Why Are We in Vietnam?

Novel, Bildungsroman by Norman Mailer

Blurb

Why Are We In Vietnam? is a 1967 novel by the American author Norman Mailer. The action focuses on a hunting trip to the Brooks Range in Alaska where a young man is brought by his father, a wealthy businessman who works for a company that makes cigarette filters and is obsessed with killing a grizzly bear. As the novel progresses, the protagonist is increasingly disillusioned that his father resorts to hunting tactics that seem dishonest and unmasculine, including the use of a helicopter, which the protagonist refers to as the "Cop Turd". At the end of the novel, the protagonist informs the reader that he is soon going to serve in the Vietnam War as a soldier.

First Published

1967

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