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Cannibals and Christians
Book by Mailer, Norman
416 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1966
About the author
Norman Mailer
355 books1,461 followersNorman 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 Award once. In 1955, Mailer, together with Ed Fancher and Dan Wolf, first published The Village Voice, which began as an arts- and politics-oriented weekly newspaper initially distributed in Greenwich Village. In 2005, he won the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters from The National Book Foundation.
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 Award once. In 1955, Mailer, together with Ed Fancher and Dan Wolf, first published The Village Voice, which began as an arts- and politics-oriented weekly newspaper initially distributed in Greenwich Village. In 2005, he won the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters from The National Book Foundation.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
April 29, 2015
I wish people would write like this more often. Where is the writer who says "I fucking know I'm right, what do you know?"
In a time of victim-idolizations, polemical writings from an American iconoclast are like cold clean water.
That is not to say the whole work is exceptional. Mailer strains and stretches metaphor and logic alike, but his conclusions are nevertheless fascinating and hard to swallow. Surely nothing social media wants to integrate into its narrative...
In a time of victim-idolizations, polemical writings from an American iconoclast are like cold clean water.
That is not to say the whole work is exceptional. Mailer strains and stretches metaphor and logic alike, but his conclusions are nevertheless fascinating and hard to swallow. Surely nothing social media wants to integrate into its narrative...
January 14, 2025
Why did I read this? It is dense and somewhat provocative and anyway, Norman Mailer was a dude in his time. Opinionated, terrible towards women, but highly intelligent and well read.
In Cannibals and Christians, he collected some of his writing from 1960 to 1966. Journalism about the Republican and Democratic conventions of 1964, on the war in Vietnam. Some book reviews. (He did not esteem Mary McCarthy’s The Group. Whatever. Why would he? He did not understand it.)
Was it worth reading? Yes, because he does capture the early to mid 1960s and I am attempting to do the same in my writing these days.
I also found the structure of the book intriguing. He arranged it so as to make an “argument” about America in those years. He did well with that. His poetry is atrocious. He should have left those poems out!
Apparently Goodreads could not be bothered to find a book cover.
In Cannibals and Christians, he collected some of his writing from 1960 to 1966. Journalism about the Republican and Democratic conventions of 1964, on the war in Vietnam. Some book reviews. (He did not esteem Mary McCarthy’s The Group. Whatever. Why would he? He did not understand it.)
Was it worth reading? Yes, because he does capture the early to mid 1960s and I am attempting to do the same in my writing these days.
I also found the structure of the book intriguing. He arranged it so as to make an “argument” about America in those years. He did well with that. His poetry is atrocious. He should have left those poems out!
Apparently Goodreads could not be bothered to find a book cover.
April 3, 2018
This is a collection of Mailer's wide ranging work from 1960 to 1966. He covers the Republican national convention in 1964, a convention I knew very little about. Dabbles in the censorship of sex within American novels. Covers the issues in 1964 thoroughly--the Civil Rights Act, sexual equality, the escalation in Vietnam and changing cultural values. Mailer also cover the Senate race with Bobby Kennedy versus Kenneth Keating. "A Review of JFK" contains some excellent material about the man. For someone that did not live through this era, the political insight and the descriptions of the functions of the American press are invaluable.
It's a little disappointing that he includes identical sections in "The Presidential Papers" and here. The author also goes off on wild tangents about the emotional impact contained within certain foods, scripts written in interview form that go off in wild directions, and the personal value of feces.
Strap yourself in. Mailer is insane and a genius, sometimes within the same paragraph. More than a few things made me cringe, but the value of the quality writing and perspective make it easy to stay with the novel.
Good quote: p.221 "One may not have written it well enough for others to know, but you're in love with the truth when you discover it at the point of a pencil."
It's a little disappointing that he includes identical sections in "The Presidential Papers" and here. The author also goes off on wild tangents about the emotional impact contained within certain foods, scripts written in interview form that go off in wild directions, and the personal value of feces.
Strap yourself in. Mailer is insane and a genius, sometimes within the same paragraph. More than a few things made me cringe, but the value of the quality writing and perspective make it easy to stay with the novel.
Good quote: p.221 "One may not have written it well enough for others to know, but you're in love with the truth when you discover it at the point of a pencil."
March 27, 2026
As my ongoing life's work of reading all Norman Mailer (I think there are only three left now) I have come to this one which I haven't read. It is another of his anthologies of various writings - this one from the mid 1960s. I did read another really good one of these of his recently, which actually seemed to be based around some kind of coherent themes - as much as Mailer tries to convince that this one has a strong theme I don't think it really does.
That isn't to say that there isn't some really good writing in here. I am sure it must be disappointing for him to say this as he doesn't rate the genre highly, but it is often the non-fiction and particularly the journalism that stands up best. This writing, particularly in the first half of this book, is shrewdly, witty and sometimes brutal in covering Republican Presidential conventions, the Vietnam War, his literary peers and writing in general. I have read him write about all those things before, but I don't think I have read most of these pieces and they are pretty good in my opinion.
As often is the case with Mailer though, as much as he can be brilliant, when he is bad he is so, so bad it is really cringeworthy, embarrassing and painful to read. His poems (which feature a lot here) are really odd little things and his views on sex and women just outdated and dumb. What is really beyond the pale here though are two really, really long philosophical dialogues where he is both the interviewer and the interviewee talking complete nonsense - at various points discussing the soul of vegetables and the existential nature of faeces - to no obviously useful purpose. If he had an editor for any of this writing it is hard to believe how much of this endless drivel they weeded out as so much of it is still in there. Weirdly, he does then venture off into a half-decent idea for a science fiction story but that is all too little, too late.
Obviously much of this is rather dated in being from the 1960s, and maybe you have to accept that sometimes writers who want to take risks with things have to fail sometimes to be great at other times, but it does feel like the bad Mailer stuff is so bad sometimes it is unforgiveable. Anyway, its almost impossible to score really, as some of the early stuff could be a five but some of the later pieces barely deserve one star, so I have gone down the middle with a three. I have definitely read worse Mailer books than this but it does have some real highs which other writings of his lack, as well as lower lows than some of those other works. I imagine it is really one for the aficionados like me, although it is in the 1960s when Mailer is really at his most relevant, but if you aren't then if you were to stop about half way through you would be doing yourself a favour.
That isn't to say that there isn't some really good writing in here. I am sure it must be disappointing for him to say this as he doesn't rate the genre highly, but it is often the non-fiction and particularly the journalism that stands up best. This writing, particularly in the first half of this book, is shrewdly, witty and sometimes brutal in covering Republican Presidential conventions, the Vietnam War, his literary peers and writing in general. I have read him write about all those things before, but I don't think I have read most of these pieces and they are pretty good in my opinion.
As often is the case with Mailer though, as much as he can be brilliant, when he is bad he is so, so bad it is really cringeworthy, embarrassing and painful to read. His poems (which feature a lot here) are really odd little things and his views on sex and women just outdated and dumb. What is really beyond the pale here though are two really, really long philosophical dialogues where he is both the interviewer and the interviewee talking complete nonsense - at various points discussing the soul of vegetables and the existential nature of faeces - to no obviously useful purpose. If he had an editor for any of this writing it is hard to believe how much of this endless drivel they weeded out as so much of it is still in there. Weirdly, he does then venture off into a half-decent idea for a science fiction story but that is all too little, too late.
Obviously much of this is rather dated in being from the 1960s, and maybe you have to accept that sometimes writers who want to take risks with things have to fail sometimes to be great at other times, but it does feel like the bad Mailer stuff is so bad sometimes it is unforgiveable. Anyway, its almost impossible to score really, as some of the early stuff could be a five but some of the later pieces barely deserve one star, so I have gone down the middle with a three. I have definitely read worse Mailer books than this but it does have some real highs which other writings of his lack, as well as lower lows than some of those other works. I imagine it is really one for the aficionados like me, although it is in the 1960s when Mailer is really at his most relevant, but if you aren't then if you were to stop about half way through you would be doing yourself a favour.
January 23, 2021
This is a hodgepodge of writings of different genres and topics, with only the most tenuous of overarching themes. It is clearly a book that would never have been published were its author not already famous. First, Mailer’s poetry is terrible. I’m not any sort of poet, but I feel confident with that assertion. His book reviews on the other hand are compelling; one gets caught up in his conviction that the novel is really an herculean undertaking, and one that is essential for the survival and self-understanding of the human species. His political journalism and commentary is interesting; some of his discussion of the Barry Goldwater movement resonates with our recent experiences surrounding the now-ex 45th president (whose name I will never again speak or write). His philosophical meanderings are rather tentative and flighty, but seem vaguely Deleuzian, with their preoccupation with the soul/spirit of things like amoebas, cells, organs, driftwood, food, feces, etc. Lastly, I suppose that this book is also interesting as a time capsule of the thought processes of the early-60’s white, male, American intelligentsia, with its heady mix of unreflective sexism, racism, and ethnocentrism. But I suppose that one wouldn’t be reading Norman Mailer if one were the sort of person to be put off by that sort of thing.
August 20, 2025
Lyndon Johnson and his America is the specter that hovers over this compilation of Norman Mailer's mid-sixties articles, interviews and speeches. The price of the ticket comes with Mailer's coverage of the 1964 Goldwater Republican convention in San Francisco's Cow Palace and LBJ's coronation as presidential nominee. Mailer spoke with Goldwater vice-presidential candidate William Miller (Remember him? The "Do you know me?" guy from American Express commercials) and figured if this was proof of Barry's political acumen his candidacy was doomed from birth. At the Democrat Norman rightly guessed LBJ would forever have to do battle with John F. Kennedy's ghost no matter how big his victory. A hilarious satire of Johnson's ghost-written campaign book follows: "The prose is as bad as anything from that catechism style of Joseph Stalin". Vietnam had not yet come to posses America, yet Mailer sees the nation already slowly coming apart due to plastic politicians, censorship laws and the dimming of intellectual light.
December 23, 2019
Having read this at a time that my only goal was to read Mailer only for his 'commentary' style. I found this book a laborious and long-winded treatise to nowhere. Maybe this IS the essence of 'Norman Mailer'... or just the booze talking.
Read
September 27, 2019Alright, the first piece on the Republican convention is very good, and the final story 'The Last Night' is pretty good even though it made me sink into depression because the scenario is incredibly grim. The poems are genuinely awful, and the long self interview about the nature of the spirit and the soul is one of the worst things I've ever read. This miscellany is nowhere near as interesting as 'Advertisments for Myself' and the format was clearly drawing diminishing returns by this point
October 12, 2016
This collection of Mailer's scribblings from 1960-64 is plagued by the self-indulgent second-half of the book. The man's often-nonsensical existential philosophizing tries the patience of the reader. The first-half, however, is chock-full of worthwhile treats; reportage on the '64 GOP convention, his views on the Vietnam War and the typically self-serving literary criticism.
November 26, 2009
A collection of poems and polemics on the political climate of the early sixties.
Full of great quotes such as-"Sentimentality is the emotional promiscuity of those who have no sentiment."
Full of great quotes such as-"Sentimentality is the emotional promiscuity of those who have no sentiment."
July 19, 2012
feces, amoeba and a President that blows up the earth. only Mailer...
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews