50 Gay and Lesbian Books Everybody Must Read

Richard Canning

Gay topics have been central to most national literary traditions, whether in fiction, memoir, drama, or verse. Yet “crossover” success stories are remarkably few, as are works of literature about gay subjects, written by heterosexual authors. Furthermore, openly gay-themed books tend to get passed over in favor of works more evidently addressing “universal” or “mainstream” concerns. No longer: Here’s the book that cues you in to the essential titles in the gay and lesbian literary canon. Edited by Richard Canning, with a foreword from renowned literary critic Harold Bloom, this volume contains fifty succinct essays by critics, public figures, and authors. They illuminate works by fifty men and women that everybody should read. Canning tackles important themes, issues of regional and cultural diversity, political aspects, and analyses of that old chestnut: What makes a work of literature gay or lesbian? Don’t expect a definitive answer. Do expect to learn why these titles are must-reads. Rearrange your shelves, book-club lists, and expectations. Whether your preference is for Ginsberg or Woolf or Melville, this is one volume no bookworm–straight or gay–should miss out on. Richard Canning is the editor of the Between Men series and author of Gay Fiction Speaks and Hear Us Out, which won the 2005 Lambda Literary Award for Editor’s Choice. Born in England, he divides his time between London and Sheffield, where he is a lecturer in English and American literature at the University of Sheffield.

Contents

Introduction / Richard Canning — Samuel and 2 Samuel (after 960 BC) / Aaron Hamburger — Gilgamesh (between 668 and 627 BC) / David McConnell — Poems (c. 600 BC), Sappho / Maureen Duffy — The symposium (c. 384 BC), Plato / Shaun Levin — Letters (1798 and later), Horace Walpole / Duncan Fallowell — Moby Dick (1851), Herman Melville / Vestal McIntyre — Leaves of grass (1855 and later), Walt Whitman / Philip Clark — A season in hell = Une saison en enfer (1873), Arthur Rimbaud / Kevin Killian — The Bostonians (1866), Henry James / Regina Marler — A Shropshire lad (1896), A.E. Housman / Mark Merlis — De Profundis (1895-97, published 1905 and 1962), Oscar Wilde / Fenton Johnson — Claudine at school = Claudine à l’école (1900), Colette / Alison Smith — Death in Venice = Tod in Venedig (1912), Thomas Mann / Christopher Bram — The flower beneath the foot (1923), Ronald Firbank / Brian Bouldrey — Mrs. Dalloway (1925), Virginia Woolf / Jane DeLynn — Time regained = Le temps retrouvé (1927), Marcel Proust / Felice Picano — More women than men (1933), Ivy Compton-Burnett / Lisa Cohen — Poems (1935 and later), Constantine Cavafy / David Plante — Nightwood (1936), Djuna Barnes / Eric Karl Anderson — The letters of Vita Sackville-West to Virginia Woolf (1922-41; 1985), Vita Sackville-West / Carol Anshaw — Brideshead revisited (1945), Evelyn Waugh / Bob Smith — Memoirs of Hadrian = Mémoires d’Hadrien (1951), Marguerite Yourcenar / Edmund White — Carol: The price of salt (1952), Patricia Highsmith / Stella Duffy — In the making (1952), G.F. Green / Peter Parker — Forbidden colors (1953), Yukio Mishima / Randall Kenan — Howl and other poems (1956), Allen Ginsberg / David Bergman — Giovanni’s room (1956), James Baldwin / Douglas A. Martin — First love and other sorrows: stories (1958), Harold Brodkey / Noel Alumit — A taste of honey (1958), Shelagh Delaney / John Weir — A single man (1964), Christopher Isherwood / Patrick Ryan — Paradiso (1966), José Lezama Lima / RIchard Reitsma — Eustace Chisholm and the works (1967), James Purdy / Jonathan Franzen — My father and myself (1968), J.R. Ackerley / Andrew Holleran — Betrayed by Rita Hayworth = La traicion de Rita Hayworth (1968), Mañuel Puig / R. Zamora Linmark — The wild boys: a book of the dead (1971), William Burroughs / Kathy Acker — The Persian boy (1972), Mary Renault / Jim Grimsley — Too much flesh and Jabez (1977), Coleman Dowell / Bradley Craft — Dancer from the dance (1978), Andrew Holleran / Matias Viegener — The cancer journals (1980), Audre Lorde / Tania Katan — The color purple (1982), Alice Walker / Mark Behr — A boy’s own story (1983), Edmund White / Robert Glück — Oranges are not the only fruit (1985), Jeanette Winterson / V.G. Lee — To the friend who did not save my life = A l’ami qui ne m’a pas sauvé la vie (1990), Hervé Guibert / Alistair McCartney — The terrible girls (1990), Rebecca Brown / Carol Guess — The man who fell in love with the moon (1991), Tom Spanbauer / Larry Duplechan — Take me to Paris, Johnny (1993), John Foster / Rob Beeston — Palimpsest (1995), Gore Vidal / Paul Reidinger — Allan Stein (1999), Matthew Stadler / Blair Mastbaum — Ghost dance (2004), Douglas Wright / Richard Canning — Burning dreams (2006), Susan Smith / J.D. Glass.

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Details

ISBN	9781593501198
Genre	Literary History
Publication Date	01-Jun-09
Publisher	Alyson Books
Editor	Richard Canning
Format	Trade Paperback
No. of Pages	288
Notes	which cover???
Language	English
Rating	NotRated
Editor	Richard Canning
BookID	59

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50 Gay and Lesbian Books Everybody Must Read by Richard Canning