We plebeians at Hitchens Watch are far from being the only people pissed off at the Preening Popinjay's pathetic, punctilious and pedantic pummelling of that precocious patrician and (running out of words beginning with 'p') venerable octogenarian, Gore Vidal. And if you don't believe me, just look at the letters that came in bashing the column in Vanity Fair. And why not?
It isn't as if it's Vidal's fault that Hitch hasn't got nearly enough of what it takes to be "the Dauphin", either in terms of effortless superiority or literary output. So we're going to be going on and on about this for some time to come, mark my words.
One of the best dressing downs that the Contrarian Clown so far for dredging up the contents of his own private cesspool and splashing them across the pages of Graydon Carter's glossy magazine comes from a blogger named Steve Donoghue, who has drafted a post entitled Penny Press Addendum: The Lying in Winter that puts "the little squib in Vanity Fair" in perspective. (Many, many thanks to John Cotter, editor of Open Letters, for putting us on to this.) Please read it all and relish it. For me, the singe best of a myriad of good points Steve makes is this one.
The vital thing to remember when you finish this little squib of Hitchens’ is the relative scale of what we’re seeing here. Yes, the Vidal That Is continually says unworthy things in unworthy ways. But Hitchens has been writing professionally for what? Thirty years? More? And for that he has what to show the year 2210? So far: nothing. Ephemera, often bashed out hung over ten minutes before deadline. Thirty years ago, Vidal had produced a body of work almost unequalled by any 20th century practitioner of English – and that was before he collected United States or wrote Palimpsest. It entitles him to forbearing silence whenever the tawdriness of his dotage makes an appearance. It obliges Hitchens and his ilk to shut their disrespectful yaps about inscriptions on frontispieces.
Hitch, though, was never much of a one for obliging the nobility. But moving on to the end, Steve has some harsh words for Graydon for publishing Hitch's latest vanity piece, but I think Graydon deserves our gratitude and our forbearance in equal measure. After all, we wouldn't want him to be accused of censoring the talents of his golden boy. And on top of that, he has done Gore the same favor in the past in allowing him to go a few rounds with fellow VF scribe Dominick Dunne over his alleged dinner party putdown, in Dunn's words, according to Pundit Review:
"'Why do you suppose Irish Catholics are all such social climbers? Is it because their mothers were all maids? Oh, I don't mean you, of course,' he said without a pause. With that he got up to leave."
Dunne ended his Gore anecdote by noting that the next morning he called his brother John Gregory Dunne and, after imitating Gore's comments, the two "roared with laughter."
Vidal responds in the May [2001] issue: "As we listened to Diarist [Dunne] tell us in grave, morally outraged tones about the 'crime and criminality among the rich and very rich' . . . I wondered why he should be so concerned with the doings of people unknown to him . . . What attracts him? The fact that they are rich or very rich? . . . Diarist is more interested in who got what money and in Celebrity, particularly his own."
Vidal defends his crack about the Irish being descended from maids: "This was a joke, but like all good jokes, it has resonance - witness Diarist's shrill, off-key response.
"I tried to tell him the story in the hope that he might put to better use all those years of climbing the jungle gym of American society."
Dunne responds to Vidal's letter: "We must stick to the facts of what happened. Remember, I don't drink at those parties, have an excellent memory, and always carry a green leather notebook . . . to make a few notes."
He fumes, "I thought you were in a mean, miserable mood because your defense of Timothy McVeigh had been such a colossal flop that it embarrassed the room before nearly clearing it, while I held the attention of the table . . ."
“The enemies of intolerance cannot be tolerant." • "If it is an offense to justice to hold people who may have been victims of mistaken identity or of vendettas by other factions, then it is also an offense to justice to release psychopathic killers who believe that they have divine permission to throw acid in the faces of girls who want to attend school." • "Don't be such a lesbian!
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