Oswald's Tale: An American Mystery

by Norman Mailer

In perhaps his most important literary feat, Norman Mailer fashions an unprecedented portrait of one of the great villains—and enigmas—in United States history. Here is Lee Harvey Oswald—his family background, troubled marriage, controversial journey to Russia, and return to an “America [waiting] for him like an angry relative whose eyes glare in the heat.” Based on KGB and FBI transcripts, government reports, letters and diaries, and Mailer’s own international research, this is an epic account of a man whose cunning, duplicity, and self-invention were both at home in and at odds with the country he forever altered.

Praise for Oswald’s Tale

“America’s largest mystery has found its greatest interpreter.”—The Washington Post Book World

“Mailer is fierce, courageous, and reckless and nearly everything he writes has sections of headlong brilliance. . . . From the American master conjurer of dark and swirling purpose, a moving reflection.”—Robert Stone, The New York Review of Books

“A narrative of tremendous energy and panache; the author at the top of his form.”—Christopher Hitchens, Financial Times

“The performance of an author relishing the force and reach of his own acuity.”—Martin Amis, The Sunday Times (London)

Praise for Norman Mailer

“[Norman Mailer] loomed over American letters longer and larger than any other writer of his generation.”—The New York Times

“A writer of the greatest and most reckless talent.”—The New Yorker

“Mailer is indispensable, an American treasure.”—The Washington Post

“A devastatingly alive and original creative mind.”—Life

“Mailer is fierce, courageous, and reckless and nearly everything he writes has sections of headlong brilliance.”—The New York Review of Books

“The largest mind and imagination [in modern] American literature . . . Unlike just about every American writer since Henry James, Mailer has managed to grow and become richer in wisdom with each new book.”—Chicago Tribune

“Mailer is a master of his craft. His language carries you through the story like a leaf on a stream.”—The Cincinnati Post

Genres: History, Biography, Nonfiction, True Crime, Crime, Politics, American History

864 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

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 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.

Reviews

[Matt · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Did Oswald do it? If one’s answer is to come out of anything larger than an opinion, it is necessary to contend with questions of evidence. In that direction, however, one encounters a jungle of conflicting expert estimates as to whether Oswald could fire the shots in time, was a good enough marksman, was the only gunman in Dealey Plaza, and on one can go, trying to explore every last reach of possibility, only to encounter a disheartening truth: Evidence, by itself, will never provide the answer to a mystery. For it is in the nature of evidence to produce, sooner or later, a counterinterpretation to itself in the form of a contending expert in a court of law. It will be obvious to the reader that one does not (and should not) respect evidence with the religious intensity that others bring to it…”
- Norman Mailer, Oswald’s Tale: An American Mystery


There’s an old saying: the shortest distance between two points is a line; the longest distance between two points is Norman Mailer.

Okay, I made that saying up. But I stand by the truth. Norman Mailer does not do things the easy way. He does them the Norman Mailer way.

Case in point, when you open up the cover to Oswald’s Tale, Mailer’s nearly 800-page deep-dive into the tangled lives of Lee Harvey Oswald, you are greeted by these lines: “When Valya was three years old, she fell on a hot stove and burned her face…”

Who is Valya? Well, eventually, after about seventeen pages – spent learning about her upbringing, her loves, her life – we discover that she is the aunt of Marina Nikolayevna Prusakova, the woman we now recognize as Marina Oswald. It is pretty extensive background for a minor character in the casting call of Oswald’s life. Not long afterwards, Valya pretty much disappears from the story, and is seldom heard from again.

That is Oswald’s Tale in a nutshell.

It is not a book that takes a lot of diversions and digressions; rather, the meandering diversions and digressions are central to the book’s structure. It is actually how Oswald’s Tale is constructed.

***

Now, I should make clear that this is an an absolute marvel.

I mean that.

Oswald's Tale is a frustrating, exasperating, compelling, mesmerizing reading experience. It defies easy description. So, what kind of book is it? It’s hard to explain, so I’ll let Mailer explain it himself, even though Capote already beat him to this particular punch:

Let me propose, then, that a mystery of the immense dimensions of Oswald’s case will, in the writing, create a form of its own somewhere between fiction and non-fiction. Technically, this book fits into the latter category – it is most certainly not fiction. The author did his best to make up no dialogue himself and attribute no private motives to his real characters unless he was careful to label all such as speculation. Still, it is a peculiar form of non-fiction, since not only interviews, documents, newspaper accounts, intelligence files, recorded dialogues, and letters are employed, but speculations as well. The author’s musings become some of the operative instruments…The result can be seen, therefore, as a special species of non-fiction that can be put under the rubric of mystery. That is because all means of inquiry have to be available when one is steering one’s way through a cloud…

There is a lot of unpack in that description, a lot of pomposity to wade through. The most interesting thing about that passage, though, is that Mailer delivers it roughly 350 pages into his narrative. That’s what I mean about structure. It’s as though Mailer wrote his entire book and then threw it in the air, allowing the currents of the wind to do his editing.

***

As noted, Mailer starts in Russia, with his long introduction to Valya, finally pivoting to the arrival of the young American Lee Harvey Oswald, a former Marine intent on giving up his American citizenship. The research here is enormous. Mailer and his investigators appear to have talked to everyone who ever came across Oswald’s path. Instead of simply relating what they had to say – which is what a normal author would do in a normal book – Mailer provides thumbnail sketches of each one of these participants. They all get the Valya treatment, so that long before you know the simplest thing about Oswald – such as his date of birth – you have learned about dozens of Soviet citizens.

The portrait of Oswald that emerges from this technique is vague and pointillist. Indeed, it stresses one’s patience, and the only thing that kept me going was the fascinating picture of Soviet life that it formed.

***

In due course, Mailer starts to tighten his narrative grip. He hones in on Marina and Lee’s troubled marriage, making extensive use of Soviet wiretaps to give us a long glimpse at the sheer domestic drudgery of their marital existence. If nothing else, Mailer proves, without having to underline the point, that Oswald did not work for Soviet intelligence (because they had enough intelligence to steer clear of the man, whose only real ability was his absolute inability to understand his limitations).

At the midpoint, Mailer does his transition thing (partly excerpted above) where he talks about how his creation is sui generis and meditates upon the search for truth. (As an aside: this quest for verity includes Mailer quoting from his CIA novel Harlot’s Ghost. I have nothing but respect for an author with the temerity to quote from his own awful fiction in a book purporting to define reality). It is only after this point that we circle back entirely to learn about Lee Oswald’s early life.

***

It is in these pages that we meet Oswald’s mother, Marguerite, an incredible character who manages to stand out, even in a crowded field of colorful, egotistical, slightly-off-balance self-myth-makers. She is a good example of one of the major strengths of Oswald's Tale: Mailer's fine eye for people. He has a real sensitivity for the complexities of humanity (which he took too far in glorifying the two-bit killer Gary Gilmore in The Executioner's Song), and he clearly enjoys this haughty, conceited woman who went to her grave fiercely believing that the world owed her much more than she ever received.

As he warned, Mailer uses a great deal of speculation, though he does a good job of making you aware of that. This is especially true during Oswald’s Marine Corps time, when he continually accuses Oswald of being a spy, while following every accusation with an admission that there is no evidence. Along with guesswork, Mailer utilizes wiretap transcriptions, book excerpts (especially Priscilla MacMillan’s Marina and Lee), and testimony from the Warren Commission (which he criticizes constantly while quoting from liberally).

***

This is not a book directed at conspiracy buffs. Mailer does not run down every single theory. Indeed, I don’t even recall him mentioning the grassy knoll. He follows Oswald, after all, and Oswald was in the Texas School Book Depository (what he was doing there is an ongoing debate). Discussions about possible conspiracies involving others are beyond the ken of Oswald’s Tale. The only time Mailer gets into the weeds of doubt, to hint that it took more than Oswald to kill John Kennedy, is during the chapter on Jack Ruby. Unfortunately, any attempts to link Ruby to Oswald, and Oswald to a broader conspiracy, fail at the same stress point: What conspiracy would use a bum such as Oswald as an assassin, and then use a bigger bum like Ruby to tie off loose ends?

This is – I must add – a rhetorical question. I don’t actually want to debate this on the internet.

***

Ultimately, Mailer grudgingly accepts a couple things. First, that Oswald was the killer. Second, that he killed alone. He has to come to this conclusion. After all, at the end of all his interviews, his digging, all his sniffing the ground like a bloodhound, that’s where the evidence – even if Mailer does not necessarily trust evidence – leads.

The did-he or didn't-he debate, however, is not really the point of Oswald’s Tale. This may be a mystery, but solving the mystery does not rate high on Mailer’s list of priorities. Or maybe he’s after a different mystery altogether. Because the thing that interests Mailer, that animates him on this epic sleuthing expedition, is to understand this man, this Oswald, with his scrawny body and smug face, his modest abilities but enormous ambitions, his confused political philosophy and inscrutable aims.

The match between author and subject, between Mailer and Oswald, is uncannily perfect. Both have towering senses of self worth, both aimed extremely high, both – unfortunately, in the case of Oswald – hit their mark.

Oswald’s Tale is a remarkable work, a demi-classic where Mailer’s artistic achievement nearly attains the same height as his literary ego, which is saying something.

[Jayakrishnan · Rating 4 out of 5]

"With anger such as ours, murder—most terrifying to say—could prove the cure for all the rest." - Norman Mailer

We live in times when men are encouraged to get therapy so that they would not aspire to the toxic side of their masculinity. I've seen guys on social media who said Salinger would never have written Catcher in the Rye if he had only taken an appointment with a therapist.

Norman Mailer had a fascination for men who could not contain themselves. Men who surrendered to what was inside them. That thing that was eating away at them. If you're a man, you know what I am talking about. Devilish thoughts torment us from the time we wake up every morning. Some asshole slighted you in the lift the previous day. Some prick (a better man) at work cut in on the woman you like. Men from another tribe ganged up and insulted you. You cannot get any of this out of your head. It is eating away at you. You suspect if you don't do something about it, there is no point in going on.

Mailer wrote a 1,100 page tome about Gary Gilmore, a murderous criminal who lived on pure instinct. He wrote another big novel about Hitler. Oswald's Tale - well, Mailer called it a mystery and it is. But it is actually Mailer the pompous boring genius sadist ogling at the life of an ordinary man who could not contain himself. An ordinary man who killed a better man, an American president no less, with a gun.

Oswald's Tale is not an entertaining book. It is not Raging Bull. I silently laugh when people say that Scorsese film is about the perils of toxic masculinity. It is the most stylish temple for it. But Mailer shows us the dreariness of it all. It's really fucking boring. Oswald must have died a thousand deaths as a poor kid, his time in the marine corps, defection to Russia and return to USA to do what he finally did. There are no slow motions. No great dialog. Just a small nasty man who was an asshole to his Russian wife (there is something exceptionally tragic about a couple in trouble - like Oswald and Marina in this book and Gary and Nicole in The Executioner's Song). A mediocrity who could not impress other men. That man is there inside us all.

Oswald's Tale is a warning. Mailer, the great artist is blowing the fog horn for men who are approaching a rocky coastline. Yes, Mailer is fascinated by Oswald. He is not unlike the sadistic public who wants to know every detail about Oswald. But he is also an uncompromising artist. It is not an entertaining thriller. It is a grave, eagerly researched and ultimately depressing book. There is nothing else like it because there is only one Norman Mailer.

[Lorna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oswald’s Tale: An American Mystery by Normal Mailer has been on my radar since it was published in 1995, in fact it was on my book shelf until the time we downsized our life and thus our library, in not making the cut. But intrigued with all of the controversy that has been the undercurrent for years, I checked this copy out from my local library. Having been in high school on that tragic day, November 22, 1963, it has never been far from my memory. But I must say, that after all of these years, that when I read the part taking place in Dallas it was with great devastation and sadness, emotions still strong reliving that fateful day in Dallas overlooking Dealy Plaza as the shots rang out from the sixth floor of the Texas Book Depository.

It is a stroke of genius in the way that Norma Mailer has chosen to format this book beginning with the first volume devoted to Oswald in Minsk with Marina while Volume II of the book is the story of Oswald in America. The author states that it may well take the entirety of the book to decide whether such method of approach, to essentially search for the nature of the man before deciding on the plot can help one determine in finding out how John Kennedy was shot and why. Because as Mailer states, “Until then, we will keep asking who was behind it and which conspiracy was operative.”

“It is virtually not assimilable to our reason that a small lonely man felled a giant in the midst of his limousines, his legions, his throng, and his security. If such a non-entity destroyed the leader of the most powerful nation on earth, then a world of disproportion engulfs us, and we live in a universe that is absurd. So the question reduces us itself to some degree: If we should decide that Oswald killed Kennedy by himself, let us try to comprehend whether he was an assassin with a vision or a killer without one. We must not only look at Oswald from many points of view—first Russian and soon American—but even try to perceive him through bureaucratic lenses. All too often, that is all we have. Let us recognize, however, that it makes some difference to our commonwealth, each and every time, whether an act of murder is visionless and mindless or is a cry of wrath that rises from a skewed heart maddened by its own vision of injustice.”

“We have come at least to the philosophical crux of our inquiry: It would state that the sudden death of a man as large in his possibilities as John Fitzgerald Kennedy is more tolerable if we can perceive his killer as tragic rather than absurd.”

Norman Mailer brilliantly plots this book with all facets explored, including all of the conspiracy theories that were rampant and still raging, soon to be more-so with President Trump ordering the release of thousands of documents that have been previously held under seal. After living through all of the trauma over the years and reading this book, I am of the mind that Normal Mailer is correct in his assessment that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. It was interesting that Mailer said that when he began writing this book he vowed to keep an open mind, although he admitted to be more aligned with the conspiracy theorists. However, in his research and plotting it all out in this magnificent book, he came to the conclusion that Oswald acted alone.

“Given the yeast-like propensities of conspiracy to expand and expand as one looks to buttress each explanation, it can hardly be difficult for the reader to understand why it is more agreeable to keep one’s developing concept of Oswald as a protagonist, a man to whom, grudgingly, we must give a bit of stature when we take into account the modesty of his origins. That, to repeat, can provide us with a sense of the tragic rather than of the absurd. If a figure as large as Kennedy is cheated abruptly of his life, we feel better, if his killer is also not without size. Then, to some degree, we can also mourn the loss of possibility in the man who did the deed. Tragedy is vastly preferable to absurdity. Such is the vested interest that adheres to perceiving Oswald as a tragic and infuriating hero (or, if you will, anti-hero) rather than as a snarling little wife abuser or a patsy.”

[Chrissie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book grabbed me right from the start. Where does it start? Russia and Belorussia, more precisely Leningrad and Minsk. We learn first about Lee Harvey Oswald’s wife’s aunt with whom Oswald’s future wife comes to live. Then it zooms in on Marina, she who will become his wife. He marries her on April 30, 1961, during his two and a half year’s stay in the U.S.S.R. I mention this because the book does not state until much later who these people are and how they come to be related to Oswald. I think this is helpful to know. All the time we are learning about him and about her. This part reads as narrative non-fiction but is solidly based on fact.

The book’s central topic is of course Lee Harvey Oswald. Yet it also gives an excellent depiction of life in the Soviet Union during the 50s and the early 60s. It is worthwhile to read just for this! This part is thoroughly engaging. It is chockfull of details and people. "Here is what is known, so now what shall we make of it?" kind of writing. Writing that pushes you to think and draw your own conclusions.

Once into volume two, Mailer begins to insert his views. The setting has shifted from the U.S.S.R. to America. We shift our gaze from Oswald’s wife, her family and their friends to Oswald’s own mother and brothers and earlier acquaintances. We look at his experiences in the Marine Corps, trained in the US and later stationed in Japan. Then we shift to the period between June 1962, when Oswald departed from Minsk with wife and daughter, through to November 1963 and the assassination of Kennedy. Lee Harvey Oswald’s subsequent assassination by Jack Ruby, two days later, follows.

Much has been written on Oswald, Kennedy and Ruby. The book presents a thorough review of what is known and what has been speculated. KGB and FBI transcripts, recorded dialogues from Oswald’s bugged apartment, excerpts from Oswald's letters, from the Warren Commission and the House Select Committee on Assassination are sited. Sections from Priscilla Johnson McMillan’s Marina and Lee, Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Assassination of JFK by Gerald Posner ad other books are directly quoted. A multitude of known facts are presented. Strengths and weaknesses of viable speculations are presented, weighed and discussed. Conspiracy theories, Haitian and Cuban international affairs and mob involvement are covered in quite great depth. I did not understand everything, but I learned a lot.

That Oswald was the assassin seems pretty clear to me. You do not get definitive answers on whether Oswald worked alone or in conjunction with others nor why he targeted Kennedy. I don’t think you can expect more than what has been delivered.

Christopher Lane does a fantastic job with the narration of the audiobook; his narration I have given a full five stars. Perfect speed, perfect everything. He captures each person’s voice wonderfully, but at the same time he doesn’t insert himself into the tale. His performance is excellent because you do not even notice he is there.


********************

Oswald's Tale: An American Mystery 4 stars
Marilyn 3 stars
The Naked and the Dead TBR

[Mike · Rating 5 out of 5]

First a bit of on-the-ground reporting from someone who has admittedly never touched a loaded firearm. There I was in August 2016, on a warm, clear day that would later turn to Biblical rain- as tends to happen in the south in summer. From the spot where Zapruder had stood, I watched a guy wait for the light to turn, then jog out to one of the Xs so his friend could take a picture; cars were already turning left from N Houston, and slowed down as the tourist sprinted back to the sidewalk. "You're gonna be the second person who died here", his friend called.

Someone has written, on the fence above the grassy knoll, "Bill Hicks was right about everything", and on the sixth floor of the former book depository, now museum, the glassed-in window is still as Hicks described: "They have it set up to look exactly like it did on that day; and it's really accurate, you know, because...Oswald's not in it. I'm talking painstaking detail..."

It’s true that you can’t get to the window, but you can look out the adjacent one and try to gauge the distance for yourself (for whatever that’s worth). As I did, I remembered a detail that had impressed me in Oliver Stone’s JFK; that if Oswald had been the shooter, it would have made a lot more sense for him to shoot Kennedy when the motorcade was on N Houston, a straight shot. 

The idea impressed me just a little less while standing at the window, only because I was able to see that the distance the motorcade would have traveled on N Houston is extremely short. As I watched the street, there couldn't have been more than five seconds between the time any slow-moving car turned right on N Houston from Main Street and then left on Elm. It's hard to imagine that even someone ready and waiting would have had time to take aim and fire. Also, as Mailer writes,

It is a direct head-on shot with the target growing steadily in size…on the other hand, trained professionals are staring at the Book Depository windows from the lead car in the motorcade, and police on motorcycles are scouring the building with their eyes. A sniper’s instinct would probably pull him back into relative darkness…

But Mailer begins about four years earlier, with Oswald's arrival in the USSR in October 1959 which has the effect of encouraging readers to temporarily forget what we know, or think we know, about Oswald, and to see him as the Soviets must have: inexplicable. And then we remember that he is inexplicable, that the ambiguities of his life have never really been resolved. In the early 90s, after the end of the Soviet Union, Mailer traveled to both Moscow and Minsk to read declassified KGB documents and to interview people who had known Oswald, 30 years earlier. There are some interesting anecdotes here; a former co-worker of Oswald’s, for example, remembers that they’d once gone rabbit hunting together; when a rabbit jumped out unexpectedly from a bush, Oswald became startled and shot into the air, missing the rabbit by a wide margin. Bill Hicks might have found that interesting. But then again, as Mailer puts it later, "Why should we ascribe any more consistency to a man with a gun...than we would expect from a professional basketball player whose accuracy often varies dramatically from night to night?" 

When Oswald arrived in the USSR, the KGB of course immediately suspected that he was an American agent. Just imagine- here was a former Marine radar operator who claimed to be a Marxist, although he demonstrated "only a superficial knowledge of Marxist-Leninist Theory." Upon being told that he would have to go back to the US, Oswald slashed one of his wrists in a suicide attempt that the doctors who treated him later expressed skepticism about (he only slashed one wrist, and the wound wasn’t deep enough to be fatal); but his subsequent hospitalization, coupled with the possibility that he was genuine, led to his being allowed to stay...under heavy surveillance, naturally. KGB agents were pretty bewildered, however; what kind of CIA man was this, after all? Did the Americans deliberately send over someone neurotic and unstable, to see how we would react? 

There are plenty of memorable "characters" here. I particularly enjoyed reading about the circumscribed lives of the KGB agents assigned to spend their days listening to Oswald and Marina's conversations, trying to figure out if Oswald knew more about Marxism than he was letting on, or if perhaps he understood Russian better than he seemed to. Later, there are two consular officers at the Soviet embassy in Mexico City who could have starred in a Cold War sitcom. They grow 'Mexican-style moustaches' and drink in the local cantina; when Oswald shows up in distress with a loaded gun, they're forced to miss their team's championship volleyball game against the local GRU officers. But Oswald's life also, had it ended differently, could have made a good Cold War sitcom, especially when he goes back to the US and the Americans, as is only natural, suspect that he’s been turned by the KGB; but why would they try to utilize such a clearly unstable person? What kind of KGB man was this, after all?

What kind of man was this? "Oswald owned all the properties that belong to a ghost", Mailer writes.

...ambition, deceit, a sense of mission, and the untold frustration of an abrupt death just as a long-held dream of personal prominence is about to unfold.

His mother could have driven just about anyone to murder, or at least to eastern Europe, but in many ways he's pathetic. He's a narcissist, a burden to every person and agency he comes in contact with (the officers' volleyball team even lost to the GRU), and he physically abuses his wife, Marina. His political and ideological convictions seem to change on a dime, but it's always got to be something; an absolute conviction, a crusade. As Eric Hoffer wrote of his archetypal "true believer", "he is a homeless hitchhiker on the highways of the universe, thumbing a ride on any eternal cause that drives by. He cannot be convinced, only converted." He also seems to fit FBI profiler John Douglas's "assassin personality": the misfit whose alienation precedes any ideological conviction, who assigns himself a mission out of desperation. The most sympathetic person in the book has to be Marina, who left her family, friends and country to be with him. Who could ever have imagined the infamy? "What is left of what was once her beauty", Mailer writes,

are her extraordinary eyes, blue as diamonds, and they blaze with light as if, in divine compensation for the dead weight of all that will not cease to haunt her, she has been granted a spark from the hour of an apocalypse others have not seen.

And 30 years after her husband slept through his alarm (he almost always woke up before, and turned it off so as not to disturb her) and without telling her left his wedding ring in a cup on the dresser, she can't let it go. She wants to know Mailer’s opinion. Did Lee do it? 

Oswald’s being an assassin personality and generally unstable is not mutually exclusive with the idea that someone, or more than one person, tried to push him in the ‘right’ direction. It's even possible that his erratic personality would have made him an appealing candidate. "Of all government bureaucracies", Mailer writes,

the CIA probably bears the greatest resemblance to an organism: that is, its analogical stomach, mind, lungs and limbs, while capable of communicating with each other, often need to do so no more than minimally- large parts of the CIA function almost entirely out of communication with other large parts. To assume that the CIA as a whole was interested in Oswald is to alienate oneself from understanding more likely possibilities. It is safer to assume that word-of-mouth concerning Oswald…made him a figure of interest to particular enclaves of the Agency who, by December of 1962, were no longer welcome in the Director’s office.

Mailer goes on to note that the Mafia and the CIA had together made an agreement to assassinate Castro, “perhaps the most important and secret aspect” of what was called Operation Mongoose; Kennedy’s decision to cut back on Mongoose, a byproduct of his agreement with Khrushchev following the Cuban Missile Crisis, “…opened a schism in the CIA. Small groups of officers, feeling betrayed by the President’s new policy, began to function in concealed enclaves.” Unlike the monolithic conspiracy posited by the Oliver Stone film, Mailer suggests that it could have been a conspiracy hatched by a few members of one of these enclaves, or even people who successfully convinced Oswald that he would be working in some official or semi-official capacity.

But towards the end of the book, Mailer quotes from Oswald's notes:

I wonder what would happen if someone would stand up and say he was utterly opposed not only to the governments, but to the people, to the entire land and complete foundation of his society.

"All the motivation for shooting Kennedy", Mailer writes, "is in that sentence." He said later in an interview that he thought Oswald “probably” did it (a different question from whether he did it alone). Why? "It was the logic of his life."

This might not amount to much in a courtroom, but I think I know what Mailer meant. It seems to be true, on one hand, that Oswald expressed a degree of approval towards Kennedy, at times. It's also now fairly well-established that earlier in the year 1963, Oswald attempted to shoot retired General Edwin Walker- member of the John Birch Society, staunch anti-Communist, and extremely rightwing- who would seem to have been some distance away from Kennedy on the ideological spectrum. But it may not have mattered. Mailer tries to imagine Oswald's rationale:

Kennedy had the ability to give hope to the American ethos…Kennedy was not, as American Presidents went, a bad President; therefore, he was too good. The world was in crisis and the social need was to create conditions for recognizing that there had to be a new kind of society…

But even this contorted logic may have been justification for something that fell even shorter of great ideological or historical vision. "It is doubtful that Oswald wanted to debate such a question with himself", Mailer continues.

He may well have possessed an instinct that told him he had to do something enormous and do it quickly, do it for his own physical well-being. The murderer kills in order to cure himself- which is why murder is properly repudiated. It is the most selfish of acts.

[Louise · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this epic work, Norman Mailer shows the complexity that is Lee Harvey Oswald and leaves the reader to determine: Did he have the soul of a Killer?

Mailer begins with Oswald’s trip to Russia and works backward through Oswald’s early family life, then forward with through his return to the US with his Russian wife. I took this book on a long flight (next trip I’m digital), so If I hadn’t been a captive audience, I wouldn’t have finished it. The early part is almost straight reporting, covering in more detail Oswald's Russian life, previously covered in Marina and Lee. The book gets a lot better and held my attention as it progressed.

The text is comprised of excerpts from the reports of the Warren Commission and the House Select Committee on Assassination, transcripts from the FBI and Russian intelligence services (some are conversations from Oswald’s bugged apartment), interviews by Mailer and Larry Schiller, the work of Priscella McMillan, Norman Posner, and Edward Epstein and a few other sources. Each is introduced with a pithy narrative using the “royal we” that sets the stage or interprets what is to come.

While Mailer does not give an opinion on whether Oswald did the deed, he does have an opinion on its aftermath: for the intelligence establishment, a trial would be explosive since Mafia-CIA-FBI links would be revealed. Mailer notes, throughout, that while the 26 volume Warren Commission Report (which relied on FBI and CIA staff) leaves too many loose ends, it does provide a wealth of information on people and life in the US at this time. There is important but spotty documentation of dates and activities but, as Mailer notes more time was spent investigating everyone on the public bus Oswald took to Mexico than Oswald’s pro and anti Castro associates in New Orleans.

There is material I had not seen elsewhere. For instance there are interviews of Oswald’s acquaintances in Minsk that Mailer and his associates had in the 1990’s showing how just knowing Oswald affected their lives and careers. There is insight into the dilemma Oswald’s presence in Russia and his later “fame" posed for the KGB. Oswald’s stint in the Marines shows possible early on intelligence involvement in Japan. While Mailer says too much is made of Oswald's dubious sexuality Mailer shows possible roots of it in the Marines.

The intent of the book is to assess the character of Oswald but you also get interpretive portraits of his mother Marguerite, his “friend” George de Mohrenschildt, Marina’s uncle and aunt in Minsk, her friend Ruth Paine and of Jack Ruby. The description of talk show host William Kirk Stuckey’s treatment of Oswald is one of the many short personality profiles that deliver wider perspective.

The book badly needs an index. On p. 703 Allan Dulles seems to be questioning Oswald while in custody in Dallas. I flipped back but could find no context. Maybe this was an editorial glitch and the questions were from the Warren Commission a year later. (Dulles later appears at a small dinner party given by Jackie Kennedy’s mother and stepfather along with George de Mohrenschildt. What it means for a daughter when her mother invites a known friend of her daughter’s husband'salleged assassin is not explored). Dulles’s interest in keeping a lid on things would be apparent, particularly to anyone who read The Brothers: John Foster Dulles, Allen Dulles & Their Secret World War.

I am not sure where this fits in the mountains of material on this topic. It hardly makes a notice in material on Mailer and his body of work. It is the Mailer voice with his Mailer take, and while 20 years old, the prose is not dated. This book unites many primary sources with insightful commentary. After the first 200 pages, it kept me occupied on a long flight.

[Siv30 · Rating 4 out of 5]

ספר עיוני על חיו של לי אוסוולד, מי שנחשב לרוצח של הנשיא ג. פ .קנדי. הוא מבוסס על תחקיר, עדויות אנשים, תיעוד מסמכים משירותי הביון הסובייטים והאמריקאים ותיעוד הפרוטוקולים מוועדת וורן, שחקרה את הרצח של ג. פ. קנדי.

החלק הראשון של הספר עוסק בעריקתו של לי אוסוולד לבריה"מ. תיאור הלך הרוחות שלו מרגע הגעתו לבריה"מ, וויתור על האזרחות האמריקאית, קבלת האזרחות הסובייטית וחייו שם. מהתיאור עולה כי הוא היה נחוש לקבל אזרחות אף על פי שנדחה כבר לאחר 5 ימים. כאקט של נסיון לשכנע את השלטונות, היא ביצע ניסיון התאבדות, שמהתיאור בספר עולה כי לא היה ניסיון רציני אלא ניסיון להכריח את השלטונות להתחשב בבקשתו, להביך אותם ובכך לדחוף אותם להעניק לו את מבוקשו.

בתחילת החלק הראשון, עם עריקתו של אוסוולד לבריה"מ הוא מנתק את קשריו עם משפחתו (אמו ואחיו) בארה"ב, אקט שיכול להיות מובן כנסיון לשכנע את השלטונות הסובייטים ברצינות כוונותיו. יחד עם זאת השלטונות לא הגבילו אותו ולא דרשו ממנו לנתק את קשריו עם משפחתו ולראיה כשרצה לשוב לארה"ב, הוא הפעיל את אחיו ואימו - מרגריט - ככח מניע ללחוץ על הרשויות האמריקאיות לקדם את עניינו ועניינה של אישתו מרינה. ואכן, אימו שבמשך חודשים ארוכים לא שמעה ממנו, התגייסה למאמץ למען בנה.

מחלק זה, לא ברור מדוע לאחר כל מאמציו החליט אוסוולד לשוב לארה"ב ובאיזה קונסטלציה עלתה ההזדמנות לחזור לארה"ב. מהתיעוד ברור שמאמצע 1961 הוא ניסה לקבל אשרות חזרה לארה"ב לו ולמרינה אישתו, לצאת מברה"מ ולשוב לארה"ב. תהליך זה נמשך כשנה, אז כבר נולדה בתם ג'ון.

החלק הראשון מבוסס על ראיונות עם אנשים שהכירו את לי אוסוולד ואת מרינה ועל תיעוד ומסמכים של שירותי הביון הסובייטים. מאחר ועם חזרתו של אוסוולד לארה"ב ובמיוחד לאחר הרצח של ג. פ . קנדי, קיבלו מכריהם הנחיות מהמשטר הסובייטי שלא לדבר על אוסוולד ותקופתו בבריה"מ, הזכרונות הללו נותרו נקיים ולא נוגעו מפרסומי עובדות שונים.

החלק הראשון מאיר זרקור חד על חייה המוקדמים של מרינה ועל המוטיבציה שלה להינשא ללי אוסוולד רק חודש וחצי לאחר שהכירה אותו. חייה שסבלו ממהמורות בעיקר לאחר מות אימה מתוארים דרך עדויות שונות: אביה הזניח אותה ולמעשה מנע ממנה מזון, בגדים ואף מקום לינה כשאיחרה לחזור בלילה. היא נאלצה להסתדר והתרועעה עם גברים בתמרה לסיפוק צרכיה הבסיסיים. היא הפסיקה את לימודי הרוקחות וחידשה אותם לאחר המעבר מלנינגרד למינסק לשם היא עוברת כדי להתרחק כנראה מאירועים שונים בחייה בלנינרד.

בועדת וורן מאינה מתארת את חייה בלנינגרד באופן שונה, אך העדויות שנצברות על חייה מטרידות ומפריכות את התיאורים שלה.

במינסק היא יוצאת עם גברים שונים שנראים לה ממעמד גבוה ומבוסס במטרה להינשא ולצאת ממעגל חייה. אחרי תקופה של כישלונות, היא פוגשת את לי אוסוולד שגם הוא סובל מדחיה של האישה אותה אהב אלה. הם נישאים באירוע מצומצם ובכלל מהתיאורים לא ברור אם היא אהבה אותו.

מזכרונותיהם של מכרים וגם מתמלילים של שירותי הביון שעקבו אחר לי אוסוולד לאורך כל שהותו בבריה"מ, עולה תמונה קשה של חיכוכים רבים בין בני הזוג. חיכוכים אלה לא החריפו לכדי אלימות פיזית אולם הזרע לאלימות נטמן ובארה"ב הוא יפרוץ לאלימות פיזית מלאה כלפי מרינה. מהתיאורים נרה שהיא לא סיפקה את הסחורה כאישתו של אוסוולד: הבית לא היה נקי, לא היה אוכ על השולחן, הבגדים לא היו נקיים, היא ישנה מאוחר בצהרים בזמן שהוא יצא לעבודה. תיאור מאוד לא מחמיא שלה כאישה.

לי אוסוולד לעומתה מתואר כגבר נעים הליכות, שקט, עדין נפש, אוהב ונאמן למרינה. בכלל יחסיו עם נשים מעלים שאלות בדבר נטייתו המינית. בעיניי אין ספק שאוסוולד אהב את מרינה בתקופת שהותם בבריה"מ: התעקשותו לצאת מבריה"מ יחד איתה, דבר שגרם לעיכובים רבם וקשים בחיי הזוגיות שלהם, הסבלנות העדינה שלו כלפיה כפי שעולים מהתמלילים השונים של שירותי הביון הסובייטים לדעתי מעידים על תחושותיו. היא לעומתו מתוארת כקפריזית, תובענית, עצלה וכפויית טובה שאינה בכלל מבינה את ההתמודדויות של בעלה. מצב זה יחריף בארה"ב שם הוא יאבד לגמרי את הסבלנות שלו כלפיה ואף ינהג בה באלימות פיזית בוטה.

יחד עם זאת הוא גם מתואר כעצל גדול בעבודה אבל כנראה זה גם נבע מהתיסכול שלו והאכזבה מהקומוניזם.

למרות החלק הראשון מעניין, הוא לוקה בתיאור יתר של דמויות שונות שהיו במגע עם מרינה ועם לי בתקופת שהותם בבריה"מ. מרוב דמויות איבדתי רגלים וידיים. החלק הזה גם לא מספק הסבר מניח את הדעת מדוע מלכתחילה ערק לי אוסוולד לבריה"מ (נקודה שגם לא תובהר בחלק השני אף על פי שהסופר ינסה לתת הסבר לצעד זה על סמך הראיות שבידיו). כמו כן, לא ברור האם הוכשר להיות מרגל מטעם הסובייטים ולא ברורים קשריו לשירותי הביון האמריקאים שיעלו בחטף בוועדת וורן.

עוד סוגיה שלא ניתן לה פתרון לאורך החלק הראשון היא שאלת נטייתו המינית של אוסוולד, שאלה שתעסיק את הסופר ואת וועדת וורן גם בחלק השני של הספר.

החלק השני של הספר עוסק בחזרתו של לי אוסוולד לאה"ב ונסיבות שהובילו לרצח קנדי. אין בחלק הזה אמירה חד משמעית שאוסוולד רצח את קנדי והסופר מאפשר לקורא באמצעות הראיונות והראיות שנאספו, כמו גם באמצעות שאלות שהוא מעלה, לגבש לעצמו את המסקנות.

החלק השני הוא פורטרט פסיכולוגי של נפש מעורפלת, מדוכדכת, כועסת ומתעתעת. מחד גבר רגיש ועדין נפש שנשים נמשכו אליו, ומאידך חם מזג וקצר רוח, שחבט באישתו ההרה גם לפני חברים ומכרים. דמות לא יציבה שהוכיחה את חוסר יציבותה בכל תחומי החיים: החל מיחסיו עם חבריו, עובר דרך יחסיו עם מרינה, עם אימו, במקומות העבודה שלו ואפילו מהבחינה האידיאולוגית עת ניסה להגר לקובה, לחבור לקסטרו ובמהלך זה ניסה גם לקבל אשרת כניסה חזרה לרוסיה.

זהו ניסיון של המחבר לתת לקורא זווית ראיה רחבה במיוחד ולעורר אותו לשאול ולהטיל ספק, האם אוסוולד באמת ביצע את הרצח? האם היתה לו הזדמנות לבצע את הרצח? ומה המוטיבציות שיכלו לעמוד בבסיס הפעולה אם אכן ביצע אותה. לטענתו, וועדת וורן היה חד מימדית ונעולה על הכתרתו של אוסוולד כרוצח יחיד : " Warren Commission’s work resembles a dead whale decomposing on a beach." האם אוסוולד היה בעצם חלק מקונספירציה לרצוח את קנדי?

אחת מהבעיות של הספר היא שלאחר 800 עמודים הקורא מצפה לתשובה, או רמז לתשובה ומילר לא מספק תשובות לכל אלה. זו אחת הביקורות על הספר, מילר מספק רק אוסף עובדות שונות שרובן ידועות וממוחזרות והן משובצות בפאזל בצורה שונה. את העובדות הוא אסף מספרים שונים שפורסמו וקטעים שונים מפרוטוקולים של וועדת וורן. החלק השני מתקדם באיטיות מייסרת אל היום הגורלי , תוך שהוא מתאר גם את הלך הרוח של אוסוולד, הלך רוח שאין לו שום תימוכין במציאות.

הספר "אגדת אוסוולד" אינו קצר והוא למעשה כולל 2 ספרים מובחנים הן בסגנון שלהם והן בתוכן שלהם. לקורא הישראלי זהו מסמך מרתק לקריאה.

[Erik Graff · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Kennedy assassination was first rumored during afternoon recess from Lincoln Junior High School. It being Park Ridge, Illinois, a number of seventh graders took it as good news. No one doubted the rumor. I was asked by another kid who'd become president now and had to think for a moment before coming up with Lyndon B. Johnson.

After recess we were taken from class to the downstairs auditorium where we were addressed, solemnly, by Clifford Sweat, our principal. The teachers all appeared serious, very serious--probably worried about our sensitivities, about how this important news ought be conveyed to a bunch of thirteen and fourteen year olds. The snide remarks of the children of conservatives ceased. We were sent home.

The next several days my family, like many others, was glued to the television, hearing rumors coalesce into "facts"; watching Johnson sworn in on Airforce One with the bloodied widow beside him; seeing the putative assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, himself assassinated by a former Chicago hood, Jack Ruby, while in Dallas police custody; witnessing the world-historical funeral procession in Washington, the burial in Arlington. The weeks that followed saw the print media cover the same material with detailed chronologies in Time, glossy color photographs in Life. The months that followed saw the hurried publication of the Warren Commission Report and the first of the books to question it, Mark Lane's Rush to Judgment.

It was probably a year or two later that I actually heard Lane himself interviewed on the radio and began my occasional forays into studying the assassination, studies which have included the reading of scores of books, of which Mailer's is the latest.

I do not subscribe to Mailer's conclusion that Oswald likely was the sole gunman, but then determining the facts of the assassination itself is not his primary concern. He and his colleagues appear to be intellectually honest and note many of the contradictions and loose threads which were left by the official accounts of the FBI and the Commission. They also attack, more than once, Posner's recent apologetic for the government's story. No, their concern is more for the character of Oswald and on this account they make a valuable contribution, primarily by going to the effort to interview many of his associates (and the KGB operatives who kept tabs on him) from his two-plus years in the Soviet Union, many of whom have never been interviewed before. What emerges is a believable, often sympathetic, portrait of a person both ordinary in the lower middle class trajectory of his life and extraordinary in terms of the means by which he tried, sometimes successfully, to transcend his background and conditioning.

I've read a bunch of Mailer over the years, liking his non-fiction more than his fiction. The most recent books of his read have been Ancient Evenings, an ambitious failure, and his The Gospel According to the Son, another, rather poor, rather uninspired, attempt to represent the person of Jesus. This biography is worth reading both for the value of its reportage and the high quality of its prose.

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

The problem with reviewing a book by Norman Mailer is that it is a little like reviewing The Bible in that most people have heard about it, many people have strong opinions that they have shared and, of course, everyone has heard of the author…

But, screw it, here’s my two cents worth.

Mailer has written a superb novel split into two parts; the first deals with Oswald’s time in Russia and is based on notes made available by the former KGB. The second deals with the “American” Oswald, exploring his childhood, time in the military and the events leading up to the assassination.
Part of my admiration for Mailer is the effortless way in which he can adopt completely different writing styles for each of his works. In “Oswald’s Tale”, he takes it a step further by writing the first part of the book with a hint of a Russian accent – not the slaughtered tone of a James Bond Villian, mind you, just enough that the reader is constantly aware of the location. The second part is completely different in that Mailer becomes the story-teller and refers to primary sources such as the findings of the Warren Commission. While this doesn’t have the magic of the first part, it provides an almost scholarly, yet accessible, overview of Oswald.

I suppose that there are sources where more information can be found on the Kennedy Assassination, likewise there are books that have tried to “explain” Oswald. But this book seems to accept that Oswald cannot be explained with the paucity of information, so readers wanting something definitive will be disappointed.

But for me, the book was magical – a narrative magnificently written by one of the most talented writers of the 20th Century, exploring what is possibly the greatest mystery in American history.

And that combination makes “Oswald’s Tale” a must-read.

[Katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

After reading Stephen King's 22/11/63 I thought it was time I finally delved into the Kennedy assassination and through internet searches decided on Oswald's Tale as a good starting (and in my case ending) point. I'd read The Executioner's Song when it first came out, but hadn't read anything else by Mailer so I didn't know what to expect.

The book is amazing in its depth, detail, the research and new light thrown on Oswald, especially his time in what was then the USSR. Mailer and his colleagues extensively interviewed former KGB agents and other Russians who knew Oswald while he was living there, and with the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the time gone by were much readier to talk than might have been the case earlier. This means there is a wealth of knowledge about how Oswald lived and worked there, his relationships with friends and women, whether or not he really was a Russian spy, and why he decided to return to the States (basically he just didn't like living in communist Russia, and as I lived there as a child for a short while I can completely understand why).

The book starts off with Oswald's sojourn in the USSR, which threw me a bit as I knew absolutely nothing about him and was expecting the usual biography of he was born then, there, went to school here, studied there, etc and so on. But it works, and I found myself totally engrossed in his story.

Mailer deals with all the conspiracy theories and in the end concludes that Oswald acted alone. Admittedly this is the only accredited account I've read of Oswald's life and death, but Mailier's arguments convinced me. I especially loved his reasoning that the CIA at the time was so distrustful of itself and had so many factions working independently of each other that it was quite possible one faction thought another faction played a part in Kennedy's assassination and vice versa. The same is probably true of the Mafia.

A great read.

[Nick Sweet · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading Oswald's Tale was one of those fantastic reading experiences I'll never forget. Mailer made his name initially with The Naked and the Dead, which didn't really do much for me. I thought The Deer Park was pretty mediocre and hated Barbary Shore, An American Dream, and Ancient Evenings and think Tough Guys Don't Dance is one of the worst books I've ever read from cover to cover (I only finished reading it to find out if it continued to be as bad as I thought it was going to be...), so none of the other books I'd previously read by Mailer prepared for a book that, for me, has to be one of the best reads to have hit the shelves in the past few decades.

Mailer follows Lee Harvey Oswald as he goes to live in Moscow and has love affairs...and then we find him becoming disillusioned with the Soviet experience and fleeing to America, with his wife, only to find that he is unable to fill the fridge... I still have the image of Oswald holding a teddy bear in his arms as he tells some official he means to defect... Of course the book is not really a novel, since the story is given to Mailer, in the sense that it's history...and therefore you can't really compare his achievement to Tolstoy's in War and Peace, given that Tolstoy assigned a minor role to Napoleon and other historical figures, and gave the main roles to the characters he'd invented--something which, in my opinion, is much harder to do... That said, though, Oswald's Tale is one of the most intense reading experiences I've ever had. After reading it, I got hold of the book that many consider Mailer's best--The Executioner's Song--and read it, and it is also a great book...but for me Oswald's Tale is his best. I've written this quickly and what I'm saying doesn't come close to giving the book justice. You need to read it!

[Terry Bonner · Rating 4 out of 5]

Over the last forty years I have read far too many books on the Kennedy assassination to be considered healthy. It is quite easy to be persuaded by presentations of specious evidence and half-baked conspiracy theories. This book, albeit not one of Mailer's best efforts, was the last book I ever ever read on the subject. The portrait of Oswald which Mailer's paints in broad strokes as he embarks on his own personal pilgrimage through the files of the House Select Committee and the KGB archives is simply irrefutable. Whatever he was in fact, in spite of his uncanny and precocious associations, Lee Oswald was beyond a reasonable doubt and to a moral certainty the man who pulled the trigger which ended Camelot. And he was a sad little man, a wannabe and a naif. I shared Mailer's combination of revulsion and empathy for this truly pitiable young man who desperately wanted to matter in a world which took little notice. To be frank, the smug and lawyerly books of Gerald Posner, which thoroughly and definitely document the case against Oswald, only managed to piss me off. It took Mailer's literary sensitivity to drive the final nail in Oswald's coffin. In the end, Oswald's guilt becomes self-evident in the simple act of leaving his wedding ring lying on the dresser beside his wages on that warm November morning in Dallas forty-nine years ago. The ballistics and the eyewitnesses and the paper trail only confirm what should have been obvious from the start. Oswald was a twenty-four year old nobody who went out that day to become history. He succeeded, but we've all been paying his debts since.

[SAM · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've read three JFK conspiracy books prior to this but this brilliant book by Mailer is by far the best and most coherent. I was a big JFK conspiracy believer but the Jim Marrs book damaged the credibility of said conspiracy. Most of it was so far out in the clouds and was laughable. Oswald's Tale focuses purely on Lee Harvey Oswald and it's hard to look past him as the lone assassin. It was a case of right place right time.

[Lynda Kelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Blimey, this was a mammoth book to get through, though so was The Executioner's Song, which I loved. I learned quite a lot here about Lee Harvey Oswald. He had to have had input from either the CIA or FBI, I believe, especially as they'd had their eyes on him for years following his trip off to Russia along with all his defection then non-defection messing around. Then he still continued to antagonise on his return to the USA by getting involved with the Cuban faction as well. So he had to be having some contact with the authorities. However, he is such a liar and so secretive that it's hard to be totally sure about him. He must've been the shooter as there were hardly likely to be a pair of them in the Book Depository that day !!
For me, the biggest clue was in the fashion Oswald travelled to land in Russia in the first place under a luxury travel permit......it was never properly explained who paid for this since he appeared to have no means whatsoever !!
I did chuckle at a very telling remark that Marina made, "Nobody asks Jacqueline Kennedy what Jack Kennedy was like in bed" !! I found Lee's mum, Marguerite, to be a real pain in the backside and you can see why all her sons appear to have severed ties with her. Her imperious attitude was beyond belief.
There were the odd formatting issues in this, a lot of needless spaces added like in meet ing or men tally or unob tainable, wrote woman and not women and area needed a space. That was pretty good for over 800 pages, though !
It did become a bit of a trudge to get through but I learned more about Oswald so it was intriguing. It just went on a bit !

[Andrewh · Rating 4 out of 5]

This tale is part-journalism and part-fictional speculation about Lee Harvey Oswald, who was at the center of the most famous conspiracy theory of the 20th century. The novel aims to reveal Oswald's character and answer the perennial question, did he really do it and why? Well, Mailer thinks he did shoot at the president, but maybe he was not the only one who did so on that day, as the Warren Commission insisted resolutely from the start (at the behest of President Johnson).

The first part of the book is taken up with recounting LHO’s life in the Soviet Union (in Minsk, Belarus), where he went at age 20 after leaving the Marine Corps, declaring that he wanted to live in the Soviet Union, which he admired. This section contains much info gleaned from the Belarus KGB files, and shows that the KGB was not sure whether LHO was a US spy or not. They decided that he could not be so, given how bad his Russian was and how lazy he was. He got a job in a factory in Minsk, and a good flat, and then, after some romantic failures, meets his future wife, Marina, whom he later gets pregnant. For some reason, which is not quite clear, a couple of years later, he then decides he wants to return to the USA and embarks on a program of pompous letter-writing to the US embassy in Moscow, who are not very keen (he has 'defected' after all). This section, written in a flat, faux-Soviet style, is very effective and offers insight into life in the Soviet Union of the time, if nothing else. Oswald appears both determined and arrogant, almost delusional about his role in the world.

Back in the US, Oswald, living in Texas, where his brother’s family is based, is then an object of interest to the CIA and FBI, having lived in Soviet Union and then returned with a Russian wife. The book spends some time establishing his strange family background – lived in poverty in a shack in New Orleans with his mother, then put into an orphanage, then developed, at the same time, a strong desire to join the Marine Corps and an interest in Communism (trying to join the local Party). This being Mailer, the book speculates that he was driven to prove himself as a ‘man’, and about his possible homosexuality, using extracts from the Warren Commission to show that this was a strong line of inquiry – they were determined to show he was a ‘lone killer’ and his gay tendencies might be seen as part of that line, with the implication of his already living a ‘double life’. By 1958, he had decided to defect and started to learn Russian, although it is not clear who paid the somewhat high travel costs of his journey to Russia (Mailer says perhaps he sold secrets to foreign agents while in Japan with the Corps).

In Texas, they get involved with local Russian emigres, some of whom may or may not be involved with the CIA (such as the bizarre Baron de Mohrenschildt, a geologist with ties to the Company), and he mysteriously comes into enough money to pay off his debt to the State Dept for the costs of repatriation from Russia (Mailer speculates that this could be from local Communist groups or from the Agency - the author quotes from his CIA novel Harlot’s Ghost about this way of developing an asset). Mailer says Oswald believed he was destined for greatness, and even writes a manifesto of his vision of society (the 'Aethian System') , in Russian. In early 1963, he loses his job in a print shop and then buys a mail-order gun (the famous carbine that he posed for a photo with in his garden), apparently with the plan to kill the far-right General Edwin Walker, a virulent anti-communist (fascist, in Oswald’s view). Oddly, despite the rifle having a telescopic sight and the victim being seated in a window, he misses his shot. The police fail to match the bullet casing with Oswald’s gun and, Mailer suggests, he is perhaps is emboldened to think that, as a Man of Destiny, he could therefore undertake a much bigger act of Historic Change (thought you might also say it indicates he was not that great a shot, and perhaps not good enough to fire three accurate shots at a moving car under extreme pressure).

He goes back to New Orleans, his birth town, and starts to mix with the local Cuban expats and joins the Hands off Cuba Campaign, which he hopes to use as a way of spreading communism. Mailer again suggests that he may be working for the FBI as a agent provocateur, without solid evidence (this is a recurring theme in any conspiracy theory). He hatches a plan to go to Cuba, and
goes to Mexico City to try to get a visa for Cuba and is told to get one to Russia first, and then visits the Soviet Embassy where he may or may not have met with a KBG officer, Mailer notes, who may or may not have been in charge of ‘wet jobs’ (there is an endless litany of possible contacts in this period, as everything he does is read back in light of his role in the assassination). He goes back to Texas, eventually, where his wife has a second child, and is then under constant FBI surveillance and yet, via a family friend, lands a job in the Texas Book Depository in Dallas in October 1963, just one month before the assassination. On the fateful day, after shots are fired from the Book Depository building (witnesses heard them), Oswald leaves calmly as chaos ensues and later encounters a policeman who tries to stop him, for some reason, and is shot dead by Lee. Oswald is then apprehended and taken for questioning. After a long period of questioning, during which Lee admits no guilt, the police decide to transfer him for his own safety, and then, in front of the TV cameras, he is shot dead by Jack Ruby, a local nightclub owner (the 'amateur hitman' in Mailer's words).

The real mystery, Mailer suggests, is perhaps why Ruby, who was not a professional gunman, took it upon himself to kill LHO when he did? Mailer posits that Ruby was likely to have been acting for the Mob (who had long hated the Kennedys) and Ruby himself implied this to the Warren Commission when he said his life would be in danger if he was to speak frankly in Dallas (but then concocted a bizarre story that he acted as he was so upset at the thought of Jackie having to return to testify in court). Mailer says it is likely the mob ordered a hit on JFK, but also that LHO was not working for them – though they may not have known this and wanted him dead just in case. Ruby’s actions are perhaps an even bigger mystery than those of Oswald (Mailer calls them ‘spiritual brothers’) and without his hit, the whole story may not have spawned the huge conspiracy that it did. It remains a mystery but the picture drawn of Oswald's character here would suggest that he would have been pleased to go down in history as the person who killed the president of the United States (the leader of the capitalist world), though there seem to be a huge number of loose ends.

[PMB · Rating 2 out of 5]

800 page document dump. Might as well just read the Warren Commission Report. What a chore.

[Richard Kramer · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you like to read, and like to live with books, you learn that some books wait, shyly, for a mutual friend to say “I think you two might like each other.” Sometimes the fix-up doesn’t work — you just say yes, you take your chances — but when it does you feel grateful to that friend, forever, that he knew you like that. Knew the two of you, you and the book.

Manny at Book Soup is one of those friends. Book Soup is on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles. Everything around it keeps closing, but Book Soup remains, independent, ornery, seen it all and has lived to tell about it. A few months ago I saw they had Norman Mailer’s OSWALD’S GHOST on the front desk, by the cash register. I knew that Manny loved Mailer and asked him about this book. “Just read it,” he said. So I bought it, making a big deal about its being a real book, with pages, and a cover, and that real book smell (I like my Kindle, and have many titles on it. But Kindle books don’t smell.) I thought — am I that interested in Oswald? I am old enough to remember the sight of Jack Ruby shooting him in the gut, live, in 1963. But six hundred pages? When there are so many show business biographies to read, and books about the Holocaust?

It’s a winner. It’s not about Oswald, not really, but about Mailer’s novelist’s attempt to force him into being a character in a narrative that makes any sense at all. There’s a blankness to Oswald, in death as in life, and OSWALD’S GHOST is the perfect title as it’s the ghost who is the author’s opponent. He goes to Russia, gets the KGB to open files, interviews the sinister set of kooks attached to the case. He tries to make sense of the Warren Report, and of the terrifying creature known as Marguerite Oswald, or Mom. By the end Mailer isn’t convinced that Oswald did or didn’t do it, and it’s his triumph as an artist that by the end you don’t care about that. Because you have been all over the world with a marvelous companion, one who can go off on the occasional tangent but always finds his way back to home, with a bagful of new stories to tell. Mailer took on Oswald, as he took on Marilyn, because as an American author of his time he felt he had to drag them into the ring with him, and see who was left standing. Two people, about whom the truth could never be known, facing a great writer with his dukes up.
And so, on to the Hitler book … (CASTLE IN THE FOREST)
(One interesting supposition of Mailer’s … he feels that Oswald could hardly have intended to be shot by Ruby, and that his goal might have been to have a Day in Court, during which he could air his not entirely crazy views about the workings of the secret world. He was, as Mailer sees it, a not very interesting young man (he was twenty-three when he did or didn’t pull the trigger) who knew it about himself, who hated that it was true, who tried to make it not be true and the rest is — history, as seen, invaluably, by Norman Mailer.
Thank you, Manny.

[Stephan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mailer's insights and description of life in the late 50's and early 60's Soviet Union was fascinating and his following Oswald's journey there was unembellished and intriguing because of that. For a man who went to the archives of the KGB leaning toward a conspiracy of some sort and be brave enough to come to a different conclusion when the facts led him to that, was very brave indeed. And Oswald's life here leading up to the assassination was at least as compelling. It all added up to the conclusion that Oswald was a loose cannon that no one wanted to deal with, neither Cuba, the Soviet Union or the U.S. I couldn't put this book down.

[Hank Pharis · Rating 2 out of 5]

Mailer goes into incredible (almost too much) detail about Lee Oswald's life. He says he set out without a definite conclusion as to whether Oswald was the lone gunman or whether there was a conspiracy and wanted to follow the evidence as objectively as possible. He concludes that Oswald was a sincere Marxist (rather than Communist), a nihlist, a narcissist, a chronic liar who killed JFK with the hope of moving the world toward a society superior to either American captialism or Soviet-style communism. He is convinced that Oswald shot JFK but still open to other possibilities as well.

[Andy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating in depth research of Oswald's life. And leaves you thinking he was unstable enough to have acted alone and secretive enough to have been an operative.

[Christian.scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant and engaging, I have read dozens of JFK/Oswald books and this one showed me things I had never seen before and made the whole saga plausible.

[Lora Shouse · Rating 5 out of 5]

I once saw somebody’s recommendation of Oswald’s Tale that said something like “it will have you absolutely convinced that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone when he killed President Kennedy.” It does seem to be the case that he did not act under the direction of anybody else and that nobody else was involved in his planning of the deed.

This book is not intended to address any other conspiracy theories or aspects of conspiracy theories. It is a book primarily about Lee Harvey Oswald. It attempts to understand who he was and what he was thinking. As far as I could tell, Oswald was difficult to understand, and it was even tougher to tell what he was thinking. The book has some success uncovering these things, but apparently, even those who knew him best didn’t understand him very deeply.

My personal opinion has always been that many different people were trying to get rid of Kennedy in one way or another at about the time he was killed for many different reasons. Some of them may have orchestrated other shootings or covered up what they thought was official evidence or gone off half-cocked in other ways about the incident. But while some of them may have had something to do with Oswald, he didn’t have much to do with them. His real motive seems to have been to gain attention for himself.

It's a well-told story, and well read. The whole thing is interesting, even the parts about the repetitive KGB Observations that you would think would be endlessly boring.

[Luke · Rating 4 out of 5]

“So long as Oswald is a petty figure, a lone twisted pathetic killer who happened to be in a position to kill a potentially great President, then … America is cursed with an absurdity. There was no logic to the event and no sense of balance in the universe. Historical absurdity breeds social disease.
We have, of course, an alternative … There, our President was killed by the architects of a vast plot embracing the most powerful officers of our armed forces, our intelligence, and our Mafia, a massive array of establishment evil that is thrilling to our need to live imaginatively with great stakes in great wars, but such a thesis also leaves us with horror: We are small, and the forces of evil are huge.” -p.606

[Cathie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is much longer than I am accustomed to reading so it was definitely an exercise in keeping my mind focused and on track. It was written in an everyday, easy to ready language and that helped but still took my two months to read. Of course Oswald is a historical figure in America and it was nice to learn more than just trusting the movies. Marina believes he didn't do it, but I think that is because she wants to believe that.

He wanted to bring down democracy and make an impact towards that goal not just be a part of it's fall. He owned the rifle that was at the location. He had previously tried to assassinate a General and did kill a cop directly after killing Kennedy. I believe he did it. The book taught me so much about his personality I know he would be happy to know that I believe he did it.

Excellent read!

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

About 75% sources and fact and 25% conjecture. The trick is which is which. Still, very interesting and informative and it filled in a lot of gaps in my knowledge of Oswald. We’ve all known people like him. Fortunately, most of the time preparation didn’t meet opportunity, like it did in his case.

[Pietro Caliceti · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF. Boring.

[Lance Lusk · Rating 5 out of 5]

I cannot adequately express how much I admire Mailer's exhaustive and incisive treatise on Oswald. To say that is entirely thorough and highly perceptive is an understatement. There is really no other book on this topic in the same league except for DeLillo's Libra. Highly, highly, highly recommend!

[Jack Bates · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was the first book by Mailer I read, having heard a lot about him, of course. But I didn't read it because of who it was by, I read it because I was a bit obsessed with the JFK assassination and particularly with Lee Harvey Oswald.

So this is based mostly on the transcripts of Lee and Marina's life in Minsk, the wiretaps in their house set up by the KGB after Lee defected to the USSR, plus FBI transcripts, government reports, interviews, letters, diaries.

The Minsk section is especially fascinating because they didn't know they were being recorded, and if they suspected it, they forgot, or couldn't sustain anything other than the realities of their marriage. It's kind of depressing, because no one's life is special, and everything you read is tinged with the enormity of hindsight. This is Lee Harvey Oswald, man, arguing with his wife about housework and moaning about his job and infinitely regretful that he's swapped the ease and luxury of life in the West for this mad dream of communism. I don't know. It's amazing. LHO is still enigmatic though. Maybe anyone would be when looked at through the intense lense of history. (Get me.) You look and you look and you still don't know, you can't see the answers. An endless mystery.

It's a tour de force of research and imagination, though.

[Ryan Young · Rating 5 out of 5]

mailer recounts the known facts about oswald's life, drawing on his own interviews and other primary sources. we learn about oswald in moscow and minsk, are ushered through the warren commission's report, and are given guidance and understanding by a brilliant journalist. oswald was under surveillance almost constantly from his defection in 1959 until his death in 1963. i wonder how my character would stand up if the entire world had access to my every word for 4 years? i read conversations between oswald and his wife in bed after a long day. i felt badly for his violated privacy and worried about how much worse it is in 2016...

i also enjoyed violating his privacy. the more you get to know lee, the less you like him. marina is not terribly likable either. the real villain in the tale though? his mother. marguerite oswald was a pompous, idiotic, self-important asshole. also she was a terrible mother.

side note, marina oswald lives in rockwall to this day. maybe you've seen her while having a late breakfast at waffle house? or bowling at shennanigans? one of the things said against her as she rebounded from the turmoil of the assassination was that she would go on "all night bowling sprees." oooooh.

[Brenda · Rating 3 out of 5]

A "novelistic" approach to the life of Lee Harvey Oswald.

Extremely interesting, frustrating read. Mailer interviewed Marina Oswald, her family, and many people who knew or met Oswald when he was living in Russia. The second half of the book covers his return to the States through interviews with Oswald's family and those that came in contact with him here. The main fault in the work comes from the scattershot aspect of Mailer's compilation of the interviews. It felt kaleidoscopic, splintered, and thus hard to follow or put together a cohesive picture of Oswald. Perhaps my thought process is too linear, but I would've enjoyed the information better if it had been arranged differently. Mailer also adds his own opinions in overly-picturesque language and leaps to conclusions that don't always logically follow the information that he's gathered.