The
Monday Book: Gay Life Stories, By
Robert
Aldrich Thames
Richard
Canning
Monday, 7
May 2012
This is a beautifully-produced but essentially
frivolous book.
As a "gallery of portraits" of gay men and
lesbians across time, geography and culture, it looks inviting. Readers
expecting anything more profound, however, regrettably must search elsewhere.
In the 74 entries, anything up to half the space is
given over to portraits, photographs or artworks. The brief biographical
summaries rarely transcend Wikipedia. Though Robert Aldrich often seeks to make
more general points about homosexuals' experience, these pull away awkwardly
from the specificity of individual cases.
Nobody should expect such a collection to be
representative. Most gays live obscure, unreported lives: those which have been
documented are exceptional. Nor should it surprise anyone that figures who have
written about their sexuality predominate. Fewer than a quarter of entries
relate to women, whose historical neglect is readily appreciated.
Gay Life Stories does have some uncontested virtues:
one is its esotericism. Aldrich, an Australian academic, contests the dominance
of European cultures, quoting South African writer William Plomer's summary of
a spell in the Far East: "Japan was my university".
Sections on "the Levant",
"Japonisme" and "International Lives" underline this broad
vision.
Who is Gay Life Stories written for? Here, Aldrich
reveals some insecurities. The epithet "ageing" recurs in a handful
of entries. Gide is "fusty". Edward Carpenter's "understanding of
homosexuality" is "antiquated", whereas Walt Whitman, whom
Carpenter imitated, perversely remains "profoundly modern".
Numerous errors suggest Google is a safer bet. Carson
McCullers never published a novel entitled 1. The "scratchy
recording" of Oscar Wilde Aldrich it recommends is now accepted as
counterfeit. Paul Bowles "settled" in Tangier, not Ceylon.
There is, inevitably, a historical problem over naming
gay sexuality. Aldrich correctly points out the many euphemisms or concealments
applied in the past. Yet he unaccountably characterises Saint Laurent's 50-year
relationship with Pierre Bergé, ending in a civil partnership, as
"friendship".
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