Legendary author Gore Vidal took a shot at the New York Times in an interview with Details magazine that was posted on Monday afternoon.
The magazine sat down with Vidal to discuss his fiction and his career. One of the things he brought up was what he called the "hysterical" reaction to his first big novel, "The City And The Pillar," which dealt openly with gay issues.
"The New York Times was always hysterical about sex of any kind, and Orville Prescott, then the principal book reviewer, said that under no circumstances would any book written by Gore Vidal be reviewed there again," Vidal said. "Ever...not to be mentioned in the New York Times is, I have always thought, a point of honor. So I survived and I notice that the New York Times did not. They can't get any advertising, and I chuckle over that as much as possible."
It should be noted that the Times has since eased that purported ban. Vidal, however, has been nothing but consistent in his scorn for the paper, telling one of its former columnists in 2008 that "I can't name three first-rate literary critics in the United States. I'm told there are a few hidden away at universities, but they don't print them in The New York Times."