#myra breckenridge

Gore Vidal was an writer, a political pundit and one of the most polarizing figures of the 20th Century. He was also a self described bisexual or pansexual.

Vidal’s lifelong opponent William F Buckley once said to him on National TV:

“Now listen, you queer. Stop calling me a crypto-Nazi, or I’ll sock you in the goddamn face, and you’ll stay plastered.”

Buckley later regretted using “queer” but still disliked that Vidal was an “evangelist for bisexuality”.

Buckley was not his only literary opponent. Vidal famously had feuds with Truman Capote and Norman Mailer as well.

In “The City and the Pillar” (1948), one of Vidal’s earliest novels, he wrote about a young man coming to accept he was homosexual. At the time, some critics were so offended by the subject, they refused to read the book, let alone review it. The book made Vidal an early champion for sexual liberation.

A later satirical novel “Myra Breckenridge” (1968) described the exploits of Myron who undergoes sexual reassignment, and becomes Myra. She tries to take down the macho patriarchy of Hollywood. It was made into the 1970 film starring Raquel Welch and Mae West.

Vidal set a goal to make his life as “promiscuous as I could make it.” He wrote in his diary that by age twenty-five, he had had more than a thousand sexual encounters.

On the straight side of the fence, Vidal had an affair with French author Anaïs Nin. He was also engaged to actress Joanne Woodward before she married Paul Newman. For a time, all three shared a house together in Los Angeles.

Regarding men… he preferred masculine young men and paid them because the cash transaction limited messy emotional entanglements.

Vidal once said:

“The difference between Italian boys and American boys, is Italian boys have dirty feet and clean assholes, while American boys have clean feet and dirty assholes.”

Vidal’s one true love was Jimmie Trimble, who he met in 1937 when they were students. Trimble died during World War II. Vidal dedicated the novel “The City and the Pillar” to Trimble.

Among his sexual conquests Vidal claimed to have slept with Fred Astaire when he first moved to Hollywood; and also with a young Dennis Hopper. One verifiable lover was Harold Lang, a dancer-actor who starred on Broadway in “Kiss Me Kate” and “Pal Joey”. Lang’s muscular butt was also cherished by Leonard Bernstein and Arthur Levante.

Vidal’s life long relationship was with Howard Austen who he met in 1950. He described their Union as “two men who decided to spend their lives together”. Furthermore, Vidal said the secret to their long relationship was they did not have sex with each other.

Austen managed the their financial affairs, travel arrangements and housing needs. They were eventually buried together in a joint grave in Washington DC.