“I knew that Jack needed a lot of help, and what he really needed was somebody who could spend a prodigious amount of time with him, every night, see him, live with him, live with him the way someone in A. A. lives with a drunk. … I wasn't doing that. So when the crime occurred — because I'd just been hoping things would work out all right — when the crime occurred, I knew that I had a responsibility on that one.”

— Norman Mailer

On his role in the parole of Jack Abbott, during which Abbot killed a man.
Interview for French TV (1998)

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Norman Mailer 165

American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, film m… 1923–2007

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Norman Mailer 165

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