Norman Mailer

• Norman Mailer


• January 31, 1923 - November 10, 2007


• He was an American novelist


• Norman Mailer is considered an innovator of narrative nonfiction. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize twice and the National book award once.


• In 1955, Norman Mailer with Ed Fancher and Dan Wolf published The Village Voice.


• In 2005, he won the medal for distinguished contribution to American letters from the National Book Foundation.


• Norman Mailer was born into a Jewish family. His dad was a south African-born accountant, and his mom ran a housekeeping and nursing agency.


• Mailer entered Harvard University in 1939 where he studied aeronautical engineering. In Harvard he became interested in writing and publishing his first story at age 18. After graduating in 1943, he was drafted into the U.S Army. In World War II he wasn't involved much in the combat and completed his service as a cook, but the experience there made him write a book called The Naked and the Dead


• In 1977, Henry Abbott had read about Mailers work on The Executioner's song and wrote to Mailer to enlighten the author about Abbott's conditions and his time behind bars.


• In 1971 he had a daughter named Maggie with Carol Stevens whom he married later in 1980. They got divorced two days after their wedding.