A weekly programme which focuses on people and the situations which shape their lives
Reporters: Jim Douglas Henry, Jeremy James, Jeanne La Chard, Gillian Strickland, Desmond Wilcox, Harold Williamson
This week: Mailer for Mayor
Most people know him as the man who brought a four-letter world of combat troops and their women into the bestseller lists with his novel The Naked and the Dead.
Tousle-haired, argumentative, radical, leader of America's belligerent intellectuals; a man who, like many, has joined issue against Government over Vietnam. And then, cheerfully and proudly admitting to his colourful past as a boozer, brawler, pot-smoker and public exhibitionist, he announced he wanted to be taken seriously - as a politician. 'I am the man to solve New York's problems,' he declared. But ten days ago New York refused to take him seriously by firmly rejecting him in the primary elections for mayor. So now it's Norman Mailer-political loser. But, with his running mate Jimmy Breslin, he fought a tough, under-budgeted campaign; and in a city where, traditionally, nobody stops to listen, he made himself heard. Man Alive followed Mailer through the sweltering weeks of his campaign to bring back this report of a man who lost-noisily.
(Colour)