Steven Abbott Collection of Materials relating to the Gore Vidal Bibliography

Steven Abbott followed Gore Vidal’s career since the early 1970s, building a definitive Vidal collection that formed the basis for his book Gore Vidal: A Bibliography, 1940-2009. He first met and interviewed Vidal in 1973, when Vidal was on a speaking engagement in Boston, Massachusetts. Further interactions led to Vidal authorizing Steven Abbott to create his bibliography, giving Abbott access to his literary archives, agents, publishers and his personal library in Ravello, Italy. While doing archival work for Vidal at the Madison Historical Society in Wisconsin, Abbott located the original manuscript for Creation, republished as Creation: Restored Edition in 2002.

For a Yale University symposium in 2003, commemorating the 55th anniversary of the publication of The City and the Pillar (1948), Abbott created a folio of book cover illustrations from translations of the book from fifteen countries that reflected the diverse cultures, eras, mores, and publishing goals. This bibliography enables the viewer to see these cultural impacts and changes over the years.

Since 1985, Abbott has been an HIV prevention educator and community activist. He was a co-founder and director of the internationally recognized, nationally replicated San Francisco Stop AIDS Project. In 2007, Steven selected Stamford University as repository for the Stop AIDS Project's archives and donated his personal papers relating to AIDS prevention to the collection.

Steven resides in San Francisco and Boston with his partner Jim Stephens. Steven has a Masters of Library Science from Simmons College.

Eugene Luther Gore Vidal (Gore Vidal) was born in West Point, New York on October 3, 1925, the only child of Eugene Luther Vidal and Nina S. Gore. In 1940, he attended Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire where he contributed to the Exonian, the school newspaper. Vidal enlisted in the U.S. Army at age 17 and worked in various capacities during World War 2 related to transportation and logistics.

Vidal began his literary career in 1946 with the publication of his first novel Williwaw. His third novel, The City and the Pillar (1948) proved to be heavily controversial and criticized due to his normalized presentation of a gay protagonist which was generally viewed at the time as “unnatural” and “immoral.” This would lead to Vidal writing under pseudonyms including “Edgar Box” where he found success writing a number of mystery novels. He also expanded his writing to stage plays and television, most notably penning the stage play The Best Man (1960) and the television play Visit to a Small Planet (1957). Other major works included Myra Breckinridge (1968), a satire of the American movie business, by way of a school of dramatic arts owned by a transsexual woman, and Vidal’s “Narratives of Empire” series of historical novels including Burr (1973), Lincoln (1984), 1876 (1976), Empire (1987), Hollywood (1990), Washington, D.C. (1967), and The Golden Age (2000). Vidal was also a prolific essayist, applying himself to numerous socio-political, sexual, historical, and literary subjects. In 1993, Vidal won the National Book Award for Nonfiction for the anthology United States Essays 1952-92.

In addition to his literary career, Vidal was also involved in the Hollywood film industry both as a screenwriter working on films including Ben-Hur (1959) and theatrical versions of his plays The Best Man, and Visit to a Small Planet. Gore Vidal also had acting roles in various movies and television including Roma (1972), With Honors (1994), and Gattaca (1997).

Gore Vidal was heavily involved in politics and ran unsuccessfully as a Democratic candidate for Congress in New York in 1960 and again for the U.S. Senate in California in 1982. During the 1968 Democratic National Convention Gore Vidal had heated debates with rival political analyst and conservative writer and political commentator William F. Buckley Jr. that led to a lifelong feud. In the wake of the 2001 September 11th Attacks, Gore Vidal was a vocal critic of President George W. Bush and the Second Iraq War (2003-2011).

During his life, Vidal lived at various times in Italy and in the United States. In 1950, he met Howard Austen who became his life partner for the next 53 years. In 2003, as his health began to fail with age, he sold his Italian villa and returned with Austen to live in their house in Los Angeles, California. Howard Austen died in November 2003. Gore Vidal died on July 31, 2012.