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UZBEKISTAN STATE WORLD LANGUAGES UNIVERSITY

PHILOLOGY FACULTY



Course paper


Theme: Peculiarites of a documentary novel in the novel “The Executioner’s Song” by Norman Mailer






Scientific advisor:
Abdalaieva Davlatoy
Group: 1908
Full name: Mirzatillaev Farrukh

Tashkent 2022


Илмий раҳбар томонидан берилган


ТАҚРИЗ
Исми, шарифи Мирзатиллаев Фаррух. Тили ўрганилаётган мамалакат адабиёти фанидан ёзган курс иши ______ ______________________________________________________________________________
Мазкур курс иши якунланган деб ҳисоблайман ва уни ҳимояга тавсия этаман.
Тақризчи _________________________ ____________
(исми, шарифи) (имзо)

“___”________ 2022 йил

“Тасдиқлайман”
Галиева М.Р.Кафедра мудири
“____”_______ 2022 йил
КУРС (иши) ЛОЙИҲАСИ
Гуруҳ:
ТОПШИРИҚ


  1. Ишлайдиган лойиҳа (мавзу)

Peculiarites of a documentary novel in the novel “The Executioner’s Song” by Norman Mailer.



  1. Бошланғич маълумотлар

The aim of this course paper is to the study social rejection in the Peculiarites of a documentary novel in the novel “The Executioner’s Song” by Norman Mailer.

  1. Қўлланмалар

a) https://journals.openedition.org/ejas/7532?lang=en
b) https://www.jstor.org/stable/40754972
c) https://www.amazon.com/Executioners-Song-Norman-Mailer/dp/044658438X



  1. Чизма қисмининг тузилиши

The course paper includes introduction, main part, conclusion and list of references.

  1. Ёзма қисмининг тузилиши

A) The idea of novel and the ideology embedded in it
B) Realistic event process through documrmtary-novel characters
C) Actual episodes that the author of the story instilled in the movie
D) Why exactly the story-film title is chosen
E) A brief insight into the story-film



  1. Қўшимча вазифа ва кўрсатмалар ___________________________________________

  2. Курс (иши) лойиҳасини бажариш режаси




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Ҳимоя






















































Peculiarites of a documentary novel in the novel “The Executioner’s Song” by Norman Mailer.


CONTENTS:

CONTENTS:

Pages

INTRODUCTION

5

MAIN PART




  1. Main images in a documentary novel

9

  1. The literary legacy of Norman Mailer

11

  1. Classification of images and allusions in the novel “The Executioner’s Song”

15

  1. A story about the social decay of his time in the novel “The Executioner’s Song”

21

  1. The history of turning a literary masterpiece into a cinematic masterpiece




25

CONCLUSION

27

REFERENCES

29

INTRODUCTION


It should be noticed that, in his public viewpoint and in his writing style Mailer was one of the initial writers of the description of a documentary novel. In order to corroborate this tendency, his own assertion may be restated that, he did not create a thoroughgoing, true account of Gary Gilmore’s execution portrayed in a massive sphere (over a thousand pages) in The Executioner’s Song (1979). In this literary work Mailer employs a full range of novelistic devices, mainly the techniques of dramatization and simultaneously he considers and receives the impossibility of pursuing objective truth in his writing, providing explanation how “two accounts of the same episode would sometimes diverge and that in such conflict of evidence, the author chose the version that seemed most likely, for it would be vanity to assume he was always right.” [Norman Mailer. The Executioner’s Song, 1998] The premise of the nonfiction novel, as imagined and practiced between the 1960s and 1980s by Truman Capote, Rodolpho Walsh, Norman Mailer, Tom Wolfe, and others, was the composition of narratives that were true in content and “literary” in form, combining rigorous research with fictional techniques from the realist novel. In an interview with George Plimpton (1966), Truman Capote states that his motivation in writing In Cold Blood (1966) was to understand that journalism and reporting “could be forced to yield a serious new art form: the ‘nonfiction novel’, as I thought of it.” But does the nonfiction novel truly dispense with fiction? To Dorrit Cohn, the phrase “nonfiction novel” serves as an oxymoron
In fact, in works like The Executioner’s Song (Mailer) and In Cold Blood (Capote), signs of fictionality are everywhere: in the artificial naturality of the dialogues, in the effects of the real, in the omniscient point of view that (at least in In Cold Blood) creates an appearance of objectivity. Truman Capote often said that his method was “immaculately factual.” But, as Matinas Suzuki Jr. (2003) has argued, several people mentioned in the book, upon being transformed into characters, questioned “the lack of precision in the transcription of the interviews and the description of their involvement in events.” The same holds true for Mailer. Hence Ivan Jablonka’s (2014, p. 240) suggestion that the nonfiction novel should be treated, in general, as simply “globally true.”
Returning to Döblin’s aforementioned maxim, it is possible to state that the nonfiction novel, just like the historical novel, is “first and foremost a novel.” However, it undeniably involves a considerable displacement, in that the literary creation intentionally takes the path of referentiality. Although zeal for historicity became an obsession for writers like Scott and Tolstoy, creative freedom, the foundation of the modern theory of fiction, is obvious to readers of historical novels. As Lubomír
The aim of this course paper Peculiarites of a documentary novel in the novel “The Executioner’s Song” by Norman Mailer.
According to the aim the following tasks are put forward. They are:

  1. The idea of novel and the ideology embedded in it

  2. Realistic event process through novel characters

  3. Actual episodes that the author of the story instilled in the story

  4. Why exactly the novel title is chosen

  5. A brief insight into the novel

The main part includes information about Peculiarites of a documentary novel in the novel “The Executioner’s Song” by Norman Mailer. this place in life, its novel uniqueness and ability
Conclusion is about the current position of the writer's works.
Reference related to the literature used in carrying out the research work.

MAIN PART



  1. Main images in a documentary novel

Prior to The Executioner’s Song, Mailer’s outstanding effort at creating a non-fiction novel was The Armies of the Night (1968), subtitled History as a novel/ The novel as history on behalf of the Anti-Vietnam War march in October 1967, in which Mailer himself took part. In order to make his novels more believable he used the transcripts from tapes and movies made of his own participation in the event in Washington. Presumably, Flis mentioned that The Armies of the Night is a book of highly metaphorical literary journalism that employs a dual, schizophrenic narrator. The author uses the third-person narration, as well as, a “split” narrator, Mailer, the participant, and Mailer, the commentator. Author divides the entire book into two parts about the same length and entitles them as “Western Voices” and “Eastern Voices”. The narrative style is the same in the both parts. The first book, “Western Voices” Relying on mostly, on Gary Gilmore’s life during the nine-month nine-day period beginning from the jail in Marion, Illinois and his re-entrance to prison for the last time in Utah. Generally, Gary is tall, thin and extremely provincial man. He spent most of his life in reform schools or various prisons. He is considered as the epitome of the destitute, a continuous loser. According to his mother he is “was in prison so long, he didn’t know how to work for a living or pay a bill. All the while he should have been learning, he was locked up.” Therefore, Gary regularly afraid not being able to “make those years up” Most people claim that it's hopeless and profoundly depressing and miserable, not just in Gary's death but in the lives of its main characters. They are married and divorced way too young, sexually violated, mentally ill, chronically poor, psychologically weak. For the first third of the book, Gary's let out of prison on robbery charges, goes to live with other relatives who put faith in his rehabilitation and try to set him up with jobs and a place to live temporarily. Then he meets this girl, Nicole. She's something like approximately 15 years younger than him. They have this obsessive, mostly personal relationship and then she leaves him and he kills a couple people "to keep from killing [her]." As Norman Mailer mostly relied on interpretation, his one-thousand-page account of the Gilmore execution is a reformative attempt to provide a comprehensive and persuasive interpretation of that event. Mailer’s creative and knowable tool of description is such that it allows history to come alive though it happened many years ago. The apparent datum is that contemporary documentary novels simulate reality, they often develop it to a certain literary degree. Many writers, whose works can be considered as documentary novels are aware of the fact and some of them openly claim it (for example, John Berendt, Norman Mailer) that their narratives can never give a fully accurate development of events, since, as soon as they are narrated, facts appear to have interrelated reflection of the author’s interpretation of the reality or history.



  1. The literary legacy of Norman Mailer

Nachem Malech Mailer (January 31, 1923 – November 10, 2007), known by his pen name Norman Kingsley Mailer, was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, activist, filmmaker and actor. In a career spanning over six decades, Mailer had 11 best-selling books, at least one in each of the seven decades after World War II—more than any other post-war American writer.
His novel The Naked and the Dead was published in 1948 and brought him early renown. His 1968 nonfiction novel Armies of the Night won the Pulitzer Prize for non-fiction as well as the National Book Award. Among his best-known works is The Executioner's Song, the 1979 winner of the Pulitzer Prize for fiction.
Mailer is considered an innovator of "creative non-fiction" or "New Journalism", along with Truman Capote, Joan Didion, Hunter S. Thompson, and Tom Wolfe, a genre which uses the style and devices of literary fiction in factual journalism. He was a cultural commentator and critic, expressing his views through his novels, journalism, frequent press appearances and essays, the most famous and reprinted of which is "The White Negro". In 1955, he and three others founded The Village Voice, an arts and politics-oriented weekly newspaper distributed in Greenwich Village. Mailer's longest novel (1310 pages), appeared in 1991 and received his best reviews since The Executioner's Song. It is an exploration of the untold dramas of the CIA from the end of World War II to 1965. He undertook a huge amount of research for the novel, which is still on CIA reading lists.[citation needed] He ended the novel with the words "To be continued" and planned to write a sequel, titled Harlot's Grave, but other projects intervened and he never wrote it. Harlot's Ghost sold well.
Indeed, though Mailer has been called one of the greatest writers of his generation, he has also been vilified as an egotistical buffoon who never lived up to the potential he showed in his debut — The Naked and the Dead, a World War II novel based in part on his own experiences as an Army infantryman.
Mailer's second novel, Barbary Shore, was panned by critics. Several publishers rejected his third, Deer Park, and when it finally saw print, it met with mixed reviews. It was a pattern that would continue throughout his career, but as Mailer told Terry Gross in a 1991 Fresh Air interview, he never let his critics get the best of him.
"I am the only major writer in America who has had more bad reviews than good reviews in the course of his writing life," Mailer said. "So that gives me a certain pride, you know. I feel they keep taking their best shot, and they're ... not going to stop me, ya know."
Mailer always wanted to be taken seriously as a writer. But his private life often got as much attention as his prose. Married six times, he was jailed briefly in 1960 for stabbing his second wife, Adele Mailer. And his feuds with fellow writers, including William Styron, Truman Capote and Gore Vidal, were infamous. Biographer Mary Dearborn says Mailer was one of the first true celebrity writers.
"This is somebody who aggressively sought out fame," Dearborn says. "He understood the politics of celebrity before anyone else did. The person comparable is Hemingway — who also had celebrity thrust upon him and then came to embrace it."
Mailer always thought of himself as a novelist, but he may have made a more enduring mark as an essayist and journalist. A co-founder of The Village Voice, New York City's fabled alternative newsweekly, he helped invent a new journalistic form: creative nonfiction, which applied the narrative style of the novel to real events. A political activist during the Vietnam War era, Mailer ran unsuccessfully for mayor of New York in 1969. And he used his own political activism as a source for his books, especially Armies of the Night, about the 1967 March on the Pentagon, and Miami and the Siege of Chicago, about the 1968 political conventions. Both books were well received — Armies of the Night, in fact, won both the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize. Mailer won his second Pulitzer for The Executioners Song, which he described as a "true-life novel" about Gary Gilmore, the first man executed in the U.S. after the reinstitution of the death penalty. Phillip Sipiora, editor of The Mailer Review, says that ultimately Mailer is best understood as a cultural commentator.
"He's always been at the center of a number of cultural storms and issues," Sipiora says. "He engaged the feminist movement in the '60s and '70s. He's been a prolific sports commentator. He's also been a critic of contemporary fiction forms. So in that sense, he's been very influential in a cultural way."
Conflict seemed to be at the core of Mailer's life and his work. Whether writing about war, murder or boxing, he seemed fascinated by the idea of violence But if critics sometimes found this fascination excessive, Mailer never apologized for pursuing life with a vengeance. Everything, he told Fresh Air's Terry Gross, was fodder for his writing.
"You know, if you're just bookish, there's a tendency to get terribly bitter about people who are physical," Mailer said. "My feeling from the beginning always was, if you are going to be a novelist, I've got to be a novelist who can encompass all kinds of experience. Don't ever narrow down the horizons of what you want to write about."

3. Classification of images and allusions in the novel “The Executioner’s Song”


The first edition of this Pulitzer Prize winner was published by Little, Brown in 1979. It was 1056 pages long, and the original retail price was $16.95. The first edition can be identified by the following criteria: "FIRST EDITION" is stated on copyright page. The Executioner's Song won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Norman Mailer’s Pulitzer Prize–winning The Executioner’s Song tells the story of Gary Gilmore, the convicted murderer whose death penalty sentence became a lightning rod for public debate over capital punishment. Though it reads like a novel, the book is a magnum opus of creative nonfiction, drawing from reams of documents and countless hours of interviews to paint a nuanced picture of Gilmore and the events that led up to his 1979 execution by firing squad. The summary and analysis in this ebook are intended to complement your reading experience and bring you closer to a great work of nonfiction.
Norman Maııer's nonf}ction novel The Exeeutioner's Song dea1s with murder. it is the story of Gary Gilmore.who robbed two men and -I. kllled them wlthout hesitation. The book is proof of Ma1ler's dexter in making nonfietion narTatlves. In faet, Mailer won his second' Pul1tzer pıize ın 1980 wlth his lO50-page work ofart The Executtoner's
Song. As in all nonfietlon novels. Ma1ler un1tes fact and ftctlon inmExecutioner's Song. He rel1es heav1ly on documents and uses novelistle t.eehn1ques to Write about characters who seem to be Netlona. MaHer dlv1des the book illto two parts about the same length and entlt1es them as 'Western Voiees" and "Eastem Voiees." The narrative
method is the same in both. The characters. Gllmore and those who were somehow related to hini, are presented in brJef seenes. The extra spacing between the short paragraphs facilitates the shift from one character to another. it is as if the character who makes an effort to recall the events. were telling his story to an İllteI Viewer or into a tape recorder. in general the language used is fiat but tuned to the styles and rhythms of the characters. The first book. 'Westem Voices" concentrates on Gcuy Gihnore's life
durJng the nine-month nine-day perJod starting wlth his parole from the prison in Marton. Illinois and his re-entrance to prlson for the last time in Utah.
Gary GiImore is talI. thin and extremely provinela1. He has spent most of his life In reform schools or various prJsons. He is the ephtome of the destltute. a continuous loser. His mother says, Gary "was in prison so long. he dldn't know how to work for a l1ving or payabill. All the while he should have been learning, he was locked up" That is why Gaıy constantly fears not betng able to ''make thoşe years up". He is awkward when out of prison; he wears mlsmatched clothes.
The first section of The Execut1oner's Song deals with characters who are mainly fam1ly members, his girlfriend Nicole Baker and Gaıy's two victims. Gilmore is released from a federal penitentlary to liis cousin in Provo. Utah and a month later moves out and starts working on a full-time Job. He soan meets Nicole Baker whose life is Just as dark as his. Nicole is Ilineteen, twice d1vorcedwith two chilciren and has been in and out of mental hospitaıs. She blames her fathers close friend Uncle Lee for her traubles. Uncle Lee abused her sexually when she was a child.
Again in The Mythopelc Reallty, Zavarzadeh says: "Instead of a netive world the Datatlona! nonfiction novel depicts a stubbom phenomenal circle of experience whtch, when closely examıned, proves baJI1ing and mysterious" (181). The protagon1st Gary Gı1more's actions as well as crtmes are Incomprehensible and illogica1. it ts difficult to beheve that characters!ike Gilmore, Nichale and otlıers In the boak could exist in the real world and are not :lnvented characters. The tradiUana! baundanea between the rea! and the fietltious are threatened. Reality seems to be mare unrealıstle for the unthtnkable has come true. Confronted wiili such characters and events. the reader is baffied. What distinguishes The Execuüoner's song from other nonfiction novels Is that tt does not concentrate solely on the Gilmore case that drew a lot of aUention, but revea1s what cannot be faund tn other nonftctlon novels. that Is, the payoffs for exc1usive rights or legal releases. it shows the great struggle that goes behind the scene to get Gilınore's story. Since an ample amount of reporting ts ready-made tn the fonn of poltce and court reports and ts accesslble to the wrlters. murder ts an enduring subject among nonftction writers. Moreover, as Truman Capote had once stated. the first step to write a nonftcUon novel ts to, choose a suQject that wou1d not "date". Thus. by wrtttng on the thenıe of murder a topic that will endure. the wrtter fulfills the ftrst requtrement for the nomtetton novel, the novel based on facts. Tom Wolfe's defln1tlon of tbJs fonn must be kept tn mind then studytng this work. WoIfe explains that it is the use by people of WI1tlng nomictlon of techntques which heretofare had been thought of as conftned to the novel or to the short story. to create tn one fonn both the klnd of objectlve reality of journallsm and the subjectlve reality that people have always gone for the novel for. This brtef analysts of The Ezecuüoner's Song 15 proof of Mai1er's abtllty in creatıng the objective reality of Jounıal1sm and the subjective reality of the novel in a single work of art.


  1. A story about the social decay of his time in the novel “The Executioner’s Song”

The article deals with psychological problems of the main character of Norman Mailer’s novel “Executioner’s Song” Gary Gilmore, who enters the world of crime due to lack of love and constant nervousness in his childhood. As a teenager, Gary began to be engaged in petty crimes, going out on the streets to escape from the ongoing terrors and moral abuse in his family. Naturally, a child who did not feel light and love in his family could not show love, empathy to the people around him. As a result he always felt pain committing various crimes. Incredibly, Gilmore scored 133 at an IQ test, moreover, scored high marks both at aptitude and achievement tests. Nevertheless, unfortunate he dropped out of high school in the 9th grade despite his artistic and intellectual talent.
One of the pioneering documentary novels – “The Executioner's Song” is a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Norman Mailer that follows the life of Gary Gilmore, a man sentenced to death for a murder in Utah. Most importantly, the author depicts the social and political environment that led the hero to the crime. In fact, this documentary novel, which reflects various social issues, was a finalist for the 1980 National Book Award. Distinguished by its recognition of
Gilmore's personality and the aftermath of his murders, the documentary has been central to various national debates over the Supreme Court's reinstatement of the death penalty. Strikingly, Gary Gilmore was the first person executed in the United States after the death penalty was reinstated in 1976. If we search for the information about his background, in 1976, 35-year-old Gary Gilmore was convicted of armed robbery in Indiana and sentenced to 13 years in prison. However, he was released earlier according to the strict criteria; afterwards he went to Utah to live with his cousin Brenda Nicole. Brenda agreed to be his sponsor; simultaneously she supported, tried to direct him to the right path, as well as, helped him to find a job. Unexpectedly, when his life was going on with the hope for the bright future, Gilmore meets Nicola Baker, to whom, despite her young age, she became a 19-year-old widow with two children. To their lucky or unlucky chance, their relationship started to be closer than ever. Warmth that began with friendship led to romance. Despite his efforts to change himself in positive way, Gilmore often suffered from emotional disorder and lack of self-control, resulting in immoral acts such as aggression, theft, and drug use. Soon after breaking up with Nicola, Gilmore killed two men in two separate robberies. After that, Gilmore, who could not live up to the expectations of his cousin Brenda Nicole, he was handed over to the police by Brenda Nicole herself. He was convicted of murder and sentenced to death at a trial in September. However, the verdict was overturned 3 times. Remarkably, Gilmore was in the national media and community spotlight after fighting to have his execution carried out
as quickly as possible. Without any doubt, Gilmore was aware of his upcoming
punishment. Gilmore's willingness to die without rebellion, without a fight, or even demand, caused quite a stir among the public. Surprisingly, there were so many people who believed in Gilmore's innocence, and hold strong belief about that he did not commit the murder. Unavoidably, the case of Gilmore's crime condemn society, the government, and Gilmore's family. Thousands of people
observed Gilmore's trials, hoping for his acquittal and survival. Simultaneously, dozens of letters were received in Gilmore's name lmost every day. These letters include everything from sincere wishes to expressions of love for Gary. "I want to express my gratitude to the thousands of people who have sent me letters over the past few weeks. I received letters from all over the world. Thank you for your attention.
These letters were full of sympathy, love and care. There are a lot good, sincere people in the world." In prison, Gary and his girlfriend Nicole, who cam to see him on a regular basis, agreed to commit suicide, resulting in them falling into a coma for a short period in November. On January 17, 1977, after appeals conducted by lawyers on behalf of the American Civil Liberties Union (against Gilmore's wishes) were decisively rejected by the US Supreme Court, Gilmore was executed by the method of his own choice: by firing squad [1, 4]. In general, he was the first person to be executed by trial in the United States since Louis Monge was executed in a gas chamber in Colorado on June 2, 1967. The documentary novel consists of three parts, based entirely on interviews and
conversations with Gilmore and his family, friends, and family members of the murder victims. First, the social environment and factors that led to the murder, the scenes of the trial and the execution are narrated, it should be noted that the novel is based entirely on documents and facts. In particular, more attention has been paid to Gary's decision to seek execution rather than proceed with the
appeals process. The first part of the novel presents in details Gilmore's childhood, including his time in prison for juvenile delinquency, including his release on certain arrangement, and his personal relationships during that time. The second part focuses on ilmore's trial, particularly his refusal to appeal the death sentence, his conversation with Lawrence Schiller, and his lawyers' ongoing fight to save Gary's life. Naturally, all these processes included documents and faceto-face meetings with the characters of the novel.
In interviews with journalists, Norman Mailer expressed his motivation to conduct long-term face-to-face interviews with everyone associated with Gilmore, to record them, "In Gilmore’s childhood tortures, I have felt and experienced all my life, almost similar memories. I understood his existence," the writer recalls in his memories. In another interview, Norman Mailer said, perhaps the most important theme of the book, "We have important choices to make in life, and one of them may be the thoughtful and dangerous choice most of us have now between dying and 'saving one's soul.'" In his analysis of The Hangman's Song, literary critic Mark Edmundson said: "From the moment Gilmore is convinced that he is ready to die, he acquires a certain dignity [...] Gilmore has developed a romantic belief. From the moment Gilmore is imprisoned, he believes himself to be worthy of dying, and is willing to end his life that way".
Norman Mailer describes Gary Gilmore's life as it was in the multi-page novel “The Executioner's Song”, based on documents and facts. That is, in 1976, he was found guilty of the death of two people in the state of Utah and sentenced a death penalty. The novel focuses on the murders, trial, and execution of Gary Gilmore, as well as the lives of the people he interacted with. The writer tries to objectively evaluate the main factors in the process leading up to Gary Gilmore's crime, not limited to the life of Gary Gilmore himself and his loved ones. Considerably, in the middle of the 20th century, the social and political life in America was completely different; therefore the society was in an incomprehensible disorder. Situations such as unemployment, homelessness, carelessness, indifference and ignorance have reached their peak – especially the rise of crim among young people was one of the most painful points. Given the above, the writer leaves to the readers themselves to consider the circumstances that caused the crime in a certain sense. Now, it is worth to analyze the life, family background and childhood of the main character, Gary Mark Gilmore, whose real name was Fae Robert Coffman, an American born on December 4, 1940, who confessed to the murder in Utah without any pressure, without rebelling against the sentence, even he came to the public's attention by rejecting the reasons given for his survival. As we mentioned above, he became the first person executed in th United States in nearly a decade after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a new version of a death penalty statutes in the 1976 Greg v. Georgia decision. These new statutes overcame the 1972 ruling in Furman v. Georgia, which ruled that previous death penalty laws were "cruel and unusual" punishment and therefore unconstitutional. (The Supreme Court had previously ordered all states to replace the death penalty with life in prison after Furman v.
Georgia.) Gilmore was convicted of the shooting in 1977 and executed. His life and execution were the subject of Norman Mailer's documentary novel “The Executioner's Song” (1979). Gary Mark Gilmore was born on December 4, 1940, in McKamey, Texas, the second of four sons to Frank and Bessie Gilmore. In addition to Gary, the children in th family were Frank, Gaylen, writer and musician, journalist Mikal Gilmore. Senior Frank Harry Gilmore, the head of the family, an alcohol addicted person, who had other wives and families, but he did not support any of them financially, socially, or spiritually. By choice, he married Bessie, a Mormon tribe from Provo, Utah, in Sacramento, California. Gary was born while the family was living in Texas under the family name Coffman to avoid the law. Frank christens his son Faye Robert with the surname Coffman, but when they leave Texas, Bessie changes it to Gary Mark. The name change was regarded as the most striking point of his life later, though Gary's mother probably never would have done this, had she known it would turn her life upside down. Frank's mother, Faye, kept the original "Faye Coffman" birth certificate, which Gary unluckily found twenty years later. It was a pity to say that this event
would be the beginning of a tragic life for Gary. Gary assumed he was illegitimate or someon else's son. He also denoted to understand why he never got along with his father. When Gary's mother tried to explain to him the reason for the name change, he did not listen, got upset, angry and run out into the street. As a result, he did not even imagine that he had entered the life of juvenile crime.
In the Gilmore’s family, the theme of illegitimacy, fraud, and conspiracy was
commonplace. Perhaps, it is not surprising that such vices as the root of the family itself, wrong living, dirty eating, neglect of children, lack of fear of others were paid with Gary's life. Frank Senior's mother, Faye Gilmore, told her daughter-in-law, Bessie, that Frank's father was a famous magician in Sacramento, where he used to live. Moreover, Bessie researched the family tree in the library and conclude that Frank was Harry Houdini's illegitimate son.
In fact, Houdini was only sixteen years old in 1890, the year Frank Gilmore was born, and only then began his magic career. Thus, his mother-in-law, Faye, insisted that Frank's father was the man who later became known as a famous magician. Gary's younger brother, Michal Gilmore, believed the story was just a lie or fiction, but both his father and mother believed it.
During Gary's childhood, the family often moved around the Western United States, and Frank supported them financially by selling fake magazine subscriptions. Gary had a bad relationship with his father, whom his brother Michal described as "a cruel and unintelligent man". Children's lives begin with
loving their parents; children learn from them as they grow up; and sometimes they forgive them. Frank Gilmore was strict and had a bad temper, and often punished his sons, Gary, and Gaylen, with a razor, a whip, or a belt for no apparent reason. He also beat his wife almost on a daily basis. However, there were times when the father's heart softened as he got older. Gary’s brother Michal said that Frank only whipped him once and never did it again after Michal told him, "I hate you." In addition, on many occasions Frank and Bessie would argue loudly and verbally abuse each other. Frank teased Bessie for being crazy, mocked at her, and pushed various slanderous stones at her. And Bessie, in revenge, called him a "Catlicker" [Catholic] and threatened to kill him one day. These abuses escalated over the years, causing depression and great turmoil in Gary Gilmore's family, especially in his own life.
Naturally, in this process, the background of Gary's family and the unhealthy
environment in it, the proximity to chaos, the instability of the family environment, definitely affected the future of the whole family.


  1. The history of turning a literary masterpiece into a cinematic masterpiece

The Executioner's Song (1979) is a Pulitzer Prize-winning true crime novel by Norman Mailer that depicts the events related to the execution of Gary Gilmore for murder by the state of Utah. The title of the book may be a play on "The Lord High Executioner's Song" from Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado. "The Executioner's Song" is also the title of a poem by Mailer, published in Fuck You magazine in September 1964 and reprinted in Cannibals and Christians (1966), and the title of one of the chapters of his 1974 novel The Fight. Notable for its portrayal of Gilmore and the anguish generated by the murders he committed, the book was central to the national debate over the revival of capital punishment by the Supreme Court in Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153 (1976). Gilmore was the first person to be executed in the United States since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976. In April 1976, Gilmore, aged 35, was released from prison after serving 13 years for armed robbery in Indiana. He was flown to Utah to live with his cousin Brenda Nicol, who agreed to be his sponsor and tried to help him find work. Gilmore soon met and became romantically involved with Nicole Baker, a 19-year-old widow with two young children who was separated from her second husband. Despite his efforts to reform himself, Gilmore had a pattern of emotional volatility and self-destructive behavior, resulting in fighting, stealing, and using drugs. After Baker broke up with Gilmore in July, he murdered two men in two separate robberies on succeeding days. Gilmore was turned in by Brenda Nicol.
He was convicted of murder at trial in September and sentenced to death. The execution was stayed on three occasions. Gilmore became a national media sensation after he fought to have his execution performed as soon as possible. He and Baker agreed to a suicide pact that resulted in each of them suffering temporary comas in November. On January 17, 1977, after appeals filed by lawyers on behalf of the American Civil Liberties Union (in defiance of Gilmore's wishes) were rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court, Gilmore was executed by the method he chose: firing squad. He was the first person to be judicially executed in the United States since Luis Monge was executed in the Colorado gas chamber on June 2, 1967.
Based almost entirely on interviews with the family and friends of both Gilmore's and his victims, the book is exhaustive in its approach. Divided into three sections, the book focuses on the events leading up to the murders, and the trial and execution of Gilmore, including full documentation of Gilmore's court appearances and his decision to demand his execution rather than to continue the appeals process. The first section of the book deals with Gilmore's early life, his numerous detentions in juvenile crime facilities, and later, prison. It details his release some months prior to his first murder and the relationships he establishes during that time. The second section focuses more extensively on Gilmore's trial, including his refusal to appeal his death sentence, his dealings with Lawrence Schiller, and his attorneys' continued fight on his behalf.
In interviews, Mailer discussed what motivated him to invest so much time interviewing everyone involved with Gary Gilmore. On one occasion, he said that Gilmore "appealed to me because he embodied many of the themes I've been living with all my life long". In another interview, he asserted that perhaps the most important theme of the book is that "we have profound choices to make in life, and one of them may be the deep and terrible choice most of us avoid between dying now and 'saving one's soul'".
In his analysis of The Executioner's Song, critic Mark Edmundson said:
“from the point where Gilmore decides that he is willing to die, he takes on a certain dignity [...] Gilmore has developed something of a romantic faith. Gilmore's effort, from about the time he enters prison, is to conduct himself so that he can die what he would himself credit as a 'good death'”.
The Executioner's Song won the Playboy writing award in 1979 and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1980,[5] and was a finalist for the 1980 National Book Award.[6]

Christopher Ricks described the novel in the London Review of Books as "a work of genius in its range, depth, and restraint".[7] Joan Didion remarks that "no one but Mailer could have dared this book. The authentic Western voice, the voice heard in 'The Executioner's Song,' is one heard often in life but only rarely in literature, the reason being that to truly know the West is to lack all will to write it down". She closes her review with, "This is an absolutely astonishing book."


David Lodge also wrote a favourable review in the Times Literary Supplement, arguing that "The Executioner's Song demonstrates the undiminished power of empirical narrative to move, instruct, and delight, to provoke pity and fear, and to extend our human understanding. It is remarkable ... for the professional skill and self-discipline with which it is composed."
Not all reviews were favourable. Charles Nicholl complained in the Daily Telegraph that Mailer perhaps overestimated the charisma of his subject, and "is often guilty of spurious[ly] overloading ... anything that touched Gilmore". He also added that the work was in need of a "judicious edit".
Mailer adapted a screenplay from the book for the eponymous 1982 television movie, which stars Tommy Lee Jones (who won an Emmy for the role), Eli Wallach, Pat Corley, Christine Lahti, and Rosanna Arquette, and was directed by Lawrence Schiller. The character Larry Samuels in the film represents Mailer.
Arguably the greatest book from America’s most heroically ambitious writer, The Executioner’s Song follows the short, blighted life of Gary Gilmore who became famous after he robbed two men in 1976 and killed them in cold blood. After being tried and convicted, he immediately insisted on being executed for his crime. To do so, he fought a system that seemed intent on keeping him alive long after it had sentenced him to death. And that fight for the right to die is what made him famous.
Mailer tells not only Gilmore’s story, but those of the men and women caught in the web of his life and drawn into his procession toward the firing squad. All with implacable authority, steely compassion, and a restraint that evokes the parched landscape and stern theology of Gilmore’s Utah. The Executioner’s Song is a trip down the wrong side of the tracks to the deepest source of American loneliness and violence. It is a towering achievement-impossible to put down, impossible to forget his detailed literature summary also contains Literary Precedents and a Free Quiz on The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer.
Norman Mailer's Executioner's Song is many things, and its status between the realms of fiction and non-fiction makes it difficult to define. It is not non-fiction, notwithstanding the author's claim in his Afterword. The Pulitzer Prize Committee recognized Mailer's work as a "...thoroughly imagined work of fiction." This novel is not a work of non-fiction, but it is also not wholly a work of fiction. The book's form causes us to examine the line between reality and perception. What is the truth? How is truth colored by the telling of it, whether through a novel or through the rules of a trial? Are the points of view about Gilmore that Mailer describes "truth" in any way?
Executioner's Song is the novelized story of the life and death of Gary Mark Gilmore, the first person to be legally executed in the United States following a ten-year hiatus on executions imposed by the U.S. Supreme Court. The execution occurs in Utah, the center of the Mormon religion. The background of the Mormon culture, with its history of blood atonement, plays a role in the novel. Mailer romanticizes Gilmore's life and death, painting him often as a heroic figure. Still, it is clear that Gilmore is a career criminal who chooses the path his life takes while still a pre-teen and pointlessly kills two people. Is Mailer biased toward Gilmore, showing him as something he is not? Is Mailer creating a commentary on perception and how Gilmore is perceived in the media and elsewhere? The presentation of Gilmore's character, whether purposefully or not, makes us wonder what is reality and what is perception. Ultimately, the whole book is colored by Mailer's perceptions and intentions, as is all media, to some degree and sometimes insidiously.

CONCULUSION


In conclusion, we may say that Norman Mailer’s work represents a third mode between the conventional categories of fiction and nonfiction, which I might call “mailerism”. His blender of genres, literary forms, and conventions constitutes a complex literary fiction, which blurs and merges the distinctions between fact and fiction, between fiction and non-fiction. His narration has got peculiar characteristics and specific rhetorical techniques. Although there is autonomy between Mailer’s fiction and nonfiction, at the same time there is a deep connection among them. The narrative forms, the imaginary worlds, the mythology, the images, the figures of speech, the repeated topics, form a strong base upon which his fiction and nonfiction is constructed.
Remarkably, Norman Mailer admits himself that he decorated the novel The Executioner’s Song with literary colors to hook the unfathomable whys and wherefores of the crime related to Gary Gilmore’s life. Strikingly, Mailer does not believe that the novel reveals the outcomes of the events, he just uses third-person narrative and thus he usually confronts from the view of inconsiderable omniscience in the novel. He recognizes the peculiarities around the characters which are moving at times, by way of regarding its originality, The Executioner’s Song is a tacitly expended and mistakable life and disgraceful death of murderer Gary Gilmore. Mailer thoughtfully structured the text, in regard to In Cold Blood, The Executioner’s Song does not fully pay attention to the comprehensive conclusion about Gary’s admissions behind his destructive aptitude. Mailer decides to approach differently so as not to make the readers console with determinable ending, as the conclusion of events he uses Gary’s mother as the closing remark, similarly, he offers it to the readers "If they want to shoot me, I have the same kind of guts Gary has. Let them come."
Based almost entirely on interviews with the family and friends of both Gilmore's and his victims, the book is exhaustive in its approach. Divided into three sections, the book focuses on the events leading up to the murders, and the trial and execution of Gilmore, including full documentation of Gilmore's court appearances and his decision to demand his execution rather than to continue the appeals process.
The first section of the book deals with Gilmore's early life, his numerous detentions in juvenile crime facilities, and later, prison. It details his release some months prior to his first murder and the relationships he establishes during that time.
The second section focuses more extensively on Gilmore's trial, including his refusal to appeal his death sentence, his dealings with Lawrence Schiller, and his attorneys' continued fight on his behalf.
This novel is noteworthy for its portrayal of Gary Gilmore, a violent product of America's prisons who became known for two reasons: first for robbing and murdering two men in 1976, and second, after being tried and convicted, he insisting on dying for his crime. In order to do so, he had to fight a system that seemed ironically intent to keep him alive. The Executioner’s Song is a Pulitzer Prize-winning true crime novel.
In the final couple of chapters, Mailer ties up a few loose ends. Nicole goes to Southern California for a few months and then relocates to somewhere in Oregon. She tries to remain faithful to Gary for a while, claiming she senses his presence during that period, but she soon reverts to her old habits, picking up a hitchhiker and taking him to bed. One of Gary's Mormon apologists claims the murderer comes to him in a vision to let him know that everything is okay and how cool it is to be able to walk through walls. Vern's knee condition gets worse, and he has to give up his shop. Bessie's health also continues to deteriorate up in Portland. Gary's attorneys sprinkle his ashes from an airplane above Spanish Fork, Utah, following Gary's last instruction and his last act of defiance. It is illegal to spread human ashes in the pristine Mormon air of the Beehive State.
The second book of this two-book tome tells the tale of the media circus Gary Gilmore creates by accepting the death penalty handed down by the Utah courts. He insists they follow through with it and chooses a firing squad as the means of carrying out the sentence. Quickly, the world media takes over the Hyatt in Salt Lake City, replete with TV producers, charlatans and fast-buck artists, including such notables as the ever-cool Geraldo Rivera. Always sensitive to the outside world's view of this peculiar state as a bucolic enclave of religious eccentrics, the governor and others high in state government are not eager to win the reputation as the first state to defy the Supreme Court ban on capital punishment, especially by firing squad. Sam Smith, the warden of the Utah State Penitentiary, and the attorneys representing Gary, however, are adamant that the state follow through with its sentence. Organizations such as the ACLU and NAACP get involved in trying to stop the execution, as does the attorney for another condemned murderer who is afraid a Gilmore precedent will get his client killed. Gary's insistence on dying creates some strange bed fellows, as traditional adversaries, the Attorney General's Office and the team of defense attorneys, join forces. They manage to get a couple of stays of execution, which are then quickly overturned in a prolonged game of legal brinkmanship. The last stay is overturned by a three-judge panel of the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals just a few minutes before the execution.

REFRENCES:



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  2. https://www.rottentomatoes.com/celebrity/norman_mailer

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  4. https://usajournalshub.com/index.php/tajssei/article/download/555/519/

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  6. https://journals.openedition.org/ejas/7532?lang=en

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  9. http://hozir.org/contents-introduction-chapter-i-american-author-norman-mailer.html?page=5

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  15. https://web.english.upenn.edu/~despey/mailer.htm

  16. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/276845778_The_blending_of_fact_and_fiction_in_three_American_documentary_crime_narratives

  17. https://www.commentary.org/articles/pearl-bell-2/mailer-settling-for-less/

  18. https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/norman-mailer-in-context/form-and-genre/9A73F0953B7544B0538751022CECEED0

  19. https://go.gale.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA514657572&sid=googleScholar&v=2.1&it=r&linkaccess=abs&issn=19364679&p=AONE&sw=w

  20. https://www.rogerebert.com/interviews/norman-mailer-tough-guy-directs

  21. http://www.bookrags.com/studyguide-executioners-song/#:~:text=Executioner's%20Song%20is%20the%20novelized,center%20of%20the%20Mormon%20religion.

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  23. https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/summary-and-analysis-of-the-executioners-song-worth-books/1125375734






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