LOS ANGELES, (Reuters) – Writer Gore Vidal, who filled his novels and essays with acerbic observations on politics, sex and American culture while carrying on feuds with big-name literary rivals, died on Tuesday at home in Los Angeles of complications from pneumonia, age 86.
Vidal’s literary legacy includes a series of historical novels – “Burr,” “1876,” “Lincoln” and “The Golden Age” among them – as well as the campy transsexual comedy “Myra Breckinridge”.
He started writing as a 19-year-old soldier stationed in Alaska, basing “Williwaw” on his World War Two experiences. His third book, “The City and the Pillar,” created a sensation in 1948 because it was one of the first open portrayals of a homosexual main character.
