Publication

1999 - Vintage Books, New York, New York (State)

Language

English

Word Count

67,500 words, Guess

Page Count

270 pages

Identifiers

and 4 more

Classifications

  • DDC813/.54
  • LCCPS3525.A4152 A78 1999

Description

Stephen Rojack is a decorated war hero, a former Congressman, and a certified public intellectual with his own television show. He is also married to the very rich, very beautiful, and utterly amoral Deborah Caughlin Kelly. But one night, in the prime of his existence, he hears the moon talking to him on the terrace of a fashionable New York high-rise, and it is urging him to kill himself. It is almost as a defense against that infinitely seductive voice that Rojack murders his wife.In this wild battering ram of a novel, which was originally published to vast controversy in 1965, Norman Mailer creates a character who might be a fictional precursor of the philosopher-killer he would later profile in The Executioner's Song. As Rojack runs amok through the city in which he was once a privileged citizen, Mailer peels away the layers of our social norms to reveal a world of pure appetite and relentless cruelty. Sensual, horrifying, and informed by a vision that is one part Nietzsche, one part de Sade, and one part Charlie Parker, An American Dream grabs the reader by the throat and refuses to let go.

Subjects

Other Editions

  • An American dreamVintage Books1999-01-01
Show 12 more editions

2 other editions not shown

Reader Reviews

No reviews yet for this book.

Be the first to share your thoughts!