Gore Vidal (pronounced /ˌɡɔər vɪˈdɑːl/ or /vɪˈdæl/) (born Eugene Luther Gore Vidal October 3, 1925) is an American author, playwright, essayist, screenwriter and political activist. Early in his career he wrote The City and the Pillar (1948), which outraged mainstream critics as one of the first major American novels to feature unambiguous homosexuality.
Vidal was born in West Point, New York, the only child of Lieutenant Eugene Luther Vidal (189...
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Gore Vidal (pronounced /ˌɡɔər vɪˈdɑːl/ or /vɪˈdæl/) (born Eugene Luther Gore Vidal October 3, 1925) is an American author, playwright, essayist, screenwriter and political activist. Early in his career he wrote The City and the Pillar (1948), which outraged mainstream critics as one of the first major American novels to feature unambiguous homosexuality.
Vidal was born in West Point, New York, the only child of Lieutenant Eugene Luther Vidal (1895–1969) and Nina S. Gore (1903–1978). He was born in the Cadet Hospital of the United States Military Academy, where his father was the first aeronautics instructor, and was christened by the headmaster of St. Albans preparatory school, his future alma mater. According to "West Point and the Third Loyalty", an article Vidal wrote for The New York Review of Books (October 18, 1973), he decided to be called Gore in honor of his maternal grandfather, Thomas Gore, Democratic senator from Oklahoma.
Vidal's father, a West Point all-American...
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