Rereading THE GOLDEN AGE by Gore Vidal, I am reminded that he is among those authors who lack a single masterpiece that will carry his legacy. His great achievement was his entire output. When he wrote a novel in whatever vein -- be it his famous historical novels or one of his post-modern inventions (as he dubbed his playfully experimental works) -- it was just a damn good and incredibly smart version of that sort of novel, but rarely was it innovative in the way a Thomas Pynchon or Hemingway would make it. I ultimately think he was ten times the writer and thinker many others who are lauded as masters were, but he lacks his GREAT GATSBY. Even LINCOLN, which certainly has received its fair share of critical and popular love, doesnt quite achieve that height of glory -- in part because many consider historical novels genre fiction in the negative sense of that word. Anyway...not really sure what my ultimate point here is except that rereading THE GOLDEN AGE reminds me how breezy and brilliant Vidals prose is, but also that its so unobtrusively readable that while it received solid reviews and became a national bestseller, no one would think to consider it a masterpiece of literature. Its just a damn good book. (Who said that many great books arent very good? The corollary that many very good books are not registered as great is true as well.) [Side note: I notice that many of my literary heroes either lack a single masterpiece or have three or four books competing for the position of their great work -- or, Great Work, capitalized and holy. Mailer has THE EXECUTIONERS SONG and THE NAKED AND THE DEAD and ANCIENT EVENINGS. Oates has BLONDE and THEM and THE ACCURSED and about a dozen short stories better than pretty much anything out there. Sartre has two major philosophical works (magna opera, to use the oddly pleasing plural of magnum opus), two major novels, three major plays, and about a dozen essays that just kill it. Same with Asimov, who outright said he wanted to be remembered not for any single work, but rather for his range and volume of work. And so forth...]
Posted on: Thu, 25 Sep 2014 19:00:57 +0000
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