Washington D C: Number 6 in series (Narratives of empire)

You either get Vidal entirely and wish history really had been like that or you consider him to have been a bitchy charletan who should have been dragged through the courts for misrepresenting old Abe and every significant American since, I think they are great and give a good insight on how it really might have been

great

I'm a huge fan of Gore Vidal but this one is a bit of a plod. Certainly not his best.

but very very fun nonetheless. Vidal takes us into the mediacracy age of politics, that transition point when TV personality was beginning to trump backroom dealing as the principal factor in national politics. Clay, the chief protagonist, is so Kenndyesque that it is painful to behold. The other characters are equally interesting: Blaise, the press baron and his angry son and crazy daughter; politicians on their way out; various hangers on. If you are a close observer of Washington, you will see that very little has changed since then (mid-40s) in terms of personalities.The backdrop of eroticism in politics is also wonderfully portrayed, as are other human qualities and frailties. For example, when he writes of an aging Senator consulting a fortuneteller, you can almost forgive Nancy Reagan for consulting an astrologer: it is scary to make decisions.This is interesting as Vidal hadn't quite gotten the tone of his American series yet, but clearly it was gestating in him. Many of his characters and their ancestors appear in the novels in the series that take place at earlier eras but were published later, when the concept had had time to mature in his mind. He is one of the best American writers of this century, underrated in my opinion.