God’s name was happening? It is one thing to hear a mighty explosion. It is another to recognize some time after the event that one has been deafened by it. The United States was going through an identity crisis. Questions about our nature as a country were being asked that most good American men and women had never posed to themselves before. Questions such as, Why are we so hated? How could anyone resent us that much? We do no evil. We believe in goodness and freedom. Who are we, then?Are we not who we think we are? More pressing, who are “they?” What does it all mean?
Simple questions. Blank as white and empty pages. We were going through an identity crisis, and that is an incomparable experience. The ego has been disrupted. It has been pre-empted. Most of us look to command an ego that will keep us reasonably efficient while we carry out our personal projects. We see ourselves as husbands or wives, as brave or prudent, reliable or decent, or certain egos may depend on the right to excuse themselves—as flighty, or in search of friendship, which, once found, will take care of all else.
In that sense, it hardly matters what kind of firm notion the ego attaches to itself. That, from the need of the ego, is less important than the ongoing expectation that the notion will rest reasonably stable. Upon that depends our identity, that firm seat which offers the psyche an everyday working notion of who we are (good-looking or good-looking enough—whatever serves).
An identity crisis builds slowly, or it can strikelike a thunderclap, but the effect is unmistakable. One can no longer offer a firm declaration of who one is. The seat upon which the ego depends has been slipped out from under. The psyche is in a sprawl. The simplest questions become difficult to answer.
A mass identity crisis for all of America descended upon us after 9/11, and our response was wholly comprehensible. We were plunged into a fever of patriotism. If our long-term comfortable and complacent sense that America was just the greatest country ever had been brought into doubt, the instinctive reflex was to reaffirm ourselves. We had to overcome the identity crisis—hell, overpower it, wave a flag.
We had had a faith. The ship of the United States was impregnable and had been on a great course. We were steering ourselves into a great future. All of a sudden, not to be able to feel like that was equal to seeing oneself as a traitor to the grand design. So we gathered around George W. Bush. That he had not been elected by a majority even became a species of new strength for him. The transient, still-forming, fresh national identity could not for a moment contemplatethe fact that maybe Bush should not even be in the White House. Why? Because now the country had to be saved. A horror had come upon us. There were people on earth so eager to destroy us that they were ready to immolate themselves. That went right to the biblical root. Samson had pulled down the pillars of the Temple. Now there were all these Muslim Samsons. A ripple went through the country, a determining wind. In its wake, flags rippled everywhere. Nearly everyone in America was waving a flag.
For a few of us, this great indiscriminate wave of patriotism was not a joy to behold. “Patriotism,” after all, “is the last refuge of a scoundrel.” So said H. L. Mencken, or was it Samuel Johnson? One could argue over the source but not the sentiment.
3
DOTSON RADER : Are they even waving flags up in Provincetown?
NORMAN MAILER : They are. We had a parade in Provincetown on the Fourth of July, 2002. A rather nice looking, pleasant fellow—he looked to me like a young liberal lawyer—came up and smiled and handed me a small American flag. And I looked at him and just shook my head. And he walked on. It wasn’t an episode in any way. He came over with a half-smile and walked awaywith a half-smile. But I was furious at myself afterward for not saying, “You don’t have to wave a flag to
Simple questions. Blank as white and empty pages. We were going through an identity crisis, and that is an incomparable experience. The ego has been disrupted. It has been pre-empted. Most of us look to command an ego that will keep us reasonably efficient while we carry out our personal projects. We see ourselves as husbands or wives, as brave or prudent, reliable or decent, or certain egos may depend on the right to excuse themselves—as flighty, or in search of friendship, which, once found, will take care of all else.
In that sense, it hardly matters what kind of firm notion the ego attaches to itself. That, from the need of the ego, is less important than the ongoing expectation that the notion will rest reasonably stable. Upon that depends our identity, that firm seat which offers the psyche an everyday working notion of who we are (good-looking or good-looking enough—whatever serves).
An identity crisis builds slowly, or it can strikelike a thunderclap, but the effect is unmistakable. One can no longer offer a firm declaration of who one is. The seat upon which the ego depends has been slipped out from under. The psyche is in a sprawl. The simplest questions become difficult to answer.
A mass identity crisis for all of America descended upon us after 9/11, and our response was wholly comprehensible. We were plunged into a fever of patriotism. If our long-term comfortable and complacent sense that America was just the greatest country ever had been brought into doubt, the instinctive reflex was to reaffirm ourselves. We had to overcome the identity crisis—hell, overpower it, wave a flag.
We had had a faith. The ship of the United States was impregnable and had been on a great course. We were steering ourselves into a great future. All of a sudden, not to be able to feel like that was equal to seeing oneself as a traitor to the grand design. So we gathered around George W. Bush. That he had not been elected by a majority even became a species of new strength for him. The transient, still-forming, fresh national identity could not for a moment contemplatethe fact that maybe Bush should not even be in the White House. Why? Because now the country had to be saved. A horror had come upon us. There were people on earth so eager to destroy us that they were ready to immolate themselves. That went right to the biblical root. Samson had pulled down the pillars of the Temple. Now there were all these Muslim Samsons. A ripple went through the country, a determining wind. In its wake, flags rippled everywhere. Nearly everyone in America was waving a flag.
For a few of us, this great indiscriminate wave of patriotism was not a joy to behold. “Patriotism,” after all, “is the last refuge of a scoundrel.” So said H. L. Mencken, or was it Samuel Johnson? One could argue over the source but not the sentiment.
3
DOTSON RADER : Are they even waving flags up in Provincetown?
NORMAN MAILER : They are. We had a parade in Provincetown on the Fourth of July, 2002. A rather nice looking, pleasant fellow—he looked to me like a young liberal lawyer—came up and smiled and handed me a small American flag. And I looked at him and just shook my head. And he walked on. It wasn’t an episode in any way. He came over with a half-smile and walked awaywith a half-smile. But I was furious at myself afterward for not saying, “You don’t have to wave a flag to
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