The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide articles from November 2008

The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide archives from November 2008

Nov.-Dec. 2008: winter reading.
November 1, 2008... The G&LR came into being at around the time (1994) that people were talking about a "gay publishing boom," reflecting a palpable uptick in the number of gay and lesbian titles being published starting in the early 90's. I remember reading in...

Katz's take on Rauschenberg challenged.(Correspondence)(Letter to the editor)
November 1, 2008... To the Editor: I find some critical problems with Jonathan Katz's article on Robert Rauschenberg in the September-October issue of the G&LR. Outstandingly, the article is written from a viewpoint outside the artist, not from the, or a,...

Why we lament a gay bar closing.(Correspondence)(Letter to the editor)
November 1, 2008... To the Editor: Jason Narlock's piece [July-August 2008 issue] on the closing of a gay bar in Fargo reflects a sentiment familiar to guys my age (64). I've read other pieces by writers who should know better than to decry the "impersonal"...

Corrections.(Correction notice)
November 1, 2008... In "Barcelona: A Magnet for Europe's Gay Couples" in the July-August 2008 issue, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapetero was incorrectly identified as the president of Spain; he is in fact the prime minister. Due to an editorial error in Cassandra...

Larry Townsend leaves a legacy in leather and pulp.(In memoriam)
November 1, 2008... THE PASSING of Larry Townsend on July 29th at the age of 77 has robbed the gay, lesbian, and leather communities of one of their pioneering writers, editors, and publishers. Larry Townsend--which was a pseudonym, as it turns out--is perhaps...

Del Martin, cofounder of the DOB, dies at 87.(IN MEMORIAM)(Daughters of Bilitis )(Obituary)
November 1, 2008... DEL MARTIN, whose name was inextricably tied to that of her life partner, Phyllis Lyon, for 55 years, died on August 27 in San Francisco at the age of 87, after several years of declining health. The couple was married in San Francisco in early...

Straight to the End.(BTW)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... Straight to the End A major study has revealed that up to one in four heterosexual men has anal human papillomavirus (HPV) infection. The condition is traditionally associated with women, who undergo the familiar "pap smear" to detect its...

Manhunt has a bad date.(BTW)(manhunt.com)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... Manhunt Has a Bad Date A brief but intense kafuffle erupted last August over a campaign contribution received by Senator McCain from one of his supporters, culminating in the return of the $2,300 gift. It seems the donor, Jonathan Crutchley, is...

SensaSlim or InstaBone?(BTW)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... SensaSlim or InstaBone? A Norwegian man is suing the Swiss manufacturer of a slimming product after the experienced "acutesexual arousal" for over thirty days while participating in a clinical trial. SensaSlim is an oral spray that desensitizes...

The Banality of justice.(BTW)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... The Banality of Justice As if we needed confirmation of just how mainstream we've become, how's this for sensory overload? Hallmark will be offering a line of greeting cards for the same-sex couple in your life on the occasion of their marriage...

Lovers rent.(BTW)(Cardinal John Henry Newman)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... Lovers Rent The Catholic Church has announced that it will exhume and rebury the corpse of England's greatest theologian of the 19th century, Cardinal John Henry Newman, who died in 1890. Now moving a corpse is a highly unusual and seemingly...

The perks of marriage.(BTW)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... The Perks of Marriage Same-sex marriage advocates often remind us that there are hundreds of benefits to marriage that same-sex couples are denied, each a privilege that could have critical importance to some GLBT couple somewhere. So when...

What Allen Ginsberg told his friends.(ESSAY)(Critical essay)
November 1, 2008... LESS THAN FIVE PERCENT of Allen Ginsberg's extant correspondence makes it into a recently published volume of his letters, yet it is more than enough. The Letters will doubtless serve a purpose for the many scholars and students of the Beat...

Cowboys on the cover of a magazine.(PHOTO ESSAY)(Essay)
November 1, 2008... THE RECENT DEATH of Heath Ledger, who made his way into gay cultural history by playing a cowboy with homosexual tendencies in Brokeback Mountain, brings to mind the odd but ongoing presence of the cowboy in gay imagery for more than half a...

Sodomy in the land of magna carta.(ESSAY)(A Gay History of Britain: Love and Sex Between Men, Since the Middle Ages)(The Gendering of Men, 1600-1750: Volume 2: Queer Articulations)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... THE FRAUGHT legal and social history of samesex male relations in Britain over the last thousand years should naturally be of interest to us. Much of American law and cultural practice derive from the mother country. The Puritanism that crossed...

It's Late, I Can't Breathe.(Brief article)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Mario, a 35-year-old gay actor, knows that he is dying. For five years, the AIDS virus has schooled him in fear. He lies in the prison of his room and gives himself failing grades for his life--an F for his lack of success, an F for his...

The fate of sodomy law in the U.S.(ESSAY)(Essay)
November 1, 2008... AMID THE TURMOIL of the French Revolution, one of the little-noticed legal transformations was the axing of ancien regime laws criminalizing "crimes against nature." The Constituent Assembly of 1789-1791 dropped longstanding (albeit rarely...

Anatomy is destiny, except sometimes.(ESSAY)(Essay)
November 1, 2008... AS A BIOLOGIST, I have found the arguments against same-sex marriage misguided--not because the evidence hints at homosexuality being based, at least in part, on biological roots, but because the same arguments that are used to keep same-sex...

A packing case of faucets.(Poem)
November 1, 2008... A packing case of faucets ready to be put to the test. Unleashed waters into a hundred sinks, tubs, pig-troughs, from aqueducts, from copper basins, over slate, sluices, barrel vaults, alleys of pipes and rivulets, onto the heads of...

At home with Robert Mapplethorpe.(ESSAY)
November 1, 2008... IN PURELY VISUAL TERMS, they appeared to be an odd couple. With his exceptionally handsome face etched deeply with a desirable masculine divinity, and held gracefully atop a tall, impeccably dressed build, Sam Wagstaff exuded sophistication,...

Cousin, my cousin MBT, 1927-2007.(Poem)
November 1, 2008... Mom's first cousin, a mom herself, partnered with another woman for thirty-plus years, two Wisconsin snowbirds, settled near Phoenix, Arizona trailer. I envied the hummingbirds who fed from feeders lining...

Taking on Dr. Laura and The Times.(ESSAY)(Dr. Laura Schlessinger)
November 1, 2008... LAST AUGUST, People magazine devoted its cover to the California marriage of Ellen DeGeneres and Portia DeRossi. For the publication that stands as a bellwether of American popular culture, it was business as usual--another celebrity wedding....

An ancient passion stirs in India.(ESSAY)(Essay)
November 1, 2008... ON A HOT NIGHT in April 2005, I walked with Kasim Mehedi, a worker for an AIDS outreach organization, through a rusty iron gate into the darkness of Hazrat Begum Park in the center of the city of Lucknow, India. During the day, the park is a...

Syringe.(Poem)
November 1, 2008... I did not make love to the stunning blond god, his muscles straining against the taut flesh of a body he was just learning to enjoy. He smeared my cock with cocaine and pulled me inside. More fix than lover, I...

The Anarchist Dream of Sexual Freedom.(Free Comrades: Anarchism and Homosexuality in the United States, 1895-1917 )(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Free Comrades: Anarchism and Homosexuality in the United States, 1895-1917 by Terence Kissack AK Press. 220 pages, $17.95 THE COVER of Terence Kissack's book depicts a rainbow flag over-laid with the portraits of Benjamin...

First Chronicles of Lesbian Literature.(Sex Variant Woman: The Life of Jeannette Howard Foster)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Sex Variant Woman: The Life of Jeannette Howard Foster by Joanne Passet Da Capo Press. 353 pages, $27.50 WHILE THE NAME Jeannette Howard Foster (1895-1981) may not ring an immediate bell for most readers, her life's work, Sex...

Lifestyles of the Gay and Banished.(Censoring Sexuality: Poulenc's Priest )(Book review)
November 1, 2008... JOHN LAURITSEN Censoring Sexuality: Poulenc's Priest by Paul Bailey Seagull Books. 147 pages, $16.95 THE HEART of this little book is a 72-pages essay, Poulenc's Priest, by the British novelist Paul Bailey. The title...

Flocking Together in America's Cities.(Greetings from the Gayborhood)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Greetings from the Gayborhood by Donald F. Reuter Abrams Image. 114 pages, $19.95 IN A POEM called "The Dump," one of the last published by the late Thom Gunn, he describes a dream in which he wanders around a lifetime's worth of ephemera...

Got the P'town Blues.(The Fisher Boy)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... The Fisher Boy by Stephen Anable Poisoned Pen Press. 332 pages, $24.95 IN THE OPENING PARAGRAPH of The Fisher Boy, narrator Mark Winslow states: "In Provincetown, I felt enveloped in the shivery skin of a paranoid, all goose bumps...

Isherwood's Inspirations.(Isherwood on Writing: The Lectures in California)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Isherwood on Writing: The Lectures in California Edited by James J. Berg University of Minnesota Press. 208 pages, $25.95 ON MARCH 20, 1959, Christopher Isherwood signed on to teach at Los Angeles State College. This turned out to...

The Son of Mann.(Alexander: A Novel of Utopia)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Alexander: A Novel of Utopia by Klaus Mann Translated by David Carter Hesperus Press. 214 pages, $15.95 FOR SOME TIME NOW, familiarity with the works of Klaus Mann (1906-1949) in the English-speaking world has been limited to...

Whimsical at Heart.(Dance Hall Road)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Dance Hall Road by Marion Douglas Insomniac Press. 480 pages, $15.95 DANCE HALL ROAD opens with a teenager, Jimmy Drake, handing Adrian Drury a picture of an electric chair. What young Adrian has done isn't clear, but one girl is...

Off the Cutting Room Floor.(Brutal Uncut)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Brutal Uncut by Aiden Shaw Running Press. 288 pages, $14.95 AIDEN SHAW'S 1996 novel Brutal was, with apologies to Thomas Hobbes, a nasty, brutish, and short book about Paul, an HIV-positive male prostitute. It was a memorable...

Life with Father.(Assisted Loving: True Tales About Double Dating with My Dad)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Assisted Loving: True Tales about Double Dating with My Dad by Bob Morris Harper. 304 pages, $24.95 FOR TEN YEARS, Bob Morris' mother, Ethel, suffered from a blood disease that made her weak and frail. She was a beauty in her day,...

Hiding in Plain Sight: The Secret Life of Raymond Burr.(Brief article)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... by Michael Seth Starr Applause Books. 280 pages, $24.95 That Raymond Burr led a closeted dual existence will not be news to most gay pop culture vultures. The week after his death in 1993, People magazine printed a cover story pointing...

The Nancy Book.(Brief article)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... by Joe Brainard Siglio Press. 144 pages, $39.50 Always a fan, I have come to appreciate the work of the late Joe Brainard even more over the years. This latest collection of his work is The Nancy Book, a variety of pictorial...

Troubled.(Brief article)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... by RM Vaughan Coach House Books. 88 pages, $14.95 (paper) Toronto writer RM Vaughan's new book is a welcome respite from the recent spate of memoirs that have deluged bookstores. In twisted, arduous detail, Vaughan takes us...

John Glines: engine and booster of GLBT theatre.(ARTIST'S PROFILE)(Interview)
November 1, 2008... IN 1983, when Torch Song Trilogy won the Tony Award for Best Play, John Glines, who produced Harvey Fierstein's epic gay play from its humble beginnings way off Broadway, thanked his lover. It was the first time a gay man ever publicly thanked...

Return Trip to Pederastia.(Images of Ancient Greek Pederasty: Boys Were Their Gods)(Book review)
November 1, 2008... Images of Ancient Greek Pederasty: Boys Were Their Gods Andrew Lear and Eva Cantarella Routledge. 272 pages,$115.00 THIS IS a timely book, with three reasons for existing. Images of Ancient Pederasty offers: first, the series of...

Director Jorge Ameer on sex, film, and Panama.(ARTIST'S PROFILE)(Interview)
November 1, 2008... One of the hardest-working filmmakers in L.A., Jorge Ameer has been an actor, a director, a writer, a producer, a cinematographer, a productions designer, a distributor, and a film programmer. Yet his many contributions to the GLBT filmmaking...

Madonna, Time Traveling at Fifty.(Sweet and Sticky)(Concert review)
November 1, 2008... "Sweet and Sticky" Live Tour by Madonna Hard Candy by Madonna Warner Brothers FROM THE VERY MINUTE we enter this world, we are contained by time. The temporal conditions of our existence are the defining conditions. In his...

Conferences/events.(Brief article)(Calendar)
November 1, 2008... International Gay & Lesbian Leadership Conf., will take place in Washington, D.C. Dec 4-7. Openly LGBT elected, appointed, and community leaders from across the U.S. and the world will convene. For more info or to register, go to:...

Call for submission.
November 1, 2008... Papers sought for a special issue of Politics & Gender on the gendered politics of the 2008 presidential primary and general elections. Deadline: April 15,2009. For more info and guidelines, visit: www.editorialmanager.com/pag/. Short...

Research assistance wanted.
November 1, 2008... Survey participants sought for a study on lesbians' self-identified attitudes about relationships and bisexual women. Confidential survey will take approximately 5 to 10 minutes to complete. To access the survey, go to:...

Announcement.(4th Annual Gival Press Novel Award goes to Lowell Mick White)(Brief article)
November 1, 2008... Gival Press is pleased to announce the winner of the 4th Annual Gival Press Novel Award: Lowell Mick White of College Station, Texas, for his novel That Demon Life. White will receive $3,000.00 and his novel will be published in 2009.

Songs from a Life in the News.(George Michael)
November 1, 2008... George Michael Tour 2008: Live North America Albums discussed: Twenty Five (2008) Patience (2004) Songs from the Last Century (1999) Older (1996) TEN YEARS have passed since George Michael was arrested in a public...