Devotion #13

I’m in the process of wrapping up some liner notes for this budding record label, in addition to a feature on one of the men who helped provide the setting for this event, so I’m afraid this post is going to be a relative quickie. I also wish it were on better terms, but once again, condolences are in order.

Norman Mailer
January 31, 1923 – November 10, 2007



“When We Were Kings” was my first introduction to Mailer, and I remember being fascinated by the insight he and George Plimpton provided throughout the film. As I learned more about Mailer and his work, two things became apparent. The first was that he might very well be the smartest author I’ve ever encountered, and the second was that he and Plimpton, along with Tom Wolfe, Gay Talese, Joan Didion, and others are to credit for the emergence of New Journalism, a long-form, literary style of reporting (also known as creative nonfiction) that allowed writers like myself with no real journalism education to actually have a shot at making a living.

Here is an excerpt from Stop Smiling magazine’s 2005 boxing issue, in which Mailer discusses the relationship between boxing and writing with his son and fellow scribe, John Buffalo Mailer.

JBM: Is there a correlation between boxing and writing?

NM: A small one, but it drew me to my interest in boxing. Which is: writers do suffer. But it’s at long range. You print a sentence or write a paragraph that is going to offend certain people in certain places, and you know it. Of course, it’s a tricky business. The people who it’s going to enrage usually don’t read books, they just hear about what you’ve done – which is usually worse. In any event, you may pay for it but you don’t know how, when or where. It’s down the road. On the other hand, there does remain one huge similarity – just one, there are many, many differences, obviously – but the one huge similarity is that you’ve got to pull it out of yourself. Particularly when writing fiction. There comes a point where you really have to dig down into your own vitals in order to get something out there. And in that sense it can be killing. You can really feel that you are using yourself up as your write. And boxers have that same feeling. Sometimes they have to call up something down deep in themselves in order to continue. And also, if you are a serious writer, there is the added desire to be more than just a serious writer – to be a writer who makes change in the history of one’s time. That’s a powerful motive. And when one feels that one is not successful at that, it’s depressing, just as it’s depressing for a prizefighter who comes to realize that his talent is not what he had hoped for. Big, but not big enough.

Another passing I have to mention is the death of Dr. Donda West, mother of producer Kanye West. West, raised mostly by his mother as an only child, has made numerous references over the course of his career to her enormous guidance and influence. According to her biography on the website for the Kanye West Foundation, Dr. West retired from her position as Chairperson of the Department of English and Speech at Chicago State University in 2004 to become her son’s general manager, and has been a close confidant on his rise to mega-stardom. Earlier this year, she published Raising Kanye: Life Lessons of a Hip-Hop Superstar, detailing her experiences as a single parent in the African-American community and her own ups and downs in bringing up Kanye. The two were extremely close. Kanye West has millions of fans across the globe, but Donda West was undoubtedly his number one.



Kanye West – possible “Hey Mama” demo – Freshman Adjustment mixtape (Chi Town Gettin’ Down Inc. 2005)

“Hey Mama” – Late Registration (Roc-A-Fella 2005)