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Summary and Analysis of The Executioner's Song
Based on the Book by Norman Mailer
By Worth Books OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED MEDIA
Copyright © 2017 Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-5040-4370-0
CHAPTER 1
Summary
Book One: Western Voices
Part One: Gary
After thirteen years of incarceration in reform school and, later, at a maximum-security prison, Gary Gilmore is finally facing release — and despite her husband Johnny's reservations, his Mormon cousin Brenda sponsors Gary for parole. He'll divide his time between her home in the Mormon town of Provo, Utah, and the home of her parents, Vern and Ida. Vern secures a job for Gary at his shoe repair shop.
Despite Brenda's heartfelt efforts to help Gary acclimate to life outside prison, there are signs he's ill-adjusted and not equipped for regular social situations, such as his aggressive approach to picking up women, crude table manners during Easter dinner, and a nerve-racking episode behind the wheel of his friend Rikki Baker's car.
When Gary disappears overnight and turns up in Idaho, he explains to Brenda that he hitched a ride in a pickup truck, fended off the driver's homosexual advances with punches, and got stopped by cops while hightailing it to a hospital. Probation officer Mont Court gives him a pass on crossing state lines, reasoning that cracking down on the parole violation could spur Gary to act out again.
Gary appears to have instantly found his soulmate when he meets Rikki's sister Nicole, an attractive nineteen-year-old single mother of two. Not long after hooking up — much to Brenda and Johnny's dismay — they get tattoos of each other's names.
Need to Know:Gary Gilmore spent most of his early years locked up — and emerged bent on making up for lost time, particularly when it came to meeting women. But when he crossed paths with Nicole, it was clear that Gary's life would change irrevocably — for better or for worse.
Part Two: Nicole
Gary soon moves into Nicole's house in Spanish Fork, Utah, where she lives with her two children, Sunny and Jeremy (Gary affectionately calls the latter "Peabody"). Thrice married and divorced at nineteen, Nicole finds herself increasingly intoxicated by Gary's adoration. She feels accepted and loved for the first time in a young life already scarred by recurring abuse. Nicole quits her factory job and begins collecting welfare, doting on Gary — and relying on him as sole the breadwinner.
Those around them are uneasy about the sudden connection — Nicole's mother, Kathryne, isn't pleased her daughter is dating an older ex-con — but for Nicole, her life with Gary, drinking beer and smoking pot together at night, and prancing around naked while he admires her body, is heavenly.
Nicole gradually opens up about her past, including the sexual abuse by "Uncle Lee," a friend of her father's, when she was just eleven. She also tells him about her three failed marriages: to Jim Hampton, whom she met after she escaped from a mental hospital; to Jim Barrett, Sunny's father; and to Steve Hudson, a churchgoer whom she ditched after two weeks of wedded non-bliss. Her son Jeremy's father, Kip Eberhardt, was abusive. Then came a relationship with Joe Bob Sears, who physically and mentally abused her, locking her in a room and calling her his "slave" — until Barrett returned to help her escape.
When Nicole gets a dark vibe from Gary, she wonders aloud if he's the devil — a question, he says, he's heard before.
Need to Know: Nicole's history of being abused and degraded by men offers a clue to why she basks in the affection of someone like Gary. She is able to overlook — or even embrace — his dark side, as long as she can count on his adoration.
Part Three: Gary and Nicole
Less than two months into his whirlwind romance with Nicole, the seams of Gary's life begin to fray. A kiss on the cheek for his cousin Toni's twelve-year-old daughter, Annette, raises concerns for deeply religious neighbor Peter Galovan. Irate, Gary picks a fight with Pete — and ends up with his own face busted wide open. Pete decides to press charges. Nicole goes to confront Pete, who insists that Gary wants to kill him, and threatens, "If he don't get you, I will." Moved by her passionate plea, Pete agrees to drop the charges, and even says a prayer for Gary.
Gary's temper is stoked further by car troubles (his Mustang needs a new battery), money troubles (he has to borrow money for a replacement battery), and excessive drinking (he regularly steals six-packs of beer). He is fixated on trading in his Mustang for a white truck, but dealer Val Conlin insists he cough up a significant down payment. Gary is frustrated, and keeps badgering Val.
Nicole is troubled by her man's habit of shoplifting, and is unnerved when he comes home with several boxes containing guns. The bloom of her love is fading. He hits her for the first time — and apologizes, but the emotional damage is done; she's been down this road before. She tells him, "I want to die," and he responds by holding a knife blade to her stomach to call her bluff.
The downward spiral continues. Gary takes Nicole's Mustang, with her and the kids in it, to sell the guns, and ends up in a violent argument with her. He steals a tape deck, crashes into a car while fleeing the scene, and ends up getting Nicole's car impounded. Terrified of returning to prison for parole violation, Gary turns himself in. Again, his probation officer Mont Court prefers to see him cooperative than to see him locked back up.
The close call reignites Nicole's love for Gary, but she's seeing clean-cut (and married) businessman Roger Eaton on the side, and starts up again with her ex-husband Jim Barrett. Barrett helps her move belongings out of the house she'd been sharing with Gary and hides her whereabouts from him. When Gary encounters Nicole again, after she stops by the house to pick up her vacuum cleaner, he tries to keep her from driving away — but she points a gun at him through the window of her car. Later, Gary appalls his cousin Brenda by declaring that he wants to kill Nicole.
Need to Know: For Gary Gilmore and Nicole Baker, the honeymoon phase didn't last long. At first it seemed like destiny that these two damaged souls found each other, but they couldn't maintain any semblance of a functional relationship.
Part Four: The Gas Station and the Motel
Gary manages to cobble together a deal for the long-coveted truck. He shows up at the home of Nicole's mother, Kathryne, seeking Nicole, and ends up taking Nicole's mentally unstable younger sister April for a ride. They end up back at Val Conlin's to sign the papers for the truck. Val is emphatic that Gary had better stick to their agreed-upon schedule of payments.
Afterward, Gary stops off at the gas station and encounters young attendant Max Jensen, a devout Mormon and a married father. After robbing him at gunpoint, Gary orders Max into the bathroom and down on the floor — then shoots him twice in the head. Once for himself, once for Nicole, he says. April, waiting in the truck, is high on drugs and has no idea what occurred in the station. The two leave and go to a movie. Later, they spend the night in a motel room. She fends off his advances out of loyalty to her sister, and they sleep in separate beds.
The next morning, Kathryne, who is worried sick, finds April safely home, but is horrified when she learns she has spent the night with Gary.
After learning of the murder, Nicole thinks it must have been Gary. Brenda's husband, Johnny, reads about it in the newspaper and thinks the same thing. Val Conlin reads about the murder while Gary is present, and rants about the stupidity of someone who would get away with a robbery and yet still commit murder. Gary responds, "Well, maybe he deserved to be killed."
The truck is having some trouble, so Gary drops it off at a gas station and sets off on foot to kill some time.
At the City Center Motel, Debbie Bushnell, pregnant with their second child, discovers her husband Benny, the manager, on the floor of the office, gushing blood from his head. She had just run into a strange tall man in the hallway who gave her the creeps.
Not far away, Gary empties and ditches the motel's cash box. But as he goes to dump the gun, it fires and hits his hand. When he returns to the gas station to pick up his truck, the employees can't help but notice he's bleeding — and one writes down his license plate number and calls the cops. His description of Gary matches one that has already been reported.
Police descend on the motel, which is next to Vern and Ida's house. It's not long before Vern, too, deduces that Gary is the guilty party.
Debbie Bushnell learns that her husband has been declared dead.
Meanwhile, Gary appeals to Brenda and Johnny for help with his wounded hand — unaware that they're collaborating with the cops on how to capture him. A roadblock is set up, but the white truck slips by. Eventually, though, the cops catch up to Gary.
He's taken to jail, and initially denies having committed armed robbery or murder. The police start building their case. Gary eventually confesses to murder — but can't offer a motive.
Gary's capture reignites Nicole's passion for him, and his for her. He writes Nicole loving, fervent letters — and confesses that he had a childhood nightmare about being beheaded that felt more like a past-life memory. He feels like he may owe some kind of karmic "debt" in this life.
Need to Know: Gary Gilmore needed to make payments on his truck, and committed two armed robberies in order to do so. But he couldn't explain why he gunned down the two victims who complied with his demands to hand over cash.
Part Five: The Shadows of the Dream
Bessie, Gary's mother, is in denial when Vern informs her that Gary has committed murder and may get the death penalty. She recalls her time with Gary's father, Frank Gilmore, who traveled around the country using various aliases and had different birth certificates. In fact, Gary had once confronted her after finding a birth certificate that listed his own name as Fay Robert Coffman and his father's as Walt Coffman — pseudonyms that led him to wonder if his real father was someone else.
Through Bessie, it's revealed that Gary's initial stint in prison was for armed robbery, and she wonders whether his early crimes were motivated by his fear that he was illegitimate.
While Gary is locked up and writing her long, soul-searching letters, Nicole is seeing other men. At one point, Gary is transferred to a mental hospital — the very one where she was once confined — and they are able to meet. Nicole struggles with the prospect of Gary's looming death sentence and even tries slitting her wrists, believing she'll be reunited with him in the afterlife, but can't quite go all the way. Gary is touched when he learns what she almost did for him.
Gary, too, is considering suicide, in addition to contemplating his death by firing squad. Locked up with a fellow longtime-convict named Richard Gibbs, he discusses his fate and talks about reincarnation. They bond by sharing prison stories, and even manage to drum up some entertainment by giving grief to a naïve guard, Luis, who calls them "Geelmore" and "Geebs."
Need to Know: Gary Gilmore's early life, and doubts about his parentage, might have played a role in turning him toward crime. His anguish over losing Nicole might have driven him to commit senseless murders. But once he was imprisoned and facing the prospect of a death sentence, his and Nicole's deep connection returned, and they started looking ahead to the next chapter — that is, life after death.
Part Six: The Trial of Gary M. Gilmore
Gary's lawyers, Mike Esplin and Craig Snyder, are frustrated by Gary's recalcitrance — he's not doing much to help build their defense case. Brenda seems like a potential witness, but there's bad blood between her and Gary since she helped the cops catch him. To boot, forensic evidence showing that Gary deliberately shot Benny Bushnell point-blank during the robbery is extra damning.
A psychiatrist's evaluation concludes that Gary is fit to stand trial, despite being diagnosed with a "personality disorder of the psychopathic or antisocial type." Gary is aware that he could act insane in order to give his attorneys material to mount a defense — at least, get the charges reduced from first- to second-degree murder — but refuses out of principle: "I resent having my intelligence insulted." (Indeed, the psychiatrist's evaluation found that Gary is of above-average intelligence — yet another factor that may indicate he was fully aware of what he was doing.)
The defense lawyers set their sights on the mitigation hearing, which takes place after the trial as per Utah law and may give Gary his best chance of getting a reduced sentence.
At the trial, prosecutor Noall Wootton provides solid evidence of Gary's guilt, including the testimony of witness Peter Arroyo, who saw Gary striding away from the motel with a cash box and a pistol. Gary's lawyers ultimately rest their case without mounting a substantive defense. After all, they don't have much to work with. Yet Gary is incredulous that his lawyers didn't make more of an effort. He insists that he wants to reopen the case and take the stand himself.
The attorneys give him the opportunity to do so in court the following day, but during questioning by the judge, Gary changes his mind. Suddenly he seems to have absorbed what his lawyers are saying and resigned himself to his fate.
Gary is found guilty of first-degree murder. Following the mitigation hearing, in which he admits to killing Benny Bushnell but claims not to understand his own motive, Gary is given the death penalty, and chooses death by firing squad. His loved ones are in shock. He is taken to the state prison.
Need to Know: Although Gary Gilmore is indignant at his court-appointed attorneys for mounting what he views as a lackluster defense, he becomes resigned to his fate shockingly quick — at least in part, it seems, because of his belief in past lives and the afterlife. He believes that he and Nicole will be reunited in their next existence.
Part Seven: Death Row
Gary's mother Bessie's recollections help to retrace Gary's path to death row. When he was young, he and his brothers clashed with their father, Frank, chafing against his intolerance of minor childhood transgressions. Bessie believes the house they lived in was haunted and that some kind of "apparition" possessed Gary. He was sent to reform school after stealing a car, and emerged hardened. After entering Oregon State Penitentiary, he attempted suicide, and was put on the drug Prolixin, which seemed to turn him into a zombie. After they stopped the injections, he was a changed man, much harder and darker.
Bessie recalls that when Gary was as young as three years old, she had a premonition that he would someday be executed. She's not alone in sensing his dark side: Gary's younger brother Mikal has long feared him. He remembers Gary's trial for armed robbery, where he pleaded with the judge for leniency, reasoning that more time in lockup would just exacerbate the issues that led his brother to a life of crime. His sentence was nine years.
In the present day, Gary incessantly writes letters to Nicole: describing prison life, begging her to remain faithful to him — and urging her to commit suicide once he's executed. Confounding all expectations, Gary is staunchly resigned to his fate.
He tells his lawyers that he doesn't want to appeal his death sentence, and thus no longer wants to retain their counsel. He can't bear the idea of living out the rest of his natural life in prison. But they insist that they can't, in good conscience, stop trying to save his life.
Need to Know: Gary Gilmore's insistence on going through with his death sentence begins to stir up controversy, to his court-appointed lawyers' consternation. To Gary and even his own mother, however, his execution seems somehow fated.
Book Two: Eastern Voices
Part One: In the Reign of Good King Boaz
Given the death penalty has only recently been reinstated, there are questions about how and when Gary's sentence will be carried out. Assistant Attorney General Earl Dorius is buzzing about the potential significance of Utah's first execution in sixteen years. Gary's case starts to attract media attention — and the interest of a lawyer-turned-writer, Dennis Boaz, who is fascinated by the arcane and believes in the principle of "synchronicity." Boaz writes to Gary affirming his right to choose death.
Gary's lawyers file an appeal, despite the fact that Gary has fired them. The state supreme court grants a stay of execution against Gary's own wishes. Via the prison chaplain, Cline Campbell, Gary reaches out to Boaz, and after a probing conversation that delves into numerology and reincarnation, decides to retain him as counsel. Out of practice though he is, Boaz goes before the Utah Supreme Court to argue Gary's right to fulfill his sentence. They rescind the stay order — but the governor instates another.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Summary and Analysis of The Executioner's Song by Worth Books. Copyright © 2017 Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.. Excerpted by permission of OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED MEDIA.
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