Rating: 
Summary: Life as a love/hate relationship
Review: The theme that seems to be clear in this memoir is that Vidal has a love/hate relationship with America, with the writing profession and with many of the human figures in his own life. This creates a complex reading experience where no story is told straight on and everything has a subtext. I loved this book because I love Vidal's historical fiction and his critical essays and comentaries. What I couldn't relate to in the book were those elements it has in common with some of his more imaginative (and in my mind less satisfying) fiction - a kind of gay over-the-top and in-your-face exaggeration that tries to make the ordinary world seem more horrible than it is because it isn't sufficiently 'interesting'. But then, that is Vidal, and the exaggeration and, yes, the hostility, is part of what makes his opinions always fresh and memorable - even when one thinks they are wrong.
Rating:
Summary: They say you are your own worst critic. Not so for Gore Vidal!
Review: They say you are your own worst critic. Not so for Gore Vidal! The guy can write and he knows it! A first-rate, honest reflection on his life and those around him (note the inside poop on the Kennedys especially!
Rating:
Summary: Bitchy and fascinating
Review: This is a fascinating memoir on two levels: 1) Vidal has lived a very interesting life and he is a great writer. 2) Vidal reveals himself to be a seriously maladjusted man who is a first class bitch. It is a very good read but I feel sad for Vidal who comes across as a hollow, nasty, deeply cynical fellow. Nevertheless, I couldn't put the book down.
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Summary: An erudite tabloid for the voyeur in all of us
Review: This is absorbing reading of Gore Vidal's early life written from the perspective of decades more of living. Gore Vidal knew them all: from Tennessee Williams to the Beat-niks to the Kennedy clan to the Hollywood set, and has choice dialogues and vignettes about all his acquaintances, relayed in intimate and sardonic perspective. His cold approach to his adundant fly-by-night sexual encounters, combined with the heartbreak of his first homosexual love who was killed at war, provide a vantage of an enigmatic yet fascinating writer and reconteur.
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Summary: I found out more about me than Mr Vidal from this book!
Review: To be honest, I didn't know what to expect.
I had read some of Mr Vidal's later books, most notably Creation and Live From Golgotha, and found them engrossing and vividly written.
Yet when I tried to read The City and The Pillar, I was stymied by the utterly different writing style, pallid and arid.
How funny that the answer to that riddle should appear in the pages of Palimpsest!
I found the book to be a wondrous experience, as it wrapped me into a life I wanted to share, as it filled me with experiences I wished to own.
Not only did I learn about Mr Vidal's life, but I learned more about the directions that I sought for my own life. Mr Vidal's persistence in pursuing his goals
were extremely relevant to the temptations that many feel; temptations to stay a careful course, to steer clear of controversy.
Thank you, Mr Vidal, for a small shot of courage, the swallowing of which was made infinitely easier by your sparkling humor.
Rating:
Summary: As Cole Porter & Gore Himself Would Say, He's The Top!
Review: We may have thought we had a fairly clear idea of who Mr. Vidal was from his astonishing novels, essays, plays, screenplays and TV plays. We were wrong. In this memoir, Mr. Vidal lifts the veil, so to speak, and gives us a birds eye view into the first three decades of his life. This book is peopled with the very talented and the merely famous. Mr. Vidal does not always have a kind word to say, which why I'd like him to sit right next to me.
Rating:
Summary: The Unbearable Weight of Being Gore Vidal
Review: What's a man to do when he's more talented than everyone else? Vidal's answers, told through the lens of his old age, are fascinating if only because the world has no other figure whose work bridges literature's twilight, pop culture's dawn and a political past when our leaders didn't seem so patently ridiculous. Gossipy, yes, but in an idiosyncratic way that lends credibility. I mean is it really malicious to have include a scene with Jackie giving douching instructions? I think not. The Truth? God knows, but that much-abused word is given a breather in this memoir, relieved of the pressure by memory's sleights of hand, readily admitted to throughout the book. Without the pressure to create an encyclopedic autobiography, Vidal leisurely rambles through his first 39 years, pausing to gaze upon an astounding collection of acquaintances. Details in the book but the effect produced is saddening on both a cultural and personal level. Culturally becuase in our compartmentalized age of "experts", wise folks with Vidal's breadth of talent can not flourish. Personally, because he feels his strength diminished, his time ending as he struggles to come to terms with a lost boyhood love. For what it's worth Gore, take your vitamins, strap on your six shooter and keep firing away
Rating: 
Summary: Good but not for everyone
Review: When Gore is focused on something, like remembering his long lost love Jimmy or gossiping about the Kennedys this is a great read. When he is giving his thoughts and observations on history his writing also sparkles.His words on his mother are so bitter but I found it hilarious. When he tries very hard to explain locations and rattles off dates and names of people ony interesting to him this book is boring. I almost put it down but I am glad I didn't because towards the end some great dish awaits. I was touched by his longing for his lost love and he is humorous enough to forgive his high opinion of himself. (most of the time)
Rating:
Summary: Shallow, catty, but -- oh, so readable.
Review: Wit, style, and skillful prose are all on display in "Palimpsest." Vidal has known "everyone" in the literary, movie, and political worlds of the '40s, '50s, and '60s. He honors some, loves others and skewers many. What satisfaction to exact revenge against all those who've wronged you over the years -- using a raised eye brow, a "bon-mot," and a stiletto between the ribs! Certainly no great memoir -- very little real insight into this life, loves, and work -- but a good read!
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