The Time of Her Time
"The Time of Her Time" is a 1959 short story written by Norman Mailer, first appearing in his miscellany Advertisements for Myself. The story depicts macho Irish Catholic bullfighting instructor Sergius O'Shaugnessy and his sexual conquest of a young, middle-class Jewish college girl, Denise Gondelman. The short story was adapted to film in 2000 by Francis Delia. On multiple occasions, Mailer has touted "The Time of Her Time" as "the godfather of Lolita." Background In a 1958 letter to Mickey Knox, Mailer describes "Time" as part of a novel-in-progress: "it's interesting I believe, real blow by blow stuff, not hot, but direct enough in its details to be considered pornographic." In light of this fact, Mailer wrote to Dwight Macdonald, and thirteen other critics, to solicit support for publication in order to avoid prosecution for obscenity. Mailer's 1961 letter to André Deutsch, his publisher in England, continues to argue the merits of "Time" and why it should be published, making it "clear that he was less and less able to bridle his irrationality" about this matter. In an untitled postscript to "Time" in the British version of Advertisements, Mailer notes that the second part of "Time" was omitted because it "is the considered opinion of some of the best legal and literary names of the Realm" that its inclusion would have held up publication of the volume. The full text was printed in a subsequent 1968 edition in England. Publication "The Time of Her Time" was first published in 1959 in the collection, Advertisements for Myself, then later in The Short Fiction of Norman Mailer. Mailer said that his publisher, Walter Minton of G. P. Putnam's Sons publishing, was brave for publishing the short story, despite its status as "a salacious object in its time". When Minton published it, "a great many of us, not only writers, but critics as well, novelists collaborated to a degree, in the sense that we were fighting the Philistines who wanted to hold literature back". The story collection, Advertisements for Myself, was published without any censorship, though "The Time of Her Time" was absent from the English publication. Mailer has maintained that "The Time of Her Time" has acted as the godfather of Lolita. "Later, Minton used to love to say one of the reasons he published Lolita was he saw he could get away with it... he realized that for all the brouhaha over the dangers of publishing 'The Time of Her Time,' nothing had happened". Summary The story — set in what could be inspired by the airy Lower East Side loft Mailer rented during a career downturn in the early 1950s — follows Sergius O'Shaugnessy after he has adjusted to life in Greenwich Village and his sexual exploration and conquests there. O'Shaugnessy, having recently departed from Mexico and his career as an amateur bullfighter, sets up a bullfighting school in his flat, perhaps Mailer's mischievous nod to Hemingway. Rumor of his sexual prowess and stamina spreads quickly through the Village until