Gay American autobiography : writings from Whitman to Sedaris / edited by David Bergman.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Bergman, David, 1950-

Series:

Living out

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Gay people--United States--Biography.

Gay people.

Gay authors.

United States.

Gay authors--United States--Biography.

Genre:

Biographies.

Physical Description:

xx, 403 pages ; 23 cm.

Place of Publication:

Madison : University of Wisconsin Press, [2009]

Summary:

The first anthology to survey the full range of gay men's autobiographical writing from Walt Whitman to the present, Gay American Autobiography draws excerpts from letters, journals, oral histories, memoirs, and autobiographies to provide examples of the best life writing from the last century and a half.

Volume editor David Bergman guides the reader chronologically through selected writings that give voice to every generation of gay writers since the nineteenth century, including a diverse array of American men of African, European, Jewish, Asian, and Latino heritage. Documenting a range of life experiences that encompass tattoo artists and academics, composers and drag queens, hustlers and clerks, it contains accounts of turn-of-the-century transvestites, gay rights activists, men battling AIDS, and soldiers attempting to come out in the army. Each selection provides important insight on the wide spectrum of ways gay men have defined and lived their lives, highlighting how self-awareness changes an author's experience.

The volume includes an introduction by Bergman and headnotes for each of the nearly forty entries. Bringing many out-of-print and hard-to-find works to new readers, this challenging and comprehensive anthology chronicles American gay history and life struggles over the course of the past 150 years.

Contents:

From his journals / Henry David Thoreau 3

From his letters to Peter Doyle / Walt Whitman 15

From his letters to Hendrick Andersen / Henry James 27

"Chumming with a Savage: Kana-ana" / Charles Warren Stoddard 40

"Love's Dungeon Flower" / Alexander Berkman 50

"Fleeing from Self (25 to 27)" / Claude Hartland 59

From Autobiography of an Androgyne / Earl Lind 68

From Rat and the Devil / Russell Cheney, F. O. Matthiessen 78

From Jeb and Dash / "Jeb Alexander" 92

From Continual Lessons / Glenway Wescott 108

"Carlsen, Crane" / Lincoln Kirstein 125

"The Magic Summer" / Samuel M. Steward 151

"Spring and Summer 1956" / Paul Goodman 158

"The Priest and the Pagans" / Tobias Scheebaum 170

From The New York Diary / Ned Rorem 181

"Gay in the Army" / Edward Field 187

From Minette: Recollections of a Part-Time Lady / Minette 200

"Larry" / Martin Duberman 207

From A Day and a Night at the Baths / Michael Rumaker 217

"Voice Over: Four Factions of the Rear Guard" / John Rechy 230

From Young Man from the Provinces / Alan Helms 236

From Under the Rainbow / Arnie Kantrowitz 249

"Writing Gay" / Edmund White 259

From The Motion of Light in Water / Samuel R. Delany 276

"My Harvard" / Andrew Holleran 287

"Puck" / Paul Monette 301

"The Last Days of Reinaldo Arenas: A Sadness as Deep as the Sea" / Jaime Manrique 320

"Cherry" / Kevin Killian 329

"The End of Being Known" / Michael Klein 337

"Memories That Smell Like Gasoline" / David Wojnarowicz 348

"On the Drip" / David B. Feinberg 353

"Hejira" / David Sedaris 363

"Ceremonies" / Essex Hemphill 366

"The Aryan Boy" / Wayne Koestenbaum 374

"Chivalry" / Gil Cuadros 381

"And Judas Boogied until His Slippers Wept" / Justin Chin 390.

Notes:

"Selected gay autobiographies and life writings": pages [401]-403.

ISBN:

9780299230449

0299230449

OCLC:

259754283