The novelist, essayist, and playwright Gore Vidal began his writing career with his novel Williwaw, published in 1946, and went on to achieve a place in the public consciousness as one of 20th-century America's greatest writers. Always politically active and frequently controversial, Vidal was outspoken on the topics of culture, politics, and history. Take a tour through his life in pictures
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Gore Vidal, photographed as a young man by Carl Van Vechten in 1948Photograph: Carl Van Vechten/Corbis