Gary Gilmore had spent over half of his life in prison when, only several months after getting parole, he killed two men in two separate, cold-blooded, and entirely pointless acts of violence. Both crimes were ostensibly committed during robberies, but Gary didn’t seem that interested in the money and made calculated and deliberate decisions to kill. No one exactly knows why, least fo all Gary.
These events form the fulcrum on which the vast, sprawling narrative of the Executioner’s Song pivots, with the lead-up of Gary’s troubled life pulling down on one end against the counterweight of justice on the other. The result is a powerful, if at times exhausting, work of new journalism, similar in structure to a novel but distinct enough that the subtitle “A True Life Novel” feels more like a bit of marketing than an accurate summary. Mailer uses some of the tools common to novelists—shifting his prose to reflect the points of view of various characters, for instance—but the dry insistance on detail and use of supporting sources feels more journalistic than novelistic.
The story is immense and detailed almost to the point of pedantry, with whole chapters—arguably whole sections—devoted to such anicillary fare as the surrounding media frenzy and quest for life rights. In the book’s second half, Gary becomes almost hollowed out as a figure, the story less about him than about the interests orbiting around him. Still, Gary Gilmore emerges as a complex figure, and Mailer manages to imbue him with a level of humanity that is almost uncomfortabl,e given the atrocity of his crimes.
Mailer’s prose is solid, evocative without hyperbole, shifting sleekly between the florid images of literary fiction and the homespun cadence spoken by the characters who populate the story. I’ve read a couple of his books in the past, but it has been some time and the Executioner’s Song reminded me how much I like his writing.