Out in the Mountains

    
   

A List of Literary Ideas For the Gay Gift:

by Hugh Coyle

There can be no mistaking that when it
comes to gift-giving during the holiday
season, the world of gay literature offers a
bounty of lasting and diverse suggestions.
Books are a wonderful way for those just
coming out to explore their new1y-under-
stood sexuality, just as they offer those
already out in the open an enjoyable means
of celebrating and expanding on their free-
dom. Gay literature also serves to increase
understanding and awareness beyond the
non-heterosexual community, and thus can
be a meaningful gift to straight friends and
family members as well.

The titles mentioned below are in no
way a complete inventory of books avail-
able on the gay experience (gay gothics and
pornography, for example, are admittedly
not represented). Discerning readers will
also see that the list focuses on male-related
literaure; I leave the compilation of the
equally rich world of lesbian writing to
someone more knowledgeable than my-
self. (OITM also welcomes readers to write
in with their own insights and recommen-
dations concerning available books by and
about gays.)

Gay literature in gemeral has been
enjoying a signigicant increase in popular-
ity over the past decade as new writers like
David Leavitt and Michael Chabon cam
high praise from the critics and enjoy sub-
stantial promotion across the nation. The
onslaught of AIDS in the eighties has in-
spired a significant amount of work as
writers share their grief and loss through
words on the page (the short story
collection The Darker fleef by Edmund
White and Adam Mars-Jones in particular

focuses on the impact of AIDS). With this
upswing in gay writing has come a broad-
ening of the range of such fiction; the
homosexuality of one or more characters in
the book no longer necessarily constitutes
the central theme in the book.

Still, there are the classics of gay litera-
ture, and these go all the way back to the
ancient Greeks and works such as the Sym-
pgsijim. One can browse through any fic-
tion shelf in any bookstore and find classics
of another kind, all of them gay: Marcel
Proust, Henry James, Walt Whitman,
Christopher Isherwood and, of course,
Oscar Wilde, just to name a few.

Gay writers today, however, have
been enjoying a freedom unlike anything
known in previous centuries. The publica-
tion of E.M. Forster’s Maigce in 1971 can
perhaps serve as a landmark, as Forster
himself had significant doubts which pre-
vented him from publishing the book on its
completion in 1914. The book is as insight-
ful and illuminating today as it must have
been to Forster when he wrote it, and it
merits as much attention as Forster’s other,
more popular classics.

Of course, even the world of gay litera-
ture has its own popular classics, and one
such enduring figure is Edmund White,
whose forthright presentation of the gay
world has established him as one of the
prominent critics of gay culture. White is
perhaps best known for his work with Dr.

Charles Silverstein on The J gy ef Gay Sex.
All the smae, his novel A Bey’s Own §tg_ry
is vital reading for anyone interested in the
matter of growing up gay, and the recent
follow-up to that book, the Beajigfjil Rgmm
is Empty, continues beyond the main

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New lesbian and gay titles in stock for the holidays:
Castro Street Memoirs, Beyond AIDS: A Journey Into Healing
Cut Outs and Cut Ups: Lesbian Fun and Games

Fridays until 8 pm

 

Monday-Saturday 12-6 pm and

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character’s sexual awakening. White has
also published Sgtes ef Desire: Travels in
 , a book which, true to its title,
explores what it means to be gay in various
parts of the United States.
In his book, White naturally describes
San Francisco as “Our Town,” and that
feeling prevails in Armistead Maupin’s
best-selling series, Tales of the City.
Maupin uses the West Coast mecca as a
steady source of material for his only-
somewhat-fictionalized work. The latest
installment,  , was recently
released in hardcover, while the earlier
books (all in paperback now) have received ,
facelifts in the form of new covers. 4
Though out on the stands for some 1
time now, David Leavitt’s Egaal Affm I
tioas continues to be a popular seller, as do I
his earlier works, The ggst Lgguage ef (
Crges and the short story collection Earg a
 . All of them portray aprofound I
sensitivity to a number of gay issues on a 1:
number of generational levels and have I
thus set something of a standard for con- i
temporary gay writing. I
Following on the heels of Leavitt come v:
works such as Michael Cabon’s The Mys-
teries ef Piasejiggh, Christopher Bram’s t(
Sjigprising Myself, and David Feinberg’s It
Eighty-Sixed. For those wishing to know WI
something more of the English gay world, It
past and present, Alan Hollinghurst’s re- til
cent novel The Swimming-Pool Librm it
has just been released in paperback. It
If you’re unsure of where to start, or if h
you’re just looking to expand your hori- ne
zons. George Stambolian has edited two rp
excellentandcomprehensivecollectionsof tr.
short stories, both entitled Men en Men. 301
These follow in the tradition of some of the no
earlier gghristepher Sage; anthologies and III
offer the reader a sampling of a number of III:
gay voices, new and old alike. iii
For those looking for something other IF
than fiction, Neil Mil1er’s In §ea;eh ef Gax DI
Ameriea expands on the study initiated by hi
White in his Travels in gay America and III»
explores how issues such as AIDS have
affected contemporary gay cu1tur6- IE
Though AIDS is certainly not the cheeriest it.‘
of topics to bring into the holiday season, 11 Dr
is nonetheless an important one, and there tat
is perhaps no more comprehensive ove_r- ~_FlS
view of the epidemic than that portrayed 1“ 1”]
Randy Shiltz’s controversial An<1tI1,613.a3l‘¢d Ii“
Played Qn. As a matter of fact, rumor has it bar
that the book is currently being considered Ierc

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for a television mlI1lS6(EgSt.t mug d onpage 9) Y1
44 §