Of Women and Their Elegance - Interview Exchange between Norman Mailer and Carl G. Jung

Sep 28, 2026

Uploaded by jayni

A literary review and interview-style exchange explores the boundary between fact and fiction in Norman Mailer’s treatment of Marilyn Monroe, shaped by Milton H. Greene’s photographs. Carole Hayes presents a staged dialogue in which Jung questions the value of images and the nature of truth, while Mailer discusses precedence, imagined memoir framing, and factual anchors such as marriages, meetings, and credited works. The discussion extends to whether characters, conversations, and reading are invented or grounded in real lives.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryLiterature

FormatPDF

Pages7

Reading Time11 min

AccessFree to download

Interview exchange

Fact and fiction in the portrayal

Photos, legend, and imagined memoir

| OF WOMEN AND THEIR ELE-
GANCE,by Norman Mailer.Photo-
graphs by Milton H.Greene.(Simon &
Schuster,S29.95)
Reviewed by CAROLE HAYES of the
English Faculty,Loyola University,
Chicago.
Please imagine the following ex-
change betuween Norman Mailer and
CarlG.Jung.
JUNG:If one picture is worth 1000
words,should not 120 pictures be
worth 120,000 words?
MAILER:I spent only 50,000 words
because Milton's photographs are so
resonant—not only of Marilyn Monroe
but those other women including
Grandma Moses.The men,too,and
that one of the empty kitchen.Actu-
ally,I blame Milton's resonance for
my“imaginary memoir”of Marilyn
based on a"set of interviews that never
took place."Milton's pictures"speak
of those little mysteries women traverse
on the road to beauty,and that as we
know is the beginning of all legend.”
In my own advance review in New
York I announced I"wanted to deepen
the legend of Marilyn Monroe,not
sweeten it.”
JUNG:Why did you write your own
review? | MAILER:There's precedent.Walt
Whitman favorably reviewed his own
work.Anonymously.I made no secret.
The critics had debated so needlessly
about whether my Pulitzer Prize win-
ning Executioner's Song was fact or
fiction....
JUNG:What is fact,what fiction,in
Of Women and Their Elegance?
MAILER:Here are some facts:Mari-
lyn did make the movies mentioned;
she was married to Joe Di Maggio and
to Arthur Miller;Milton Greene did
produce The Prince and the Showgirl;
Marilyn did stay with the Greenes in
Connecticut;she did appear with them
on Edward R.Murrow's Person to
Person.Marilyn even had some of the
conversations given to her in the book.
JUNG:Which conversations?
MAILER:I admit I make no distinc-
tions there.Why do you,of all writers,
quibble?Another borderland between
fact and fiction is Marilyn's reading.
But she could have read some of the
books in Amy Greene's library.
JUNG:What then is pure fiction?
MAILER:Apart from your own
theories?Some of the most interesting
characters are fictional:Edward,the
boyfriend who didn't think Marilyn
was good enough for him but who im-
pregnated her thrue times;Bobby de | Peralta O’Connor,the rich boy who
takes Marilyn along on a failed plot to
murder his ex-wife;Abraham Robert
Charles,the "worst acting teacher,"
who outdid you.C.G.,in his theory,
shared with Marilyn,that we have two
souls.
JUNG:Do you allude to my observa-
tion that woman has an animus,man
an anima—those mutually exclusive
images projected on the opposite sex—
which explain how men and women
distort and fantasize each other's inner
lives?Forgive my self quotation....
MAILER:As long as you take no
pleasure in it.
JUNG:In your anima projection on
Miss Monroe,for example....
MAILER:Are you accusing me of pro-
jecting my anima on Marilyn Monroe?
I never touched her,let alone inter-
viewed her.
JUNG:Ah,but it is your image of her
that is so resonant of what I said in
Marriage as a Psychological Relation-
ship about a certain type of woman
who attracts anima projections.
"Sphinxlike,"she is"of more than
doubtful chastity,childlike and yet en-
dowed with a naive cunning that is ex-
tremely disarming to men.”She is the
"great illusionist,the seductress."
MAILER:So I said more economically | | --- | --- | --- | | RECENTLY published in England,a
book of reminiscences by a long-time
foreign correspondent,now European
editor of NewsweekEdward Behr,
who has chosen possibly the most
provocative title of the year:Anybody
Here Been Raped and Speaks English?
The London Sunday Times

FAQs

What is the central theme of the exchange in the document?

The exchange focuses on the relationship between photographic representation and the line between fact and fiction in portraying Marilyn Monroe.

How does Mailer explain his approach to writing about Marilyn Monroe?

Mailer emphasizes an “imaginary memoir” structure, citing the resonance of the photographs and the use of interviews that never took place, while also listing specific facts tied to Monroe.

Which questions does Jung raise about truth and images?

Jung challenges the idea that more pictures cannot translate to more meaning, and he presses on what counts as fact versus pure fiction, including how anima-projection ideas relate to the portrayal.

Sep 28, 2026

Uploaded by jayni