Brg up Billy Lee Brammer’s The Gay Place, the Texas polil novel published 1961, and you’ll get mixed reactns. Some rears love ....
Contents:
- BOOK REVIEW: “THE GAY PLACE” BY BILLY LEE BRAMMER
- LEAVING THE GAY PLACE
- 'THE GAY PLACE' WAS ONE OF THE BT NOVELS OF S ERA; A NEW B TELLS THE DALLAS-BORN THOR'S VIVID STORY
- THE GAY PLACE: BEG THREE RELATED NOVELS
- THE GAY PLACE
- ‘LEAVG THE GAY PLACE’ AND ‘THE GAY PLACE’ REVIEW: THE TEXAS WAY
- RETURN TO THE GAY PLACE
- WISNS MIDDLE SCHOOL FEATUR 'THIS BOOK IS GAY' LIBRARY, STIRRG ONLE OUTRAGE
- RON DESANTIS CONSIRS SUG BUD LIGHT OVER ANTI-GAY BOYTTS BEE WHY NOT?
BOOK REVIEW: “THE GAY PLACE” BY BILLY LEE BRAMMER
* the gay place novel *
On the ver of the Universy of Texas Prs edn of Billy Lee Brammer’s 1961 novel The Gay Place is a blurb by David Halberstam:.
Other is The Gay Place, a stunng, origal, tensely human novel spired by Lyndon Johnson.
“I know a gay place”.
LEAVING THE GAY PLACE
The Gay Place is a seri of three novellas, wh terlockg plots and characters, by Amerin thor Billy Lee Brammer. The novellas, published a sgle book, clu The Flea Circ, Room Enough to Caper and Country Pleasur. Set an unnamed state intil to Texas, each novella has a different protagonist: Roy Sherwood, a member of the state legislature; Neil Christiansen, the state's junr senator; and Jay McGown, the ernor's speechwrer. The ernor himself, Arthur Fenstemaker, a master polician serv as the domant figure throughout. The book also clus characters based on Brammer, his wife Nade, The book has been wily acclaimed one of the bt Amerin polil novels ever wrten. * the gay place novel *
Stt Fzgerald poem which clus the l: “I heard Helena/In a hnted doze/Say: ‘I know a gay place/Nobody knows.
'THE GAY PLACE' WAS ONE OF THE BT NOVELS OF S ERA; A NEW B TELLS THE DALLAS-BORN THOR'S VIVID STORY
“The bt novel about Amerin polics our time.” —Willie Morris Set ep the heart of Texas, The Gay Place nsists of three terlockg novels— .. * the gay place novel *
Given Halberstam’s strong endorsement of The Gay Place, I expected somethg solid and important and sential.
The Gay Place clearly isn’t the sort of polil story that is immersed the electoral-legislative procs and that exam the moral and personal quandari of policians tryg to make or fluence policy cisns while strivg to stay afloat as the current of events barrels them along.
THE GAY PLACE: BEG THREE RELATED NOVELS
“The bt novel about Amerin polics our time.” —Willie Morris Set ep the heart of Texas, The Gay Place nsists of three terlockg novels—The Flea Circ, Room Enough to Caper, and Country Pleasur—each wh a different protagonist. Unifyg the stori is Texas ernor Arthur Fenstemaker, a nny master polician moled on Lyndon Johnson, for whom the thor served as a prs ai. The ernor any means necsary to do what needs to be done, while the other characters… * the gay place novel *
Hardly anythg polil, such as legislative horse-tradg, tak place on the pag of The Gay Place, and most of what do occurs eher off-stage (e. Brg up Billy Lee Brammer's The Gay Place, the Texas polil novel published 1961, and you'll get mixed reactns. The Gay Place won praise om Gay Tale, David Halberstam, Kathere Anne Porter, Willie Morris and Calv Trill, who lled the bt Amerin novel about polics wrten the 20th Lee Brammer cir 1960, an image om Leavg the Gay Place: Billy Lee Brammer and the Great Society, by Tracy Dgherty.
THE GAY PLACE
Brammer and his book, the only one he pleted, are likely to attract a h round of attentn wh the publitn of Tracy Dgherty's Leavg the Gay Place: Billy Lee Brammer and the Great Society. Leavg the Gay Place: Billy Lee Brammer and the Great Society, by Tracy Dgherty(Universy of Texas Prs)Brammer was born Dallas 1929 and grew up Oak Cliff. The future print would serve as the primary spiratn for the protagonist of The Gay Place.
Wh a prcriptn) chased wh Dr Pepper to keep him Lee Brammer 1961, an image om Leavg the Gay Place: Billy Lee Brammer and the Great Society, by Tracy Dgherty.
(At-Amerin Statman / Universy of Texas Prs)Some of the bt sectns of Leavg the Gay Place ncern how Brammer's teractns wh Johnson helped shape The Gay Place.
‘LEAVG THE GAY PLACE’ AND ‘THE GAY PLACE’ REVIEW: THE TEXAS WAY
Brammer was able to e the dynamics of his own failg marriage as material for The Gay Place as spe of mostly good reviews, The Gay Place failed to sell well. Kg, along wh Doatsy Shrake (seated, at left), Holly Gent Palmo, Pete Gent and Billy Lee Brammer an undated image om Leavg the Gay Place. Brammer wrote nsistently the years after The Gay Place, tryg unsuccsfully to fish a mancript he lled "Ftian Days.
Brammer spent the fal years of his life as a speed eak, eventually dyg of an Dgherty (Hannah Cm / Universy Prs of Texas)Dgherty reunts Brammer's saga and the tim which he lived pellg fashn, which mak Leavg the Gay Place one of this year's bt nonfictn books about thor W. Leavg the Gay PlaceBilly Lee Brammer and the Great SocietyTracy Dgherty(Universy of Texas Prs, $29.
After receivg glowg cril acclaim for The Gay Place, Brammer was unable to wre another novel praised so highly. The Gay Place (1961) is a seri of three novellas, wh terlockg plots and characters, by Amerin thor Billy Lee Brammer.
RETURN TO THE GAY PLACE
In most lists of Amerin polil fictn, Billy Lee Brammer’s “The Gay Place, ” published nearly 60 years ago, gets a spot, and rightly so. Published forty years ago, a novel lled The Gay Place ptured a perd Texas that today may seem as archaic as the book’s tle, but s power bridg the years and generatns gone by.
Wh nary a sharecropper or a horseman, The Gay Place was Texas’ first succsful urban novel. It do not, however, explore gay and lbian sexualy (though today often wds up misplaced that sectn of bookstor.
WISNS MIDDLE SCHOOL FEATUR 'THIS BOOK IS GAY' LIBRARY, STIRRG ONLE OUTRAGE
) For centuri “gay” has suggted joy, brilliance, and mirth; the thor found his gaiety the boozy, ctuo liv of policians, journalists, and mp followers At the fifti. Billy Lee lifted his tle om a le a wistful Fzgerald poem (“I know a gay place / Nobody knows”) and ed as an epaph for the At he had known, and for love self.
Comprisg three novellas, lled “The Flea Circ, ” “Room Enough to Caper, ” and “Country Pleasur, ” The Gay Place has two nnective sews: the theme of maral alienatn and fily and an outrageo Texas ernor lled Arthur “Goddam” Fenstemaker. Like most fictnal characters, The Gay Place’s Arthur Fenstemaker was a montage of persons real and imaged, but Billy Lee worked for LBJ for several years when Johnson was the U. The shame was what he chose to do to the time of s publitn, The Gay Place was herald as a lerary triumph, not a polil tattletale.
Only two are still prt and much remembered: The Gay Place and Joseph Heller’s Catch-22.
RON DESANTIS CONSIRS SUG BUD LIGHT OVER ANTI-GAY BOYTTS BEE WHY NOT?
Authors as distguished as Gore Vidal, Ronnie Dugger, and the late Willie Morris have praised The Gay Place as one of the bt novels ever wrten about Amerin polics.
David Halberstam, the thor of The Bt and the Brightt and other splendid books about the natn’s life, says of his iend’s novel, “The Gay Place still stands as one of those really rare brilliant achievements. Of the polil novels our lerature, only two rank wh The Gay Place: Robert Penn Warren’s All the Kg’s Men and now Joe Kle’s Primary Colors—though remas to be seen if Kle’s book will endure as a work of art.
” Years before Kle anonymoly published his roman à clef about the Cltons, he wrote about The Gay Place: “Brammer’s unwtg triumph was to disver the perfect stcture for munitg the exasperatg unrealy of the master polician. ”For Texas wrers, The Gay Place reached far beyond polics. And The Gay Place ntu to spire a host of talents.