Stormin' Norman dies

Richard Pyle at Associated Press, via CNN:

Norman Mailer, the macho prince of American letters who for decades reigned as the country's literary conscience and provocateur, died of renal failure early Saturday, his literary executor said. He was 84. Mailer died at Mount Sinai Hospital, said J. Michael Lennon, who is also the author's official biographer.

From his classic debut novel, "The Naked and the Dead," to such masterworks of literary journalism as "The Armies of the Night," the two-time Pulitzer Prize winner always got credit for insight, passion and originality.

Some of Mailer's works were highly praised, some panned, but none was pronounced the Great American Novel that seemed to be his life quest from the time he soared to the top as a brash 25-year-old "enfant terrible."

Mailer built and nurtured an image over the years as pugnacious, streetwise and high-living. He drank, fought, smoked pot, married six times and stabbed his second wife, almost fatally, during a drunken party.

More here.  Longer New York Times obituary here.  An interview with Mailer here.