The City and the Pillar by Gore Vidal
A Book Review
I had always considered Gore Vidal as a writer of political and historical works but he began his long and illustrious career as a novelist. The City and the Pillar is his third novel and one that shocked and outraged the American public through its frank depiction of homosexuality. Although by today’s standards it is fairly tame.
The novel was published in 1948 and as a period piece it is a fascinating document revealing how gay people lived in a time where homosexuality was illegal. While the majority of men chose to live a conventional life with wives and children, there are those such as Jim Willard, the protagonist of this novel that embraces his homosexuality and avoids heterosexual compromise. It is interesting to note that although the prevailing attitudes attitudes were anti-gay, there were pockets of tolerance in tbe dive bars of 8th street in New York and the celebrity soirees of Hollywood, as well as in the armed forces.
Unlike most contemporary portrayals of gay men, Jim Willard is an all-American sportsman type. Athletic, blond and blue eyed, he is the antithesis of how gay men were portrayed during this period, usually as effeminate pansies obsessed with their mothers. It is a bold move by Vidal, in an attempt to normalise gay men in the eyes of his reader. Furthermore he is motivated by an idealistic love that sees him leave home to follow Bob Ford, his first love at sea.
With his departure from Virginia, the novel follows a meandering path, as Jim searches for his lover. Willard goes to sea, pitches up in Hollywood where he picks up an A-Lister, has a dalliance with a writer, spends a summer in Mexico, joins the Navy and sets up a successful tennis business. While there are some interesting moments and keen analysis of both sexual and gender politics along the way the novel feels rather unfocused.
Indeed it feels as though this novel would have worked better simply as a sociological description of contemporary gay culture as the fictional elements of the story are somewhat weak. As previously mentioned, the plot was unfocused, some of the writing is melodramatic and some characters redundant. Although Vidal was clearly stating that both men and women should not be judged on their sexuality, his depiction of gay relationships is fairly cynical. It is strange for a novel to be beating the drum for gay rights while at the same time showing those same relationships in a very damning light. It is as though Vidal is saying society shouldn’t condemn gays even though most gay experience is pretty abject.
As a period piece it is worth a skim but ultimately Gore Vidal’s views are pretty unsympathetic and he is not the most gifted of novelists as most of his recent obituaries stated.
