by Fred Kaplan
Gore Vidal and his half-sister Nina (Nini) at Merrywood, c. 1938.
(Courtesy of Nina Auchincloss Straight)
Gore Vidal’s passport photograph, 1939.
(Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, Gore Vidal Collection)
Gore Vidal (seated, first left) with his Boy Scout Troop at Los Alamos Ranch School, c. 1941.
(Los Alamos Historical Museum)
Rosalind Rust, c.1942.
(Courtesy of Edes F. Talman)
Nicholas Wreden, Vidal’s editor at Dutton, c.1946.
(Courtesy of Peter Wreden)
Anaïs Nin and Gore Vidal, New York, c.1946.
(Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, Gore Vidal Collection)
Gore Vidal (right) and Harold Lang, probably in Bermuda, 1947.
(Wisconsin Center for film and Theater Research, Gore Vidal Collection)
Nina Gore Olds, c.1946.
(Courtesy of Tom Auchincloss)
Tennessee Williams and Gore Vidal, Key West, c. 1950. (Courtesy of Gore Vidal)
Gore Vidal, Truman Capote, and Tennessee Williams, New York, 1948, at a party celebrating the opening of William’s Summer and Smoke.
(Photo by Jo Healy, Courtesy of Erin Clermont)
John Latouche and Alice Astor in the mid-1950s.
(From the John Latouche Papers, Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Columbia University)
Cyril Ritchard and Gore Vidal reviewing the script of Visit to a Small Planet, 1957.
(Performing Arts Research Center, New York Public Library)
Gore Vidal, unknown person, Marian Seldes, William Shatner, and E.G.Marshall, rehearsing for The Indestructible Mr Gore, 1959.
(Performing Arts Research Center, New York Public Library)
Gore Vidal (right) and Christopher Fry, the two uncredited writers responsible for most of the script of Ben-Hur, Rome, 1958.
(Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, Gore Vidal Collection)
Andy and Fred Dupee at Edgewater, c. 1959.
(Courtesy of Andy Dupee)
Barbara and Jason Epstein, c.1960.
(Courtesy of Barbara Epstein)
Claire Bloom at Ravello, c. 1972.
(Courtesy of Gore Vidal)
The high-spirited Maria Britneva and Gore Vidal, c. 1960.
(Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, Gore Vidal Collection)
John F. Kennedy, Gore Vidal, and Tennesee Williams, Palm Beach, 1958.
(Courtesy of Gore Vidal)
Melvyn Douglas, Lee Tracy, Gore Vidal, Frank Lovejoy, Leora Dana, and Joe Anthony at the first reading rehearsal of The Best Man, New York, 1960.
(Courtesy of Lyn Austin)
President-elect Kennedy greeting the cast and author of The Best Man backstage, New York, 1960.
(Performing Arts Research Center New York Public Library)
Gore Vidal welcomes John F. Kennedy, who arrives to campaign in Dutchess County, 1960.
(Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, Gore Vidal Collection)
Gore Vidal campaigning in Kingston, New York, 1960. Joanne Woodward and Paul Newman are in the audience (bottom right).
(Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, Gore Vidal Collection)
(Top) Mike Pendergast (far left) and other New York State politicians with Harry Truman and Gore Vidal at a Dutchess County political event, 1960. (Above) Eugene Vidal, Gore Vidal, and Joe Hawkins on election eve, 1960, about to get the news that Gore has lost the election.
(Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, Gore Vidal Collection)
(Left) Gore Vidal at home in Rome, c. 1964.
(Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, Gore Vidal collection)
The first meeting of Gore Vidal and Italo Calvino (left), Judith (Chichita) Calvino (left), and Howard Austen (center), American Academy in Rome, 1974.
(Courtesy of Gore Vidal)
Gore Vidal at La Rondinaia, Ravello, 1996. (Author’s photo)
Howard and Gore at their daily chess game, Ravello, 1996.
(Author’s photo)
At Ravello, 1996. (Author’s photo)
Acknowledgments
Gore Vidal and Howard Austen fulfilled their initial commitment to provide total cooperation. To both of them, I am deeply grateful. With the exception of the mysterious 1948 diary, I have seen everything. I suspect the diary contains nothing that would surprise me. Having access to it withheld whetted my curiosity, which now, having completed this biography, I discharge into thin air. Neither Mr. Vidal nor Mr. Austen saw the manuscript or any portion of its publication, with the exception of my quotations from our oral interviews, which I gave Mr. Vidal the opportunity to participate in editing since they inevitably contained slips of the tongue and by-the-way comments not intended for publication; he also was allowed to see the quotations from his unpublished letters for his information but not for his response. He played no role in their selection or use. Toward the end, he expressed his desire to see the manuscript. Doubleday and I were successful in maintaining our position that it was neither in his nor our interest for him to read it before publication.
Various and many institutions have provided access and materials. They all have my appreciation and grateful acknowledgment. Foremost of these are the Wisconsin State Historical Society, Madison, and the University of Wisconsin, Madison, particularly the Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, which houses the Gore Vidal Collection. Harry Miller, the librarian in charge of the manuscript reading room, and Tino Ballio, the director of the Center for Film and Theater Research, were particularly helpful, the Wisconsin staff a model of professional and generous assistance. My thanks to the Carl Albert Congressional Research Center, University of Oklahoma; the American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming; the Beinecke Collection, Yale University Library; Christ Church College Library, Oxford University; the Columbia University Rare Book and Manuscript Library; the Harry Ransom Collection, University of Texas, Austin; the Houghton Library, Harvard University; the Lilly Library, Indiana University; The John F. Kennedy Library; the Los Alamos Historical Museum; the Performing Arts Research Center, New York Public Library; Princeton University Library; the Library of the University of California at Los Angeles; the University of Delaware Library; the University of Virginia, Alderman Collection; the Museum of Television and Radio, New York; the Vanderbilt University Library television news archives; and the Z. Smith Reynolds Library, Wake Forest University. In the legal world, Simpson Thacher and Bartlett has the equivalent of institutional status. Through the good offices of Donald Oresman, the firm provided access to their numerous files on the Vidal-Buckley case. William Phillips facilitated my access to the Little, Brown files. In London, Michael Shaw of Curtis Brown made that agency’s records available to me. The Guggenheim Foundation, through Thomas Tanselle, provided a copy of Vidal’s fellowship application. Some of Random House’s files are in the Random House Collection at the Columbia University Rare Book and Manuscript Library, where Bernard Crystal made them and the John Latouche Papers available. Unfortunately a widespread indifference in the publishing world to history of any kind has resulted in the loss or purposeful destruction of precious records from institutions as diverse as Dutton and William Morris (where Owen Laster kindly gave me access to the extant files).
Ginny Howard at Potomac School, Lisa Gornner at Landon School, and Ellis Turner at Sidwell Friends School provided Vidal’s school records. Owen Carle and Robert Taylor made available their memories of and files about William Lawrence Camp. I am particularly indebted to Wallace Ragan and John Claiborne Davis (retired) of St. Albans School for their assistance and hospitality, and to the access they provided to what remains of Vidal’s St. Albans School world. Edward L. Sanderson shared with me his research into the life of Jimmie Trimble. Rachel Collinsworth, director of the Los Alamos Historical Museum, gave me access to its files relating to the Los Alamos Ranch Experimental School; numbers of Los Alamos School alumni were
helpful, particularly Peter Dechert, Alan Meyer, Wilson Hurley, and Oscar Steege. Phillips Exeter staff and numbers of Vidal’s classmates provided helpful cooperation, particularly Edouard L. Desrochers, Academy Archivist; Jacquelyn H. Thomas, Academy Librarian; and Philip R. Berger, Hamilton Bissell, John Spencer Dickinson, and Otis Pease.
For the Gore family in Mississippi and the world of Vidal’s Gore family background I am indebted to Lois and Bill Gore’s help and hospitality; I am also indebted to their son, Miles Gore; to Nini Auchincloss Straight for letters and photographs; to Tom Auchincloss for photographs and clippings; to Roy Thompson for photos and other documents. Susan Milstead in Los Angeles arranged my visits to her mother, Margaret Sutton, Gore Vidal’s aunt. Katharine (Vidal) Smith in Florida and Sally Vidal (Mrs. Felix Vidal) in San Antonio cooperated graciously. Louis Auchincloss unstintingly gave me access to his large collection of letters; Barbara Epstein made available her correspondence with Vidal and access to the files of The New York Review of Books, Jason Epstein a photograph and two extended interviews. Barbara (Andy) Dupee trusted me with photographs, letters, and memories; Margaret Shaffer provided letters and hospitality at Bard College and arranged access to Edgewater; Elaine Dundy generously offered letters, memories, and photos; Don Bachardy provided letters, photos, and hospitality in Santa Monica; Jay Parini provided his good offices as Gore Vidal’s literary executor, and contributed wise counsel.
Among those who provided documents, with permission to use them, and other forms of help, including oral testimony, and whose contributions are indicated in only some cases in the endnotes and other acknowledgments, are: John Aldridge; Rhodes Allan; Jay Allen; Roger Angell; Samuel G. Armistead; George Armstrong; R. F. Arnold; James Atlas; Hugh Auchincloss III; Lyn Austin; George Axelrod; Jack H. Bady; Tish Baldrige; Lee Barlow; Theresa Baxter; Saul Bellow; Alain Bernheim; Marjorie Bernheim; Janet Bingham; James Birney; Claire Bloom; Boaty Boatwright; Tina Bourjaily; Vance Bourjaily; John Bowen; Paul Bowles; Andreas Brown; William F. Buckley, Jr.; Judith Calvino; Virginia Spencer Carr; Bernard Carragher; Dick Cavett; David Cook; Lulli Corsini; John Curtis; Nathaniel Davis; Sharon Delano; Michael di Capua; Robert Dolce; David Herbert Donald; Michael Dorn; Deborah Druba; Elaine Dundy; Dominick Dunne; Mark Engel; Tom Erhardt; Gary Fisketjohn; William Fitzgerald; Peggy Fox; Antonia Fraser; Jack Fricks; John Kenneth Galbraith; John Galliher; Milton Gendel; Robert Giroux; Herman Gollob; Georgina Gooding; Thomas P. Gore II; George N. Gray, Jr.; William Gruver; Hugh Guilbeau; Judith Halfpenny; John Hallowell; John Hanes; Phyliss Wreden Harholdt; Nicholas Haslam; Armis E. Hawkins; Judith Kessler Hayes; Suzette Meredith Hayes; Tom Hayes; Michael Hecht; Hugh Hefner; Clive James; Conrad Janis; Judith Jones; Stanley F. Kaminsky; Joseph Kanon; Bill Kauffman; Harry Kloman; John Knowles; Mickey Knox; Speed Lamkin; Heidi Landecker; Owen Laster; James Laughlin; Oatsie Leiter (Mrs. Robert Charles); Lyle Leverich; A. K. Lewis; Sam Lurie; Ransom Lynch; John Macrea; Romana McEwen; Thomas McFarland; Catherine McKenna; Judith McNally; Norman Mailer; Martin Manulis; Sarah Marshall; Jayne Meadows; Susan Mengers; John Mitzel; Geoffrey Moore; Jan Mostowski; Janet Caro Murphy; Anthony Neville; Paul Newman; Johnny Nicholson; Cary O’Dell; Joseph J. O’Donohue; Charles Osborne; Diana Sternbergova Phipps; George Plimpton; Norman Podhoretz; Richard Poirier; Betty Pollock; Barrett Prettyman; Max Rabb; William Riggan; Ned Rorem; Jean Rose; T. G. Rosenthal; Eleanor Rovere; Joseph Ryle; David Samples; Arthur Schlesinger; Alan U. Schwartz; Ruth Sewell; Edward Sherin; John Saumurez Smith; Sharon Snow; Jean Stein; Mary Steven; Roger Straus; Donald Stewart; Luisa Stewart; Gunther Stuhlmann; Edes F. Talman; John Tebbel; J. Winter Thorington; Alfred True; James Tuck; Lawrence Turman; Carrington Tutwiler; Frank Von Zerneck; Lois Wallace; James E. Walsh; Patsy Walsh; William Walsh; Raymond Bentley Washburne, Jr.; Wilcomb Washburn; Graham Watson; Edward Weisl; Theodore Weiss; Rene Weiss; Miles White; Leon Wieseltier; Jane B. Willingham; Bernard X. Wolff; Joanne Woodward; Merrell C. Wreden; Peter Wreden.
Susan O’Brien was of invaluable help in the latter stages of the research. At Doubleday, William Adams, Maria Carella, Debbie Cowell, Herman Gollob, Mario Pulice, Bill Thomas, and Steve Rubin were unfailingly professional and committed. Georges Borchardt and his agency staff handled their duties with exemplary competence.
Lapses of memory and organization probably have resulted in omissions from my list of helpful angels; to them I apologize. Some lesser creatures, whose names I do recall, I have not recorded here.
A Note on the Author
Fred Kaplan is Professor of English Literature at
Queens College and the Graduate Centre of City
University, New York. He is the critically acclaimed
author of Henry James, Dickens, Thomas Carlyle
(nominated for the Pulitzer Prize), and The Essential
Gore Vidal. He lives in Brooklyn, New York
Also by Fred Kaplan
Thomas Carlyle: A Biography
Dickens: A Biography
Henry James, The Imagination of Genius: A Biography
Sacred Tears: Sentimentality in Nineteenth-Century Literature
Dickens and Mesmerism: The Hidden Springs of Fiction
First Published in Great Britain in 1999
Copyright © 1999 by Fred Kaplan
This electronic edition published in 2012 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
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London, WC1B 3DP
Published by arrangement with Doubleday, a division
of Bantam Doubleday Dell
The moral right of the author has been asserted
All rights reserved
You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (including without limitation electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, printing, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
eISBN: 978-1-4088-4072-6
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