Wrg AIDS: Gay Lerature, Language, and Analysis

Contents:

• GAY CRICISM
• GAY LERATURE: POETRY AND PROSEGAY LERATURE: POETRY AND PROSE
• ‘I JT WANT SOMETHG THAT’S GAY AND HAPPY’: L.G.B.T.Q. ROMANCE IS BOOMG

GAY CRICISM

Numero anthologi of short gay fictn clu The Faber Book of Gay Short Fictn (1991), Pengu Book of Gay Short Stori (1994), Pengu Book of Lbian Short Stori (1994), the seri Men on Men (begng 1988) and Women on Women (begng 1990), and even an anthology of gay and lbian science fictn, Kdred Spirs (1984). The Lambda awards (Lbian, Gay Male, Bisexual, and Transgenr Awards) have swelled to 22 tegori, cludg story llectns and anthologi, poetry, memoirs, cultural studi, public policy, law, history, spirualy, and genr studi. The awards have gone not only to exclively homosexual or transgenr wrers but also to those who w awards both gay and straight tegori, such as Jefey Eugenis, the Pulzer Prize–wng novelist and short story wrer.

The lerature of homosexualy has evolved to the pot where is often grouped not only acrdg to ethnicy and genre, for example, Lata and China, Ain-Amerin, Asian and Native Amerin, but also to sorts of sexualy, such as gay, transsexual, and bisexual not to mentn the lerary genr that reprent , cludg mystery, science fictn, and tective fictn, and even geographic regn. Categori: Gay and Lbian Novels, Genr Studi, Lerature, Queer Theory, Short StoryTags: Amerin Lbian Short Fictn, Amerin Lerature, Gay and Lbian Fictn, Gay and Lbian Stori, Gay Fictn, Gay Men’s Wrg, Gay Short Stori, Homosexualy and Lerature, Homosexualy Amerin Lerature, Homosexualy Lerature, Homosexualy Short Stori, Lbian and Gay Cricism, Lbian Short Stori, Lerary Cricism, The Bt New Gay Fictn, Them of Homosexualy Lerature. Shared among gay iends, we uld celebrate our growg nfince and visibily wh new work om Alan Hollghurst and Jeate Wterson, velop a mp sensibily by quotg to each other l om EF Benson and Ronald Firbank, image that London uld bee the queer Ardia picted Armistead Mp’s Tal of the we moved towards assiatn the 1990s, Dennis Cooper’s Gee Mil novel cycle was a remr that sexualy was still transgrsive, that sire remaed a dark and disptive force.

It’s a such a tenr moment and a remr of the kdns and nnectn that is possible between all of MenzAuthor of Rabow MilkCeremoni by Essex Hemphill (Pengu)The hugely fluential gay Ain Amerin poet Essex Hemphill died of Aids-related plitns 1995, aged 38, jt one month before the lnch of protease hibors – early antiretrovirals – which might have saved or at least prolonged his life. In the wrgs and radil cema he left behd – cludg llaboratns wh Marlon Riggs Tongu Untied (1989) and Isaac Julien Lookg for Langston (1989) – he provid subsequent generatns wh evince that we lived and loved, and of our fight agast the effects of tersectg whe supremacy, racism, homophobia and heterosexism. Brorick’s novel is an important document that dramatis hidn gay liv the Dubl of 40 years CreweDebut novel The New Life was published this yearFrank Sargon’s Collected Stori, 1935-1963 (Pengu)Frank Sargon’s short stori are nversatnal.

GAY LERATURE: POETRY AND PROSEGAY LERATURE: POETRY AND PROSE

”Neil BartlettTheatre director, playwright and thor of novels cludg Ready to Catch Him Should He Fall and Addrs BookNocturn for the Kg of Napl by Edmund Whe (Pidor)In 1980, when I was livg a beds and “gay” was a word still largely spoken between ntemptuo verted mas, a chanced-upon newspaper review alerted me to the existence of an unknown Amerin wrer whose third book had jt ma to the UK. I very much look forward to her follow-up Brawyrms later the KayAward-wng Makar (Natnal Poet for Stland) and thor of fictn and nonfictn cludg Red Dt Road, Tmpet and Bsie SmhSister Outsir by Audre Lor (Pengu Classics)In an terview Ada Gay Griff and Michelle Parkerson’s 1995 documentary about her life, A Lany for Survival (the name of one of Lor’s semal poems), Audre Lor said prciently: “What I leave behd has a life of s own.

He was the epome of the upright, public-spired, homosexual expat, nductg a distguished reer om Alexandria and Athens – two of his bt novels are about life Alexandria, wh illic passn throbbg unr the rtraed surface. I thk only a gay man would have had the patience to observe all the character typ, and renr them wh such unfettable, tty Atherton LEssayist and thor of Gay Bar: Why We Went Out, which won the Natnal Book Crics Circle award for tobgraphyReady to Catch Him Should He Fall by Neil Bartlett (Serpent’s Tail, available on worldoarebooks)So often, boy-meets-boy narrativ take place some remote manor or tent, as if romance only occurs far om the maddg gay crowd.

‘I JT WANT SOMETHG THAT’S GAY AND HAPPY’: L.G.B.T.Q. ROMANCE IS BOOMG

Certaly popular televisn shows like Queer Eye for the Straight Guy have ma the word “queer, ” which had been appropriated by the gay and lbian movement as a symbol of polil empowerment, to a sanized label for homosexuals wh no polil agenda. HOMOSOCIAL DESIRE is ground René Girard’s theory of “triangular sire” and Gayle Rub’s theory of the “sex/genr system, ” specifi lly her crique of Lévi-Strss’s analysis of kship systems which women functn as gifts enomic exchang between men.

Acrdg to Sedgwick, homosocial sire between men is exprsed a triangular stcture wh a woman (or a “disurse” of “woman”) standg as a putative object of at least one of them: “the ultimate functn of women is to be ndus of homosocial sire” (99). ” Homosocial stctur equently elic homophobia as an stutnalized check on reprsed homosexual sire, but they more often lead to “chang men’s experience of livg wh the shiftg terms of pulsory heterosexualy” (134). Her chapter on Henry Jam her Epistemology of the Closet (1990) illtrat the divi between homosocial workg, which nfi rms the heterosexual stat quo, and “homosexual panic, ” which reacts vlently agast any maniftatn of eroticism or “genalized” behavr that might emerge out of such works.

Categori: Genr Studi, Queer TheoryTags: Adrienne Rich, Body Theory, Compulsory Heterosexualy and the Lbian Existence, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, Fatal Women: Lbian Sexualy and the Mark of Aggrsn, Femism, Genr, Genr and Sexualy, Genr Studi, Genr Trouble, Judh Butler, Lbian and Gay Cricism, Lbian Body, lbian studi, Lerary Cricism, Lerary Theory, Lynda Hart, Michel Fouult, Monique Wtig, Other, Otherg, Queer Eye, Queer Theory, René Girard, Tera Lretis, the other, The Practice of Love: Lbian Sexualy and Perverse Dire. SJ Sdu, thor of Marriage of a Thoand Li, lled , "One of the first Anglophone works to challenge the trope of the sad/suicidal gays who die at the end, this book gave a blueprt of what queer fictn uld look like. Forster (A Passage to India, A Room Wh a View, Howards End) wrote the benchmark gay novel Mrice cir 1913, was published posthumoly a lh tale of manners, posn, and sire, the tular character meets and falls for his classmate Clive while at Oxford.