Norman Mailer’s latest production, Advertisements for Myself, is a painful book to read not because the author is so grimly determined to unburden himself of all his grievances and resentments but because he reveals an aspect of himself as a writer that is not pleasant to contemplate. With vindictive fury he attacks all those who have misunderstood his work or slighted his talent or offended him in any way. Snarling fiercely at his enemies, he chalks up on a private (now public) scoreboard the grudges he will some day pay back with interest. Let his foes beware of him; the day of reckoning will come. Thus, despite his repeated asseverations that he will not abandon his integrity, he transforms his struggle for literary fame into a free-for-all literary brawl.