Norman Mailer, who died yesterday at the age of eighty-four, had long been considered the successor to Ernest Hemingway's literary throne. Mailer's first book, The Naked and the Dead, published in 1948, was a bestseller and prompted many people to label this twenty-five-year-old writer as the "new Hemingway." Did Mailer deserve this distinction? Who better to answer that question than Ernest Hemingway himself.

In A. E. Hotchner's 1966 book, Papa Hemingway, Hemingway revealed his less than favorable opinion of The Naked and the Dead:

"The guy who wrote The Naked and the Dead—what's his name, Mailer—was in bad need of a manager. Can you imagine that a general wouldn't look at the co-ordinates on his map? A made-up half-ass literary general. The whole book's just diarrhea of the typewriter."

Ernest Hemingway often had harsh words for his fellow writers and those he criticized were usually the ones he respected the most. Norman Mailer's literary accomplishments are great, his works memorable, and his legacy in American literature cannot be overlooked. Time will determine his place in history and whether he is the rightful literary heir to Ernest Hemingway.