Because Vidal writes about himself all the time you might feel "why a bio?" - but on the other hand you also feel, "well, I'd like to know what the untold story is". He deserves a big serious bio and Kaplan does an admirable job. Although drawing heavily on Vidal's own writings and interviews with the subject, this is very well researched and well written, too. It certainly doesn't lack for colourful characters - Vidal's father (though perhaps a bit bland as a person) was a top athlete, aviation pioneer, on the cover of Time, etc; his mother was a beautiful, funny, enigmatic pain (the classic mother-of-a-gay-son, to be honest); grand-dad was a blind Senator (conservative, isolationist, populist, honest, anti-welfare - continually defies "left wing" and "right wing" categorisation); step dad was an amiable wealthy idiot who later became Jackie Kennedy's step dad.
All these are familiar from Vidal's writings but Kaplan's more objective account is great to read. So are stories of the time at school (where Kaplan correctly devotes considerable chunks to the time Vidal spend honing his debating skills - something which contributed to his later genius as an essayist and skill as a television pundit). He was surprisingly straight as a younger man - had a full on and apparently satisfactory relationship with a girl called Rosalind (surely the basis for "Kit" in A Season of Comfort), then later on with Anais Nin before making the switch full time. After the war he was part of what was a pink mafia - running around Europe going cruising with other gay writers like Tennessee Williams and Isherwood, feuding with Truman Capote, etc (William Goldman is right - talent tends to cluster - sometimes the clustering can get really specific, e.g. Vidal went to bed with Jack Kerouac). Had enough cash to live this really nice lifestyle until declining sales of his novels forced him to look elsewhere to make money - an early attempt to write paperbacks didn't hit paydirt, but a move into television did. Then it was Broadway and movies, all of which Gore made a success at, then politics, at which he nearly made a success at, then back to novels, with a string of best sellers. No wonder he was confident and cocky.
The book becomes less interesting once Vidal gets his life in order. I would have liked more on his post 60s adventures in the screen trade, eg Caligula instead of all the pages devoted to his feuds with Buckley and Mailer - in the scheme of things surely they weren't that important. The book ends in the 1990s, before Vidal had what is maybe his final (?) chapter as a public figure: involvement with Tim McVeigh, opponent of Bush and the post Sept 2001 world. Not Kaplan's fault but you feel the book needs another edition.
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