Customer Reviews

On God: An Uncommon Conversation

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(0)
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I have always admired Mailer for his writing style, but not his opinions. It came as a major shock that a Progressive like Mailer would even acknowledge the existance of God, Good and Evil. Maybe there is hope for the Dark Side after all. It seems that Mamet also has finally seen the Light.

I think people of all Faiths would find this book a worthwhile read even though some of Mailer's opinions may be offensive. Give it a chance.

A good read from an newly-enlightened man as he approached mortality.

During much of his long and illustrious career in American letters, Norman Mailer wrote extensively about his beliefs concerning God, the Devil and the war between good and evil, as well as man's role in this cosmological struggle. The foundation of Mailer's cosmology is based on the idea that God is not all-good and all-powerful, but is an existential God doing the best that He/She can do. His thoughts and beliefs relating to his religious system were often expressed implicitly in his novels and more explicitly in his non-fiction. Now, with the publication of this excellent book, On God, we have Mailer's thoughts on these topics systematized and expanded over the course of more than two hundred fascinating and stimulating pages. The book is in the form of an interview as indicated by the subtitle "An Uncommon Conversation." This interview took place at intervals over the course of three years - from June 2003 to June 2006. The interrogator, Michael Lennon, is very skillful at extracting Mailer's thoughts, getting further explications, always probing deeper, reminiscent, in a way to Melville's description of peeling the onion, layer by layer, to get to the deeper meanings one finds below. The reader is often as pleased with the manner in which ideas develop as in the actual ideas themselves. The book seems spontaneous and fresh even though Mailer had been thinking about the topics covered for the past fifty years.

On God will certainly prove to be invaluable to Mailer scholars or for that matter to anyone who loves to read his books since an intelligent comprehension of his works is not possible without an understanding of his metaphysics. This book should also be of interest to anyone who has an open mind with regard to religious questions. One does not need to be an expert or even familiar with Mailer's prior work to get much from this book. Most especially, it should prove to be of great interest to anyone who is not an atheist but who also cannot accept the dogma of organized religion. Somewhere, deep in the vast body of Proust's Remembrance of Things Past, there is a statement very similar to this - "religion starts at the point where the mind shuts down." I think Mailer would have been in agreement with the spirit of this remark since its target is organized religion. In contrast, Mailer's cosmology requires an actively working mind, constantly probing, trying to discover the nature of reality. This task, however, can never be completed since Mailer's God is more Creator than Lawgiver and He is involved in a cosmic battle, the outcome of which cannot be known. In Mailer's system everything is in process, nothing has been completed. Final answers will not be found. Nevertheless, we must search for the right questions.

I read "Miami and the Siege of Chicago" shortly after it was published. It was a fairly decent book. But I saw Mailer was a second-tier novelist who considered himself, vainly, to be absolutely first-tier. He admired Hemingway too much and modeled his behavior after that vastly more talented American novelist. Mailer wanted to be Hemingway. But Mailer never really evidenced Hemingway's bold grace or prolific talent and never really pulled off the clownish, public ruses, which ultimately now diminish him. As for existentialism, Mailer liked to quote Nietzsche and Dostoyevsky. I'm not sure how well he really understood Sartre or Kierkegaard or Gabriel Marcel or Heidegger. But Mailer brands himself as an existentialist because he seems to love the sound of the word, which he too often repeats, and wants you to believe he is "authentic" -- the real thing. Mailer comes off as a narcissist, which he is, of course, and lives at the center of his own cosmos: God is an author, God forbid. Having said all of this candidly, "On God" offers some fresh and profound theology: it turns out that Mailer is far superior, later in life, as a theologian than over a long career as a novelist. His approach to the big question as to "If God is good and all powerful, why is there so much evil?" is convincing and cogent and enlightened. Read the book for Mailer's answer to this one question alone. He offers some of the most insightful, however speculative, perspective on the authentic reality of the relationship between God and the Devil since the epic poetry of Milton in "Paradise Lost." He attacks the inauthenticity rampant among organized religion. Despite his criticisms of the faithful to buy too readily the church's easy advice that the mystery of life is a panacea to its fundamental absurdity, Mailer worked at it and had infinite faith in his own ability to forge understanding from nothingness and to find meaning in the unknowable. My best advice is not to read Mailer as a novelist, read Hemingway instead. But do read Mailer's theology in this short but intriguing book. Mailer made almost no impression upon me at any point as a novelist and even less as a literary bon vivant. But his insight and perspective and intelligent speculation on God will linger and lead to a deeper understanding of the nature of God. One only hopes that Mailer has now found temporary paradise as, if his theory on reincarnation is accurate, God is likely to be sufficiently amused by his spirituality and Mailer is gamely inspired to participate in Nietzsche's eternal recurrence so that we see Mailer in one shape or form, again.

In On God, Michael Lennon, President of the Norman Mailer Society, asks America's most infamous grand old literary lion both respectful and pointed questions that add up to an exegesis of Mailer's long-developing metaphysical speculations that have for five decades informed Mailer's work, especially his fiction since The Naked and the Dead. Those interested in Mailer and in understanding his work will truly benefit from this more or less final, culminating analysis and presentation of the author's thought. In addition, the reader discovers a new way of looking at ethics, personal and national, for the 21st century. "The reason we are having these dialogues," Mailer says, "is that Fundamentalist notions of absolute authority are too much of a manic faith machine capable of inspiring world disasters."

In this rich book, the theological and thematic preoccupations that have implicitly informed Norman Mailer's vast body of work are rendered explicit. The combination of Mailer's brilliant insight and Michael Lennon's erudition results in a sophisticated but accessible explanation of Mailer's theology, notably the ongoing battle between God and the Devil over the souls of men and women, with humankind representing the third vector of power in this struggle. This is a fascinating read.

Norman Mailer's new conversational book continues the dialogue he had with his son in "The Big Empty." Norman has written many big books that many of us have not read with care, especially Harlot's Ghost and Ancient Evenings. Now the voice he uses in his near next-to-last utterances is full of wonder about the afterlife, and how a man who communed with the great writers of the past will commune with the great writers of the future. Michael Lennon, who spurred Mailer to speak, is to be commended for prodding the Jewish author to speak to the Catholic scholar.

Christopher Busa

Norman Mailer has spent a good deal of his fifty plus year career as a writer wrestling with the issue of God and the nature of His being, speculations that have helped make his books rich texts for advancing limitless sets of dualisms about the condition of America and the growing complexity in the issue of good vs. evil. He has now brought us his new book, "On God:An Uncommon Conversation", a series of discussions with his literary archivist, professor J.Michael Lennon. It is a fascinating discussion, intriguing quite despite Mailer's confessed lack of theological training. The lack of training works to Mailer's advantage; his God is less an all seeing General Manager of the universe than he is an artist trying to fill a page with beautiful words , or a canvas with arresting figures in sublime colors and shades.

Mailer is that rare creature, an actual American religious existentialist, a philosophy that insists that we cannot have a meaningful faith unless we face the circumstances of our life straight on, without reservation, and take a creative action to deal with them, sans the comforting catechisms priests, rabbis or monks might offer us. The point is that we advance toward a solution, create a meaningful context for ourselves in an existence where greater assurances are impossible, and that we take full responsibility for the consequences of the acts we do; we commit acts of faith that God is with us, without guarantees, and that we make mistakes along the way.

Mailer is taken with the notion that we're created in his image, and speculates that he also gave us his temperament and fallibilities as well as his best graces, all without the supernatural abilities. God is more like us, let us say, than we are like him, and it is in this area where religious existentialism finds another nuance. Far from being the silent Kierkegaardian God who is static,cold and despairing, apropos for Northern European weather conditions, Mailer is considering a God of Action, something of a Hemingway in deistic form who must prove himself with creative acts, a diety in the trenches, making mistakes, failing, succeeding, learning from his mistakes, constantly evolving.The God that interests Mailer is one guided by intuition no less than we, His creations whom we are said to resemble.One might say that it's a pity that Mailer hadn't followed through on his spiritual notions and developed a fully argued theology, but he is a novelist and storyteller, after all, and his long held ideas about God's motive, condition and instincts have served him splendidly as a source of metaphor in his fiction, journalism and essays. Mailer and Lennon go through Mailer's ruminations at length, and there is something of great interest in how his conception of The Lord as literary figure, an artist have informed and enlarged his fiction and nonfiction writings; it is in the books, from "Presidential Papers" through his latest novel "The Castle in the Forest "where one finds the greatest and most provocative application of his religious thinking. "On God" , always intriguing, quietly quirky, lacks the energy and , one may say, the conviction of older writings.Lacking a novel or a major essay to reinvigorate his metaphors and thus surprise himself and the reader with the limitless ambiguities involved in reconciling Higher Powers with the flux of actual experience, he sounds weary,as if he's explaining himself yet again one time too many . Mailer's spiritual thinking is best witnessed elsewhere, in his novels " An American Dream","Ancient Evenings and "Castle in the Forest", and his journalism, especially in "Armies of the Night".

Mailer at his Best

A review of "On God: An Uncommon Conversation"

by Norman Mailer and Michael Lennon

240 Pages Published in 2007

ISBN-10: 1400067324
ISBN-13: 978-1400067329

Norman Mailer has been talking about theology at least since he wrote "The Executioner's Song." He says there is a struggle between God and Satan and we see this divine struggle as the clash of good and evil. We are all players in the struggle.

Reincarnation gives us many parts to play. We return as new beings in successive lives.

Mailer presents his theology well. It has a unity and a logic that you find in all his work.

I thoroughly enjoyed "On God." This book helps readers understand much of his earlier work, especially:

- The Executioner's Song

- Conversations with Norman Mailer (Literary Conversations Series)

- Oswald's Tale: An American Mystery

- The Gospel According to the Son

- The Spooky Art: Thoughts on Writing

- The Castle in the Forest: A Novel

- Ancient Evenings

I thoroughly enjoyed and I recommend "On God" by Norman Mailer.

Mr. Mailer has a powerful belief in God and also in the forces of evil (the devil). As to the destiny of the individual soul, he leans towards reincarnation. The major religions of the west do not believe in reincarnation. Some splinter groups do, but essentially the west believes in soul survival in heaven or hell, with perhaps purgatory. The religions of India, China and Japan believe in reincarnation. If Mr. Mailer's leaning is correct, the east is smarter than the west. But that's a big "if". All in all, the book deserves five stars for its depth of thought.

In On God, retired English professor and Norman Mailer scholar Michael Lennon interviews (who else) Norman Mailer to tease out his views on the nature of God, the Devil, and religion in society.

Mailer himself sets the stage in the preface:

"I am obviously ignorant of most of the intellections required of a competent theologian" (p. xv). "But what will be evident to anyone who has studied such matters is how truly untutored I am" (p. xv). Then why should anyone read this book? "I have spent the last 50 years trying to contemplate the nature of God" (p. xvi).

In other words, Mailer has the same credentials as most of humanity for the past 2000+ years.

Let me start off with a listing of some interesting and tough "Mailerisms" that appear in this book:

"Revelation has always stuck me as a power trip for high priests who were looking to create a product that would enable them to lead their flock more securely, more emphatically" (p. 5).

"I confess, then, that I feel no attachment whatsoever to organized religion" (p. 5).

"When I think of evolution, what stands out most is the drama that went on in God as an artist" (p. 5). "God is an artist. And like an artist, God has successes, God has failures" (p. 7).

"God learns" (p. 113).

"All right - we are going to be reincarnated" (p. 23).

"No, God's energies are also limited " (p. 34).

"My guess is that the Devil sees God as incompetent" (p. 46).

"My basic premise proposes that there's a different mixture of God and the Devil in every one of us" (p. 63).

"I want us to cease looking upon [the great holy books] slavishly" (p. 82).

"It may be there are agents of death with which God experiments as fully as God experiments with the development of human and animal life" (p. 95).

"How, for God's sake, could God put up with suburbs and malls and superhighways and plastics" (p. 135)?

"I've felt from the word go that George [W] Bush is one of the Devil's clients. And every time he feels that Jesus is talking to him, count on it: Satan is in his ear" (p. 141).

"God does the best that He or She can do" (p. 179).

"I don't think that God listens to prayer" (p. 198).

"The beauty of Christ - what Christ was saying to all of us - is that the poor have as much reason to exist as the wealthy" (p. 213).



So what is Mailer saying with all this? God can't handle everything, and, as an artist, constantly experiments. The Devil tampers when possible, so there is a constant interplay and tension between good and bad... look at evolution as an example. "But I don't see any inherent logical contradiction in saying that I do believe our God created the world we live in and is in constant conflict with the devil" (p. 4).

Mailer has a theological belief system that probably mirrors a small minority, and the world will not be beating a path to his door asking for additional clarification. In fact, he probably wouldn't or couldn't offer any. If Mailer were arguing with an atheist, he would suggest "The burden of proof is on you. You have much more to explain about how we're here if you insist that there's nothing behind our existence" (p. 53). I suspect he would also argue that the burden of proof would be on anyone with an alternative belief system. Mailer is right. After all, he's been thinking about this for 50 years! And God once spoke to him in an all-night diner in Brooklyn. God said to him "Leave without paying." And it was so.

Mailer continually refers to the Catholic Church, its beliefs and ceremonies, as a point of comparison. It is clear that he respects this institution... he is a "closet Catholic."

Having just finished reading World Without End by Ken Follett, with its focus on the 14th century in Europe, I wondered about what from Mailer's book or philosophy will last for another 500 years. What will people who read this book in 500 years think about our level of intellection? One of the current issues or controversies in modern US society is "intelligent design." In 500 years, we will have an even better understanding of how the universe was formed, and how living things are connected. For Mailer, when asked who created God, he replied "I'm not going to get trapped in arguments that ask me to explain what came behind the God I'm talking about" (p. 154). In other words, he has an understanding of the inconsistencies, logical fallacies, and errors in his arguments. No problems... he is as human as the rest of us. But this is where his technique of spending "...the last 50 years trying to contemplate the nature of God" fails. He is a literate man with an opinion, not THE man with an opinion, and not a man with THE opinion. Mailer speaks with no authority. What I mean by that is that his authority is no more, and no less, than anyone else. For example, business cartoonist Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert, took a step away from his normal line of work to write two short books on the nature of religion and God: The Religion War, and God's Debris. These were very thoughtful books (or as Adam's wrote, "thought experiments") that would make a reader review her or his own beliefs. Will Mailer's book do this? I don't think so, at least not to the level of Adams. And Adams is a cartoonist!

I envision that Norman Mailer, after a remarkable life, finally listened to all the people who would listen to his cocktail party chatter about the nature of God and the Devil and encourage him to write about it. It probably sounded better after that second glass of wine.