American author/journalist/hipster Norman Mailer died on Saturday, November 10th. It would have been kind of fitting if the man who wrote The Naked and The Dead, one of the most critically acclaimed novels about the experience of Allied WWII soldiers in Japan, had died on Remembrance Day, but I'm guessing he didn't have much say in the matter.
While The Naked and The Dead was his first major success, he wound up being much more successful as a journalist, and won two Pulitzer Prizes for non-fiction. One of his more influential non-fiction works is a 1957 essay called "The White Negro", in which he pretty accurately forecasts the "youth revolution" of the 60's, as well as predating the nihilism of early punk by a solid 20 years. He also discusses the subculture of "the hipster" at length, and makes some interesting predictions about the future of the hip.
I have jotted down perhaps a dozen words, the Hip perhaps most in use and most likely to last with the minimum of variation. The words are man, go, put down, make, beat, cool, swing, with it, crazy, dig, flip, creep, hip, square.
Not exactly a perfect prediction, but quite a few of his predicted terms are still hanging around. I can dig it. The rest of the essay's a pretty interesting snapshot of American youth right on the brink of cultural revolution, and an interesting bit of perspective on the hipster's place in history.
No comments:
Post a Comment