Gore Vidal is the sort of person whose interviews I read not because I enjoy or respect (or, erm, am familiar with) his work, but simply because I hope that some sort of internet-negotiated mental osmosis might bless me with his covetsome verbal acrobatics–I yearn for his ability to insult with a detached elegance; instead, my own sense of humor is increasingly shaped deformed by a Gawker Media-influenced sense of crude snark.¹

1. Snark ain’t in the dictionary? Get on it, Webster! You too Merriam!↩