Dog his homework— David Halper’s "How to be Gay," reviewed by David Greven

Contents:

• HOW TO BE GAY
• HOW TO BE GAY BY DAVID M HALPER – REVIEW
• HOW TO BE GAY
• ‘HOW TO BE GAY’ BY DAVID M. HALPER
• HOW TO BE GAY - SOFTVER

HOW TO BE GAY

No one rais an eyebrow if you suggt that a guy who arrang his furnure jt so, rolls his ey exaggerated disbelief, lik techno mic or show tun, and knows all of Bette Davis’s bt l by heart might, jt possibly, be gay. Inspired by the notor unrgraduate urse of the same tle that Halper tght at the Universy of Michigan, provokg cri of outrage om both the right-wg media and the gay prs, How To Be Gay trac gay men’s cultural difference to the social meang of style. Far om beg terred by stereotyp, Halper nclus that the geni of gay culture ris some of s most spised featur: s atheticism, snobbery, melodrama, adoratn of glamour, ritur of women, and obssn wh mothers.

HOW TO BE GAY BY DAVID M HALPER – REVIEW

Halper, a profsor of the history and theory of sexualy at the Universy of Michigan, Ann Arbor, provotively argu that when to fg what means to be a homosexual man, sex is overrated. ” The great value of tradnal gay male culture, he further poss, perhaps even more challenggly, “ris some of s most spised and repudiated featur: gay male femy, diva worship, atheticism, snobbery, drama, adoratn of glamour, riture of women and obssn wh the figure of the mother.

Among the most unual thgs about “How to Be Gay” is that is, at heart, a 500-pl-page work that explor a fundamental kd of gay sensibily by ncentratg almost exclively on one actrs, Joan Crawford, and on a sgle scene a sgle movie, the 1945 drama “Mildred Pierce. Halper teas an enormo amount out of this scene, cludg the sense of “glamour and abjectn” gay dienc fd Crawford, and how the film packag the “transgrsive spectacle of female strength, tonomy, feists and power. Halper works up to an argument (impossible to summarize here) about how the film evok a “dissint perspective” on the very ia of romantic is articulate about many other thgs this book, cludg how gay men often fd more ronance straight cultural artifacts than gay on.

HOW TO BE GAY

Halper even neatly mows down hipster irony the face of the kd of gay male irony that f ’s a kaleidospic book that at s base breaks wh what the thor lls “the ‘Brokeback Mounta’ crowd.

What he n be ncerned about, seems, is the culture of Gay, passed down through generatns of slappers, proppg up the bars of Soho London, Chelsea New York, and the Marais Paris, all quarters which are now as ad as the proverbial Halper has wrten an over-long book, more lolised s applitn than he seems fully to appreciate, about the aspects of beg gay other than sexual choice.

Naturally, when a urse "How to Be Gay" was announced the Amerin mid-wt, an army of enraged fay-first mpaigners rose up tpe leisurewear to nounce Profsor Halper for wantg to rec the nocent.

‘HOW TO BE GAY’ BY DAVID M. HALPER

He adms that "Amerin" is an unspoken adjective much of what he has to say, cludg the tle of the book – I gus "How to be an Amerin Gay" would be an even more unvg subject than the one he has chosen. Outsi Ameri, he reliably gets thgs wrong, suggtg that Bollywood mils may reprent the same sort of gay cult to Indian gay men that Sex and the Cy do to Amerins – he's clearly never seen a film a Calcutta cema, or he would have noticed that the appeal is not a gay thg at all at s source. He don't wre about cloth, or gtur, or ga, or any of what intifi a gay man to another at 80 pac, or the syntax and vobulary and slang which mak them mutually clear at closer quarters – I mean, you n't always be sayg "Have you seen Mommie Deart?

The book would have been much stronger if were a discipled 120 pag about Mildred Pierce, and s off-shoots – Mommie Deart and var drag-show renstctns – specifilly examed om the viewpot of a middle-aged gay man. I feel pretty much left out, never havg seen Mildred Pierce, as a blissfully funny book about homosexualy the 19th century, Strangers, Graham Robb provid a list of thgs that at the time were thought to e or to dite homosexualy.

It was surprisg, fact, that anyone end up heterosexual, so all-enpassg were the the quali Halper intifi wh gayns are beg "a great dancer or ok, that you have a weakns for mid-century morn, or that you drive a VW Golf" – a VW Golf? Elsewhere, lists of gay-nnected activi n stretch to surprisg plac: "beg gay had somethg to do wh likg Broadway mils, or listeng to show tun or torch songs or Judy Garland, or playg the piano, wearg fluffy sweaters, drkg cktails, smokg cigarett and llg each other 'girliend'.

HOW TO BE GAY - SOFTVER

Elsewhere, Halper wonrs whether gay culture is dyg out, on the basis that – he claims – straight people bought up the ho of gay people after they died of Aids the 1980s and 90s, and that the numbers of gay bars major ci are on the cle om peaks the 70s. After all, those lns hookg up on Grdr are formg powerful nnectns wh hundreds, sometim thoands of other gay men, tossg each other asi afterwards wh savage abandon, and are dog whout the aid of mercial bars.

That don't seem like such an awful age of the mp persona, the bg ment, the ironic alln is not passg, exactly, but is movg towards a particular sectn of a particular gay muny at a particular pot time. An tertg book about gay culture would spend time wh a range of gay men, of different ag and class and backgrounds, fdg out how their social works were formed, as well as vtigatg how they liked to be urse, that would be a great al harr than jt gog on about a uple of scen om 40s movi that you and your iends simply adore. You'd hardly gus, om Halper's acunt, that gay culture was anythg but owned and monstrated by late-middle-aged whe men about four Amerin cultural nfince is driven on by s ual fuel, money – some time soon the ccial gay diva will not be Lady Gaga, but Fish Leong.