The New LGBTQ Literature List

[PeterRS]

There's an interesting article in today's UK Observer newspaper with today's writers informing readers of lesser-known books about gay life that deserve to be classics. So it's not discussing the James Baldwins or Alan Holingshursts. I won't list them here as it's easy to see them headlined in the article. I will just quote a few lines from near the start.

"Arriving in London in the last few months of the 1980s, I discovered that there were more than a few hundred of us and that books still had a potent force. Shared among gay friends, we could celebrate our growing confidence and visibility with new work from Alan Hollinghurst and Jeanette Winterson, develop a camp sensibility by quoting to each other lines from EF Benson and Ronald Firbank, imagine that London could become the queer Arcadia depicted in Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City."

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/apr/09/lgbtq-lost-classics-books-chosen-by-authors

It made me think about the books which helped me realise that I was not one of a few feeling he was gay. One of the first i read was a classic of its time and I see from amazon that it remains in publication today. Written by the late French diplomat Roger Peyrefitte, Special Friendships was the English translation published in 1958 of his 1944 novel Les Amities particulieres. It is set in a French religious public (private) school for boys, outlines his own homoerotic experiences and deals specifically with the crush/love of two boys for each other. The New York Review of Books wrote in its review, "Schoolboy passions have seldom been described with such delicate sympathy and understanding." Regarded by many as scandalous, Andre Gide congratulated Peyrefitte on its publication. It was assumed to be autobiographical although it seems Peyrefitte did not acknoweldge his own homosexuality until he was posted as Secretary to the French Embassy in Athens in his early 30s.

After Les Amities particulieres Peyrefitte continued to be regarded as an iconoclast when he published in 1955 Les Clefs de Saint Pierre - printed in English in 1957 as The Keys of St. Peter -   which was regarded as "lewd and libellous" and was prosecuted for obscenity in Italy. Hugely popular in France, it attacked Pope Pius XII in particular and the Catholic Church in general. A secondary theme is the realisation of a young seminarist that he has fallen in love with another man. In articles written some years later, Peyrefitte accused Pope Pius of being a closet homosexual and having chosen for his Papal name his lover's first name. This reached the eyes of Pius who in an address in St. Peter's Square complained about the "horrible and slanderous insinuations" being said about him!

[Pete1111]

Mary Renault portrayed same-sex affection and love in her books, although there were limits on what publishers allowed.

The Last of the Wine (1956) portrays three instances when Alexias and Lysis made love. 

In The King Must Die and Bull From the Sea, the hero Theseus is not portrayed as homosexual yet being with another man was strongly suggested at least twice.  It was within is nature in the right situation.

These two books describe certain gay men and women characters as heroic.

Her writing was so beautifully subtle and symbolic that some readers refuse to interpret a young man's attraction to another was more than a strong bond of loyalty.

Renault and her partner lived in South Africa to avoid trouble at home in England.  I recall her books were published in the States.

[alvnv]

The Man Who Fell in Love with the Moon by Tom Spanbauer: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_Who_Fell_in_Love_with_the_Moon

 

[PeterRS]

I suspect most of us were eager to read Mary Renault's novels in our youth. She was one of the few writers prepared to highlight homosexual relationships even though the references are now regarded as somewhat mild. Fire From Heaven depicts the love between Alexander and his boyhood friend Hephaestion, while The Persian Boy describes the love that develops between Alexander and the young castrated Persian from an aristocratic family gifted to Alexander by King Darius.

[TotallyOz]

4 hours ago, PeterRS said:

I suspect most of us were eager to read Mary Renault's novels in our youth. She was one of the few writers prepared to highlight homosexual relationships even though the references are now regarded as somewhat mild. Fire From Heaven depicts the love between Alexander and his boyhood friend Hephaestion, while The Persian Boy describes the love that develops between Alexander and the young castrated Persian from an aristocratic family gifted to Alexander by King Darius.

This is an amazing book. It was gifted to me by one of the loves of my life back in NYC and is cherished still today.

[Pete1111]

I started reading

All That's Left in the World.

I belonged to a book club where the leader would call this book a good "beach read". 

A popular book.  I'm liking it.  

 

 

[Pete1111]

On 5/28/2023 at 6:46 PM, Pete1111 said:

 All That's Left in the World......I'm liking it. 

 

 

I finished this one.  Honestly my interest diminished as I read.  Perhaps this is one young adult book that truly is meant for young adults only.