and the quite young Nicole (if i remember he was fifteen years her senior). Their love is a classic low-rent wild west tale with the 1970s in Utah as a backdrop. Nicole stays home with the kids (that were not Gilmores) and Gilmore steals snow skis, gets drunk and bugs the hell out of a auto dealer for a new truck he'll never be able to afford. Course once he gets the truck he's gotta have a way to pay for it, and lucky for one typewriter, Mailer's got him the tomb of a lifetime. One classic American tale of the west, lust, jealousy, the death penalty, and of course, Norman Mailer.

I dug up a VHS copy of the film adaptation at Odd Obsession video here in Chicago, and it's actually a made-for-tv film starring a young and very ambitiously corny Tommy Lee Jones in the role of Gilmore and an even younger, and very foxy Rosanna Arquette in the role of Nicole. I'm a sucker for old made-for-tv films, and this has all the classic elements: hubris, glimpses of nudity in bedrooms in which the moon is blue, quick pan shots of blood after a gunshot, swelling violins, country western score, occasional clarinet that caters to the emotions of the stock characters, and the dreaded "to be continued" when the going gets tough. Considering how long the damn book is, the film never felt rushed nor condensed.

Also of interest to those having read the book is Matthew Barney's Cremaster series (part II I believe) in which Barney plays Gary Gilmore in a rather chilly gas station scene. I saw a still of this movie hanging at the contemporary art museum the other day and from Mailer's word to Barney's tribute, Gilmore's journey is a continued reminder of American's fascination with people losing it over love.

(less)

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Apr 12, 2011

Darlene rated it

Full disclosure: I am not now nor have I ever been a proponent of the death penalty. There are some very good reasons it should be abolished.. least of which is that there is no evidence it serves as a deterrent to anyone other than the person being executed (for obvious reasons). This is the story of killer Gary Gilmore. In the summer of 1976, he robbed two men and then shot them both execution style. He was tried, convicted and sentenced to death in the state of Utah. What made this case so c...more Full disclosure: I am not now nor have I ever been a proponent of the death penalty. There are some very good reasons it should be abolished.. least of which is that there is no evidence it serves as a deterrent to anyone other than the person being executed (for obvious reasons). This is the story of killer Gary Gilmore. In the summer of 1976, he robbed two men and then shot them both execution style. He was tried, convicted and sentenced to death in the state of Utah. What made this case so controversial is the fact that Gilmore decided he did not want to wait and go through the endless appeals process. He wanted to be executed right away. Like most true crime books, this story takes you through the entire trial process and you get a behind the scenes look at how the criminal justice system of the United States works.. which isn't always logical and doesn't always seem fair. There are not many redeeming qualities to gary Gilmore's life. He was a career criminal who had been in and out of prison his entire life. As a matter of fact, he committed these crimes while on parole. At the same time, Mailer shows you how absolutely illogical this whole process can be.. not to mention the hypocrisy that was present in this case. Although Gilmore said he wanted to be executed right away and it would seem that the state would want to save the tax payers significant money by granting his wish, that is not what was done. The ACLU took up the case and began to fight appeals FOR him. Attorneys were concerned that perhaps Gilmore had a death wish and perhaps that made him insane so they proceeded to try to stop it for that reason.

Mailer's book went on for over 1,000 pages and truthfully he could have summed in up in far fewer pages. Having read other books by Mailer, I think this is just his style. Gilmore's story is very compelling and it also demonstrated the very mixed feelings of the people who are charged with carrying out these state sponsored murders. It also demonstrated how political this process really is and how the killer is often exploited by his own attorneys and other people in his life who want to use his story for profit and fame. All in all, a very sad but interesting story. Gary Gilmore was executed by the state of Utah on January 17, 1977. (less)

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Apr 07, 2008

Lindsay rated it

Recommends it for: Jim

Ok so it's majorly long, but it's a true story and you get to know every tiny detail about what happened...and I can't believe how often I have heard other's refer to this story since then. If you've read Under the Banner of Heaven, you'd probably be interested in this one because there are some weird coincidences and even some of the same people are in the book.

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Feb 25, 2008

John rated it

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. One of my biggest failings as an otherwise liberal-leaning guy is that I'm not adamently anti death penalty. What can I say? Sure, the justice system is a bit screwey and unforgiving, and quasi-racist. But beyond the social factors, some criminals are simply vicious, hurtful, hateful bastards with violent tendancies no remorse, and IMHO, ain't nothing wrong with settling the score, cleaning the slate, tabula rasa or whatever.
So reading Norman Mailer's 1979 tome on the first state-sponsore...moreOne of my biggest failings as an otherwise liberal-leaning guy is that I'm not adamently anti death penalty. What can I say? Sure, the justice system is a bit screwey and unforgiving, and quasi-racist. But beyond the social factors, some criminals are simply vicious, hurtful, hateful bastards with violent tendancies no remorse, and IMHO, ain't nothing wrong with settling the score, cleaning the slate, tabula rasa or whatever.
So reading Norman Mailer's 1979 tome on the first state-sponsored execution carried out in the United States since the Supreme Court places a moratorium on the practice, in a book club with a bunch of NPR-listening, Slate-reading intellectuals who wouldn't even consider the possibility that capital punishment might, sometimes, in extreme instances, occaisonally be warranted - much less the idea that it should remain a fixture in our justice system - yeah, that can be pretty intense.
I'd like to hope that everybody in the group at least somewhat had their convictions challenged as much as I did.
Mailer cleverly divides the book into two halves: "Western Voices" focuses on the story of Gary Gilmore, a Colorado ex-con, his parole from prison, his alcoholism and petty theft leanings and sexual perversions, but also a side that was insanely intelligent, perceptive, sensitive and madly in love with Nicole Baker. (The Nancy to his Sid, if you will.) Mailer does not at all play down his central character's abusive, criminal, murderous failings. But the author gives as round of a picture as he possibly can (a taxing task, considering that Mailer did not pull from sources other than actual interviews for this novel, hellbent on making it "a true fiction" or whatever), in the end making us really sympathize and feel for this murderous guy, even if we don't really understand him and, nonetheless, want him to die.
Move onward to part two, "Eastern Voices," the point where the media from New York and Los Angeles and special interest causes like the NAACP and the ACLU rally to Gilmore's cause, insisting that he should not be put to death even though he accepts the guilty verdict and has no wishes to appeal. This segment of the book adds fuel to the fire of those who have leanings against mainstream broadcast media and activist cause opportunists, and I spent a lot of the section feeliing that the filmmakers and activists were all wrong, further that they were being offensively insistent in their wrongness, that Gilmore should just be allowed to accept his sentence if that's what he wanted. Mailer obviously wanted this reaction out of his readers, so he could then twist the knife in a totally different direction in an extremely detailed and graphic description of Gilmore's execution and autopsy, making even my moderate self murmur "Hmm, this is kind of barbaric."
This hasn't even scratched the surface of the depths this book gets to...which, really, are the depths that only a 1,056 page book can. But don't let the page count deter you, as it is an engrossing read, and highly impressive in that it will make you question your outlook, whatever side of the fence you fall on.(less)

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Aug 22, 2007

Cat rated it

Shelves: truecrime

Was I blown away by this book? No. But I read it to the end, and given that the version I read clocks in at over a thousand pages, it's a testament to the "readability" of this book.
I have never read anything by Mailer before, largely because I had an enduring vision of Mailer-the-pompous-celebrity, and that image turned me off. As a 27 year old I am too old to remember a time when Mailer was anything other then a "literary lion".

I decided to read "Exec...moreWas I blown away by this book? No. But I read it to the end, and given that the version I read clocks in at over a thousand pages, it's a testament to the "readability" of this book.
I have never read anything by Mailer before, largely because I had an enduring vision of Mailer-the-pompous-celebrity, and that image turned me off. As a 27 year old I am too old to remember a time when Mailer was anything other then a "literary lion".

I decided to read "Executioner's Song" because of it's prominent role in Matthew Barney's "Cremaster Cycle". In Cremaster II, Barney assumes the role of Gilmore and Mailer himself plays the role of Harry Houdini, who might be Gary's grandfather (the father of Gilmore's father, Frank Gilmore).

"Shot Through the Heart" by Mikal Gilmore (Gary's younger brother" was a book I read back in college, so before picking up Executioner's Song, I already had a thorough familarity with the outlines of the Gilmore story.

The plot is easy enough to summarize: Career criminal gets out of prison after thirteen year sentence, falls in love, breaks up with girlfriend, commits a pair of senseless murders and then refuses to appeal, becoming the first man executed in America in over a decade.

Over four hundred pages of the book deal with the story from the perspective of Lawrence Schiller, a Hollywood Impressario who decided to lock up the rights to Gilmore's story. As I waded through the hundred's of pages dealing with Schiller's struggles, I dealt with a variety of emotions. At first, I was angry, but by the end of the book, I realized that the detailed exploration of the exploitation of Gary Gilmore is really at the heart of this book.

Mailer really focuses the book on the effect that Gilmore's decision to force the hand of the state has on those around him. As a criminal defense attorney, I was tickled by the ACLU types who tried to halt the execution without the permission of Gilmore. Truly, that was a time when America as a culture had not routinized the taking of human life.

I found the most compelling writing to be contained in the first five hundred pages, as Gilmore is realized from prison and attempts to constuct a life. His description's of a man out of balance bring into question the efficacy of volition in the face of destiny. The more one reads Gilmore's own thoughts, the more it becomes clear that he was destined to spend his life in prison.

That he transcended prison and gained lasting immortality by making the choice to die at the hand of the state is something that any casual fan of American pop-culture should consider at length.

At times, Mailer draws direct parallels between Gilmore and celebrity culture, such as when Gilmore, the night before his execution, greets Johnny Cash with the question, "Is this the real Johnny Cash?" This is a resonance that is also at the heart of Barney's Cremaster Cycle. In the words of critic Nancy Spector, the story of Gary Gilmore represents, "The emancipatory potential of moving backward in order to escape one's destiny." (Spector, Only the Perverse Fantasy Can Still Save Us, in the Cremaster Cycle, p. 36) (less)

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Aug 27, 2007

Sara rated it

i think that this book got another big pump from matthew barney's cremaster cycle's and thank god. it's incredible. mailer tracks the life and execution of gary gilmore, a man who saw more time inside of a prison than outside-by a large margin-and eventually randomly murdered two mormon men in utah, where he lived for almost nine months after being released from prison and before he was incarcerated again. there's no doubt that this is gilmore's book. and no one else's.

there's no way...more

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Oct 05, 2011

Anastasia rated it

I've become interesting in Normal Mailer that last six months or so and this is the third book of his that I picked up. It's a hefty tome at 1050 pages. Sucked me in from page one. wonderful depiction of some interesting and gritty characters. Especially enjoyed the back drop of Provo, UT in the '70s. The book gives a wonderful sense of culture and history set against a rugged backdrop. Have to say that I hit the wall around page 700. Became very bored with all of the back and forth and de...more

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Aug 09, 2011

Ryan Milbrath rated it

Norman Mailer’s masterpiece, The Executioner’s Song, is a seminal work of New Journalism. Mailer, among others like, Tom Wolfe, Hunter S. Thompson, and Truman Capote, combines a research essay with a novel format. In other words, it’s a non-fiction novel – if there is such a thing. The topic for Mailer’s exploration is the infamous Gary Gilmore. Gilmore is the first man to be executed in the state of Utah since the United States reinstated the death penalty in 1975.

Mailer paints a comprehe...more

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Aug 06, 2011

Nikole rated it

I first discovered this book as a teenager , poking around my parents bookshelf. I hadn't expected to find much there, aside from the hundreds* of cook books, nursing books and other non fiction reference type books that I would find terribly dull as I had little interest in cooking or becoming a nurse.

Over my teen years I would return again and again to this book. I had the distinct feeling that my parents would disapprove of me reading it-due to the subject matter and language-so I s...more

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Dec 10, 2010

Jason Pettus rated it

(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted illegally.)

The CCLaP 100: In which I read for the first time a hundred so-called literary classics, then write reports on whether or not they deserve the label

Essay #52: The Executioner's Song (1980), by Norman Mailer

The story in a nutshell:
One of the last great hurrahs from the so-...more

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Oct 05, 2010

Rob Maynard rated it

This book was all the rage-caused a lot of rage-when I was a freshman in college. I passed on it at the time because I hadn't started reading Mailer and I didn't like the idea that it glorified a loser-murderer such as Gary Gilmore.

But this book is a masterwork of reportage and writing. At over a thousand pages it's a commitment, not a light read. But Mailer's writing and reporting partnership with Lawrence Schiller, which began with this book, yields an amazing time capsule of Amer...more

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Jan 05, 2010

Stafford Davis rated it

This book is massive. As it has 1,056 pages, it is both massive in an encyclopedic and weight sense. I suspect some would bog down, not finish it, and more usefully make a door stop or booster chair out of it. It’s also massive in more important historical ways. The Executioner’s Song is the true story of Gary Gilmore, who spent most of his life in prison and was finally executed in 1977. The book starts with Gilmore’s parole and his attempt to reconnect with his guarded family in Utah. The read...moreThis book is massive. As it has 1,056 pages, it is both massive in an encyclopedic and weight sense. I suspect some would bog down, not finish it, and more usefully make a door stop or booster chair out of it. It’s also massive in more important historical ways. The Executioner’s Song is the true story of Gary Gilmore, who spent most of his life in prison and was finally executed in 1977. The book starts with Gilmore’s parole and his attempt to reconnect with his guarded family in Utah. The reader follows as he tries to reestablish himself in a society that makes no sense to him. He is hopeless in so many ways that one would feel sorry for him if he wasn’t such an asshole. Norman Mailer portrays Gilmore as a man that makes short sighted and shabby efforts to live a normal life but is offset and eventually betrayed by his inability to understand denial. Despite being intelligent and articulate, he lacks qualities that seem to be innate to most, in that he has no understanding of his relationship to others and the consequences his behavior produces. He is selfish and egocentric to the core producing an evil aspect that Mailer expertly portrays.

A passage about Gary Gilmore and his tormented girlfriend, Nicole Baker.
With her eyes closed, she had the odd feeling of an evil presence near her that came from Gary. She found it kind of half agreeable. Said to herself, Well, if he is the devil, maybe I want to get closer. It wasn’t a terrifying sensation so much as a strong and strange feeling, like Gary was a magnet and had brought down a lot of spirits on himself.
Midway though the book, Gilmore murders two innocent people, is arrested and sent back to prison. Eventually convicted of the crimes, Gilmore gets caught up in moral and philosophical battles from opposing sides of the legal spectrum. He becomes a media sensation as he fights for his right to die, because at the time of the murders there was no death penalty in the U.S. Gilmore fights judges, governors, Mormons, publishing agents, journalists, and lawyers in a postmodern media circus for his chance to become the first man killed in America’s newly reinstated death penalty. He serves as the ‘executioner.'

An interview between Gilmore and a journalist.
Interviewer: Your I.Q.’s supposedly about 130, and yet you’ve spent almost 19 of the past 22 years behind bars. Why were you never able to get away with anything?
Gilmore: I got away with a couple of things. I ain’t a great thief. I’m impulsive. Don’t plan, don’t think. You don’t have to be a superintelligent to get away with shit, you just have to think. But I don’t. I’m impatient. Not greedy enough. I could have gotten away with lots of things that I got caught for. I don’t, ah, really understand it. Maybe I quit caring a long time ago.
What’s amazing to me is that a novel came out of all this. One that won its author the Pulitzer Prize for the second time. Mailer is one of the originators of, ‘The New Journalism' which is a way to tell a factual story in a fictive structure. Mailer assembled this book over the course of two years by sifting through interviews, court transcripts, newspapers, and interviewing almost all of the people involved himself. The story is a solid read in that it gives the reader a true sense and honest portrait of the characters involved as well as the period. Mailer has an invisible style that never intrudes into the narrative with his opinion, but rather populates the multifaceted landscape of an American tale with this unique document. (less)

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Dec 07, 2009

Dave James rated it

Norman Mailer is a journalist, controversialist and novelist, in that order. He made his name in the 40s with the for that time too sexually explicit The Naked and the Dead. Armies of the Night was an account of the marches on the White House protesting Vietnam, featuring naturally as central character Norman Mailer. The Executioner's Song is brilliant journalism and a riveting novel combined. I would say it rivals Capote's In Cold Blood in its depiction of the so-called 'criminal mind.' It g...more

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Dec 01, 2009

Kara rated it

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I read this book when I was 14 and it had an out sized impact on me. An unrelenting, exhaustive and harrowing account of 9 months (from when he is released on parole to the day of his execution), of Gary Gilmore's life. The book is based almost exclusively on accounts from Gary Gilmore's family and friends and is written in an unperformative, transparent style that is exceedingly, exhaustively detailed but remarkably never boring or tedious.

In inscrutable detail, Mailer follow...more
I read this book when I was 14 and it had an out sized impact on me. An unrelenting, exhaustive and harrowing account of 9 months (from when he is released on parole to the day of his execution), of Gary Gilmore's life. The book is based almost exclusively on accounts from Gary Gilmore's family and friends and is written in an unperformative, transparent style that is exceedingly, exhaustively detailed but remarkably never boring or tedious.

In inscrutable detail, Mailer follows Gilmore's pitiful life. An intractably violent product of America's prisons (he spent 20 of his 35 years in prison), Gilmore robbed and killed two innocent men by shooting them point blank in the backs of their heads, and then insisted on dying for his crimes. The book follows his fight with the judicial system that was intent on keeping him alive after sentencing him to death. By refusing to appeal his sentence, Gilmore sent the justice system into chaos.

At 14 I was not above the erotic allure of the condemned murderer or above being conned, and Gilmore had a highly evolved con man style. He was not a raving lunatic wielding an axe or a ski masked rapist. He was complicated, charming yet violent, insecure but also self aggrandizing, uneducated yet poetic. His story is set against a grim, melancholy backdrop - Provo, Utah. But even a landscape as bleak as this manages to evoke an impossibly quixotic trailerparkesque allure. Without explanation or editorializing, but through Gilmore's own words, interactions, relationships (particularly with Nicole, his teenaged welfare-mother girlfriend with her own headful of romantic ideas - of "meeting beyond the grave" -and their increasingly desperate and romantic love letters), the snowballing media circus, the fumbled lover's suicide pacts....a seductive picture of a killer and a killer's life/world is painted.

The culmination of all this takes place in 1979 in the Utah State Pen "death house" - an abandoned cannery behind the prison, where after eating hard boiled eggs and coffee, he is strapped to a chair with a wall of sandbags behind him and shot to death by a firing squad. So much for romance. (less)

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May 16, 2009

Bren rated it

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In writing The Executioner's Song, Norman Mailer saw through Gary Gilmore's eyes.

Mailer, in his in-depth fictionalization of the notorious Utah criminal, presents the acerbic retaliatory hatred displayed by Gary Gilmore, just as much as he could recreate the intense modalities of passion and love scrawled from behind barred walls. Not just Gilmore, either - Mailer managed to transpose his mindset from the convicted murderer to that of his young girlfriend Nicole, his uncle Vern, his...moreIn writing The Executioner's Song, Norman Mailer saw through Gary Gilmore's eyes.

Mailer, in his in-depth fictionalization of the notorious Utah criminal, presents the acerbic retaliatory hatred displayed by Gary Gilmore, just as much as he could recreate the intense modalities of passion and love scrawled from behind barred walls. Not just Gilmore, either - Mailer managed to transpose his mindset from the convicted murderer to that of his young girlfriend Nicole, his uncle Vern, his team of lawyers, and even such tertiary characters as Nicole's addled emotionally-tortured sister April.

Mailer also grants some life back to the two men murdered by Gilmore. Max Jensen, a Sinclair filling station employee, and Bennie Bushnell, a manager of a little motel near Gilmore's uncle Vern's home, are given tender (yet entirely human) treatment by the author. They live prior to the murders, and once killed, haunt the remainder of the story. "Do you fear what a reincarnated Benny Bushnell may do to you?" he is asked by one interviewer. "What's going to happen when you meet Bushnell and Jensen on the other side?" is asked a little later. Gary Gilmore does not have a ready answer for either.

In fact, Gary Gilmore cannot even explain why he killed the two men. The baffling aspect is just as much a mystery to him as it is to those around him. He was, by his own admission, aloof during these murders, as if each action were the logical progression of the ones preceding it. He killed simply because it felt as if it should be done that way. Neither man had put up a fight during the initial robberies: "[Bushnell:] was calm, even brave," says Gilmore. And "I was struck by [Jensen's:] friendly, smiling, kind face."

So, how does a writer - who has never met the real-life murderer - go about completing an epic novel based upon his understanding of the man? How does he even manage, somewhat, to paint a sympathetic character from a man who defies common sensitivities? By delving past the media blitz, and by looking to those who never saw the "monster," but the human entity that he was. Mailer spent the bulk of 1978 interviewing, researching, and compiling a vast series of documents pertaining to the life - and ultimate demise - of Gilmore. Not a pleasant task, considering how relatively recent his killing spree and execution had taken place, and only those who were close to Gilmore had survived, each scarred in their own ways. Uncle Vern, for example, suffered with a decomposed knee and his long-time wife had a sudden stroke, placing him in dire straits and effectively dismantling his own shoe repair business. His cousin Brenda, who had been hospitalized for gynecological surgery during the last days of his incarceration and execution, never completely recovered from the physical ailment nor the sense of loss. Young April - sister of Gilmore's girlfriend (who herself was institutionalized throughout the majority of the ordeal) - continued to have nightmares about the evening she and Gary went riding, and Gary came back to his truck immediately after having killed Jensen.

It all came back to them as they briefed Norman Mailer, who had intended (in his own way) to portray Gilmore not just as a man - but as entertainment (in the form of a novel).

The Executioner's Song is actually two books, both directly related. Book One, entitled "Western Voices," deals primarily with Gilmore and his interpersonal relations. The crimes and aftermath come toward the end. Book Two, "Eastern Voices," revolves mostly around the so-called "media circus" surrounding Gilmore's refusal to appeal his execution sentencing. Book rights, film rights, interview payouts, exclusivity contracts... it is truly possible for a reader to become lost in the overflow of information being shoved at them, and yet just as enthralled by the processes of a modern-day presentation of justice... or justice denied, variant upon one's politics.

Mailer does not take this opportunity to preach. He does not use it merely as "light entertainment," either. Mailer recants the life and death of an American man and his family, unflinching and unblinking in the face of heartbreak. The story is a contemporary Crime & Punishment, with the psychological torments being spread to each and every player within the story.

Including the reporters and lawyers.

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Apr 18, 2009

Don rated it

The first part of this book, detailing Gary Gilmore's life from his release from prison through his killing of tw men, his trial and sentencing, is fascinating. The rest of the book is less so, although not uninteresting. Unfortunately, the second part of the book is well over 600 pages long.

The second part of the book, which focuses on Gilmore's stay on Death Row, the legal battle by others to stop his execution and, most significantly, the story of Larry Schiller's acquisition of...moreThe first part of this book, detailing Gary Gilmore's life from his release from prison through his killing of tw men, his trial and sentencing, is fascinating. The rest of the book is less so, although not uninteresting. Unfortunately, the second part of the book is well over 600 pages long.

The second part of the book, which focuses on Gilmore's stay on Death Row, the legal battle by others to stop his execution and, most significantly, the story of Larry Schiller's acquisition of the rights to Gilmore's story and how Schiller went about developing the material, just isn't sufficiently compelling to take up so much time and space. The legal battle doesn't provide much insight into the actual constitutional issues or arguments; it focuses more on the individual attorneys and their maneuverings. The Schiller part of the story is only of mild interest. Not surprisingly, Schiller is portrayed very sympathetically, despite the fact that his role fits to a T the cliche of the Hollywood producer entering into a real-life human drama to sign the principals up. (The book was written by Mailer apparently under contract to Schiller. It is based on the material, including interviews, collected by Schiller. The copyright in the book is jointly owned.)

Ultimately, Gilmore remains something of a puzzle-an intelligent, sometimes charming man/boy who has spent most of his adult life in prison, he is released into a world much friendlier and supportive than most prisoners ever experience. His relatives provide a home for him, help him get a job, his boss is sympathetic and bends over backwards to help Gilmore adjust. Nevertheless, he senselessly begins to steal and in relatively short order senselessly kills two men in different incidents. Schiller's interviewers are never able to engage Gilmore in a meaningful dialogue to try to explain any of this.

Perhaps because they are hampered by the limitations of the interview and other material, Mailer/Schiller never really come to grips, or really event attempt to do so, with the central mystery here--why did Gary Gilmore kill? And ultimately, despite the superficial charm of Gilmore, that's the only question that is really interesting.(less)

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Aug 18, 2011

mary rated it

This is Mailer's finest hour. This book tops my all-time-favorite list and I am reminded of that each time I read it. Here, Mailer investigates the life of Gary Gilmore, who drifted in and out of the prison system before being paroled. In the short time he was free, Gilmore murdered two people, a gas station clerk and a front desk person at a hotel. Gilmore was sentenced to death, and demanded his death sentence be upheld despite shifting attitudes in the US Supreme Court towards Capital Punishm...more

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Feb 16, 2009

Pats rated it

This book is more than a simple story of a man getting executed after a ten year moratorium on the practice. While this is certainly contained within the book--and to a degree, pulls on the heart strings--this novel is fascinating in its observation of battle for presenting the spectacle by various media people(journalists, screenwriters, etc.) Hence why the darn thing is soooo long. While it's not an especially interesting read from an aesthetic standpoint--Mailer writes like a journalist plai...more

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Jun 28, 2007

Jac rated it

I just finished reading this a minute ago and I have goosebumps. This book is monumental. Norman Mailer wrote it in 15 months and with the level of research and detail, I just don't think it's possible, but I know it's true. It took me a month to read, but if you want an absolutely gripping book that will last you a few weeks, this is the one. You'll feel torn as to what's right and wrong and that ever diminishing space between. I'm gushing.

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Sep 01, 2011

Brian Gatz rated it

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Cast a pall over me for three days. I'd give it five stars, but it's tough to live with (the book, the rating). Probably as bone-close to an American fable as I've read: love, murder, celebrity, government, the courts, and the media mixed into an incredible tale of who we are. There's much in common with 'Gatsby' in that crime manages to pay, and there's a girl that gets away. Gatsby's obsession with Daisy is not unlike Gary's with Nicole. Their crimes are of different scale and nature (murder v...more

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Aug 10, 2011

Tim added it

A remarkably thorough book. Mailer examines not only the life of Gillmore, and his murders, trial and execution as one would expect, but also delves into the lives of the marginal characters in the book, his girlfriend, cellmate, priest at the jail, jailers, the warden, his aunt uncle and cousin, his brother, his lawyers, the prosecuting attorneys... to name just a few. And that is just the first half, the second half deals extensively with the media coverage, and the attempts most notably of La...more

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Oct 09, 2010

Judy rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: historical-fiction

Not sure I'll finish this one. As one would expect, there's already some pretty heavy swearing and it looks like there might be some sex as well. Have to see where it goes.

Update: Well, I finished it. It was one of the most depressing books I've ever read. Based on nine months out of the life of Gary Gilmore, who killed two men in UT in 1976. It was like watching a train wreck, what with the lives the main characters lived. I felt it was a fair picture of what happened. No real slant ...more

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Apr 17, 2009

Jacki rated it

This was a massive, sprawling book.

What I liked most about the book was how it made me think so much, even when I wasn't reading it. About the characters, capital punishment, relationships, the whole nine yards.

Noman Mailer must have spent countless, countless hours researching and gathering information on this book- the detail was unreal. I felt like I really knew these characters and could sympathize with them.

The only part I didn't love were the parts tha...more

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Oct 07, 2011

Joe Goulart rated it

On the whole, I loved it. Mailer's prose is vivid, active, and easy to read. He convincingly portrays every character in the book, and does a better job casting an empathic (if not entirely sympathetic) light on the mind of a killer than any other work that springs to mind. Some of the passages dealing with the emotional pain suffered by the protagonist are almost too painful to read, and Mailer's handling of the relationship between Gary and Nicole deserves mention among the most intimate and i...more

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Aug 16, 2010

Daniel Silveyra rated it

· review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I did not know anything about this book when I approached it. I did not know, for example, that it is a non-fictional account of the execution of Gary Gilmore. The words on the cover, "A True Life Novel", I dismissed as literary pretension.

Know that this is a long book: around a thousand pages. Know also that it is, according to Mailer, the condensed result of around 15,000 pages of transcripts, depositions, letters and other documents from the actual case. Know that the bo...more

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About Norman Mailer

Norman Kingsley Mailer was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, poet, playwright, screenwriter, and film director.

Along with Truman Capote, Joan Didion, and Tom Wolfe, Mailer is considered an innovator of creative nonfiction, a genre sometimes called New Journalism, but which covers the essay to the nonfiction novel. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize twice and the National Book ...more

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“Historical, religious, and existential treatises suggest that for some persons at some times, it is rational not to avoid physical death at all costs. Indeed the spark of humanity can maximize its essence by choosing an alternative that preserves the greatest dignity and some tranquility of mind.” — 3 people liked it

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