Although there’s plenty of travel, Berger doesn’t consider his book travel literature. Following one of his literary idols, Lawrence Durrell, Berger aims instead for a “residence book.” Read More
To those lucky saps who find themselves in possession of The Complete Short Stories of James Purdy (Liveright Publishing): be...
One thing the reviewing of diaries can do is deflate the zeppelin of personality one has created around the writer, in this case, author Christopher Isherwood, whose crystal-clear stories of conflicted characters have been ridden blissfully by many for years... Read More
With the publication of The Harvey Milk Interviews, editor Vince Emery humanizes the slain politician, allowing Milk’s own words to temper the hagiography advanced by Randy Shilts’s The Mayor Of Castro Street, as well as the subsequent documentary that brought Milk to a wider audience. Read More
Fans of Hollywood, once content with maps detailing the homes of movie stars, now prefer detailed flow charts of the...
In a 1959 letter to his parents, William S. Burroughs confessed: “I give as much attention to a letter as I do to anything I write [...]." In Rub Out the Words: The Letters of William S. Burroughs, 1959-1974, editor Bill Morgan displays some of the author’s best work. Read More
One of the heroes responsible for changing the medical establishment’s understanding that gay people can be sane, Silverstein helped sway the American Psychiatric Association to remove homosexuality from its list of mental illnesses in 1973. What’s most disturbing (or exonerating) about For the Ferryman is that even a shrink of Silverstein’s stature can be sucked into a tumultuous psycho-dependent relationship. Read More
In 1957, just as the obscenity trial over “Howl” was coming to a head, the Mattachine-associated Pan-Graphics Press published a...
Too controversial for Vanity Fair? Secret Historian may be the Big Gay Book of 2010. Justin Spring’s Secret Historian: The...
While drafting an introductory letter to Johnny Mathis in his new collection of writing, Role Models, John Waters thinks: “Explain...
