Your Favorite (for me to discover)
What’s your favorite queer*/LGBTQ* book/novel/graphic novel/comic/film?
What would you recommend that I check out/read/watch this Holiday break?
KNOWhomo
RSSPosts tagged with "books"
LGBTQ* Artists You Should Know: Robert Giard (1939-2002)
Particular Voices: Portraits of Gay and Lesbian Writers
(following from the Robert Giard Foundation)
In 1985, after attending a performance of Larry Kramer’s The Normal Heart—one of the first dramas dealing with the impact of AIDS on gay life—Robert Giard decided to devote his energies as a photographer to some aspect of the gay and lesbian community. Thus was born his two-decade long project of photographing over 600 gay and lesbian writers—from famous playwrights to emerging novelists to unsung poets and pioneering performance artists.
Particular Voices: Portraits of Gay & Lesbian Writers is an extraordinary visual record of the flowering of queer voices in the wake of the Stonewall Rebellion and the AIDS crises, while also paying homage to many earlier 20th Century activists and writers who had urged the creation of a community identity, or otherwise gave public voice to gay and lesbian sensibilities.
(Photos, clockwise, beginning from upper left: Ann Bannon, Robert Howard, Kitty Tsui, and Adrienne Rich.)
**Note from Ruth Elizabeth:
The winner of a Lambda Literary Award in 1997, 182 of these portraits are collected in a book also titled Particular Voices: Portraits of Gay and Lesbian Writers, alongside excerpts of each writer’s work carefully chosen together by Giard and the writers themselves. GORGEOUS.
LGBTQ* Books You May Want To Read
Transgender Warriors: Making History from Joan of Arc to Dennis Rodman
In this fascinating, personal journey through history, Leslie Feinberg uncovers persuasive evidence that there have always been people who crossed the cultural boundaries of gender. Transgender Warriors is an eye-opening jaunt through the history of gender expression and a powerful testament to the rebellious spirit. (text from GoodReads.com)
LGBTQ* Children’s Books You May Have Missed:
One Dad, Two Dads, Brown Dad, Blue Dads by Johnny Valentine, illustrated by Melody Sarecky
So this happened: Rebecca went to the children’s section of the library when working on our theses became a bit too much to bear, and this is what she found. Looks like the universe knew we needed something to cheer us up!
Published in 1994 from Alyson Wonderland (an imprint of Alyson Books), One Dad, Two Dads, Brown Dad, Blue Dads is a spectacular example of children’s authors who are doing it right. The book is inclusive of many kinds of diverse family structures and addresses the difficult-to-articulate complications of navigating awkward questions from strangers as a child in a family that might not fit into the cookie-cutter family structure depicted in many mainstream children’s books.
I hope you find time soon to grab a copy and snuggle up with someone you adore to celebrate the love we find in each other from all corners of the queer community.
LGBTQ* Young Audience Books (You Might Have Missed)
Lisa Jenn Bigelow’s Starting From Here
Sixteen-year-old Colby Bingham’s heart has been broken too many times. Her mother has been dead for almost two years, her truck driver father is always away, her almost girlfriend just dumped her for a guy, and now she’s failing chemistry. When a stray dog lands literally at her feet, bleeding and broken on a busy road, it seems like the Universe has it in for Colby. But the incident also knocks a chink in the walls she’s built around her heart. Against her better judgment, she decides to care for the dog. But new connections mean new opportunities for heartbreak. Terrified of another loss, Colby bolts at the first sign of trouble, managing to alienate her best friend, her father, the cute girl pursing her, and even her dog’s vet, who’s taken Colby under her wing. Colby can’t start over, but can she learn how to move on? (from GoodReads.com)
LGBTQ* Infographics You May Have Missed
Stats on LGBTQ* Young Adult books published in the
U.S through 2011 via Malinda Lo.
(source) - post from KNOWhomo Moderator Cael
What’s your favorite YA (LGBTQ*) Novel?
BOOKS, Books Everywhere, and Finding a Queer* One for Me!
Are you going home for the Holidays? Do you finally have time to read things for pleasure again? Are you trying to come out to your friends and would like some help?
**Ok, to explain, I kept showing up to Feminist Theory (while I was in undergrad) with different Lesbian/Queer* texts until my adviser finally asked me if I needed to talk. I am the person who used book jackets to start conversations.
Back to the books!
Be sure to check out the KNOWhomo Literature, Theory, and Graphic Novel pages. It’s always a great place to start.
Keep On, Keeping On!
(Some of my personal collection shown above. If you’d like any information on any of those texts, please let me know.)
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What LGBTQ* Book Are You Currently Reading?
Persistence: All Ways Butch and Femme edited by Ivan Coyote and Zena Sharman
In the summer of 2009, butch writer and storyteller Ivan Coyote and gender researcher and femme dynamo Zena Sharman wrote down a wish-list of their favourite queer authors; they wanted to continue and expand the butch-femme conversation. The result is Persistence: All Ways Butch and Femme. The stories in these pages resist simple definitions. The people in these stories defy reductive stereotypes and inflexible categories. The pages in this book describe the lives of an incredible diversity of people whose hearts also pounded for some reason the first time they read or heard the words “butch” or “femme.” Persistence is a raucous, insightful, sexy, and sometimes dangerous look at what the words butch and femme can mean in today’s ever-shifting gender landscape, with one eye on the past and one eye on what’s yet to come.
*Lambda Literary Award finalist
*American Library Association Stonewall Honor Book
LGBTQ* Resources You Might Have Overlooked
GoodReads.com’s Lists of LGBTQ* Books/Discussion Groups
(photo from: BlogHer)
Just click a hashtag below to be brought to hundreds of book titles. LGBT* lists include countless additional lists. Poetry, Graphic Novels, etc are much more concise lists.
(If you are a member of Good Reads and would like to follow/discuss books with another fellow bibliophile, my profile can be found HERE)
#Gay/Queer Poetry (The first book listed is Siken’s CRUSH, which I HIGHLY recommend)
LGBTQ* BANNED (!) or CHALLENGED (!) Books You Should Know
This week marks the 30th anniversary of the American Library Associations Banned Book Week Celebration (which celebrates and encourages you to read books which have been banned/challenged in local libraries and education, as well as educate yourself about censorship and printed media).
If you’d like more information, please check out ALA.org/bbooks
Below are TEN of the most challenged/banned LGBTQ* books. All of the information for these books is taken from the Huffington Press’ 16 Books Challenged for Their Gay Content (read more HERE).
KNOWhomo & Keep On, Keeping On!
(all text from Huffington Post)
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‘And Tango Makes Three’This 2005 children’s book, written by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson and illustrated by Henry Cole, tells the story of two penguins raising a baby penguin in New York’s Central Park Zoo. Sounds innocent enough… except for the fact that both penguins were male.
Conservative opponents, such as the Focus on the Family Action group, said the book was inaccurate and promoted a political agenda to little kids. -
‘Running With Scissors’Augusten Burroughs’ 2002 memoir traces his adolescence, living in the dysfunctional household of his mother’s psychiatrist. A central point to the memoir is the sexual relationship between thirteen year-old Augusten and thirty-three year-old Neil Bookman. This homosexual content, along with profanity, drug use, and “moral shortcomings,” led it to be banned in some high schools.
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‘Maurice’E. M. Forster’s tale of homosexual love in early 20th century England, follows Maurice Hall from youth to adulthood and details his struggles, and eventual acceptance, of his gay tendencies and his relationship with another man.
The book was published in 1971 after Forster’s death. The author resisted publication because of public and legal attitudes to homosexuality — a note found on the manuscript read: “Publishable, but worth it?” So, in this case, the author himself was the one challenging the book, only because he knew how the book would be received in early 20th century England. -
‘Annie on my Mind’This 1982 novel by Nancy Garden follows the romantic relationship between two 17-year-old New York City girls, Annie and Liza.
Although it was a widely praised piece of young adult fiction, it also brought critics, particularly in Kansas. Because of the gay themes, copies of the book were burned and superintendent Ron Wimmer of the Olathe School District ordered the book removed from the high school library to avoid controversy.
Garden later commented, about the burning: “Burned! I didn’t think people burned books any more. Only Nazis burn books…” -
‘Howl and Other Poems’When Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl” was published in 1956, the iconic Beat poem was considered “obscene literature,” and U.S. Customs officials seized 520 copies of the poem. “Howl” contained references to illicit drugs and sexual practices, both heterosexual and homosexual.
At the obscenity trial, literary experts testified on the poem’s behalf. Supported by the ACLU, the California State Superior Court Judge Clayton Horn decided that the poem was of “redeeming social importance,” and it went on to become one of the most popular pieces of Beat literature. -
“Luv Ya Bunches”This children’s novel about four elementary school girls was pulled from Scholastic Book Fairs in 2009. Scholastic asked author Lauren Myracle to edit out some inappropriate language — “geez,” “crap,” “sucks,” — and turn one character’s lesbian parents straight.
Although Myracle was fine with changing the language, she saw nothing offensive about a child having gay parents and wouldn’t replace them with a heterosexual couple, so Scholastic didn’t accept the book for fear of getting hate mail from parents.
Myracle commented, “Over 200,000 kids in America are raised by same-sex parents, just like Milla. It’s not an issue to clean up or hide away… In my opinion, it’s not an ‘issue’ at all. The issue, as I see it, is that kids benefit hugely from seeing themselves reflected positively in the books they read. It’s an extremely empowering and validating experience.” -
‘Revolutionary Voices’Edited by Amy Sonnie, this anthology was created by and for radical queer youth, committed specifically to youth of color, young women, transgender and bisexual youth, (dis)abled youth and working class youth.
The resource for queer students was widely controversial and was even targeted by members of Glenn Beck’s 9/12 movement and on theAmerican Library Association’s list of most challenged books in 2010. -
‘The Color Purple’Alice Walker’s 1982 novel about the lives of black women in the 1930s American South is one the American Library Association’s frequently challenged classics, for reasons including “the homosexuality, rape, and incest portrayed in the book.”
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‘Am I Blue?’Though 1994’s “Am I Blue?” — a collection of stories about being LGBT from authors like Francesca Lia Block, Bruce Coville, Nancy Garden and James Cross Giblin — was honored with awards from the ALA and the New York Public Library, it was also challenged for its content.
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‘The Perks of Being a Wallflower’Stephen Chbosky’s 1999 coming of age novel details introverted Charlie’s first year of high school. Among controversial issues, such as drug use and suicide, the book’s coverage of homosexuality landed it third on the American Library Association’s list of the top ten most frequently challenged books of 2009.
Reading Between The Lines
KNOWhomo Question of the Week:
Your favorite book/comic/graphic novel/short story with a LGBTQ* character?
Favorite LGBTQ* novel?
**Remember: You can check the comments for recommendations for future reading. You can also check in with the KNOWhomo hashtags #Book(s) and #Comic(s)/Graphic Novels
LGBTQ* KNOWhomo History Posts You May Have Missed
Gay (identified cis-)Men in History
(all posts can be found under the #history hashtag on the right side — click name to link to past post)
- Alan Turing - The man who (basically) created your computer
- Friedrich-Paul von Groszheim — “I’m proof that Hitler didn’t win”
- Gerry Studds - Congress 1983 (coming out in Congress)
- Homosexuality in the American Military FYI Moment - Military Men pre-DADT
- Frank Bolt - Homo History and the Prisoner of Alcatraz
- Bayard Rustin - Martin Luther King Jr’s trusted adviser, civil rights and queer leader
- Secret Historian: The Life and Times of Samuel Steward, Professor, Tattoo Artists and Sexual Renegade
- Nero - No Fiddle Played at his Roman Queer* Marriage
LGBTQ* Interviews and History You Should Know
(to learn more about Barbara Gittings, click HERE for a previous KNOWhomo post)
Illustration from Sidonie G. Colette’s Claudine a l’ ecole (1905?)
Following text from:
Jonathan Ned Katz. Copyright (c) 2008 Reedited by Katz from Gay American History (1976).
In an interview taped on July 19, 1974, Barbara Gittings spoke with the present author (Jonathan Katz) about her development as a Lesbian, and about the founding and early history of the New York Daughters of Bilitis.
*excerpt*
J.K.: Was there no one you could talk to about the subject?
B.G.: No, I didn’t know anyone to talk to. So I went looking in the bars. I didn’t have much success talking to people in the bars, especially about the literature. These were women’s bars in New York City. I had great difficulty in finding women who had read the same books I had. It was important to me to meet other Lesbians as Lesbians, but I still needed more than that. I needed to find Lesbians who shared my interests. Once when I went to a bar in New York City I had with me Colette’s very first novel, from the Philadelphia Free Library, one of the Claudine series, Claudine a l’ ecole, and it happened to have illustrations. There was an illustration of Claudine’s two female schoolteachers who were having an affair-one sitting on the lap of the other, embracing very ardently. I was fascinated by the novel, and fascinated by the picture, a line drawing. It seemed to me very bold to have a picture like that in a book published early in the twentieth century for the general public. I was in this bar and trying to talk to somebody-and I showed her this book, and this drawing, trying to make her understand why this is such a remarkable illustration, and she says, “Oh, at home I’ve got a lot sexier pictures than that.” I didn’t understand what she meant; now I do!
There weren’t people I could talk to about the kind of literature I was interested in. A few people had read The Well of Loneliness. Fewer still read any of the others, novels like those of Gale Wilhelm which I found, and which, I recall, had happy endings-for a change. The literature was very important to me. The nonfiction literature gave me a bad picture of myself, a picture I had to work against. The fiction, despite stereotypes, despite unhappiness, despite bad characters, was much more positive.
LGBTQ* Nonfiction Books You Have Asked About
Over the last year, many people have asked about the literature on my bookshelves behind me in select vlogs. I usually respond one-on-one but as emails continue to circulate, I decided to share the titles with you.
The picture above and information below are nonfiction texts from a section of my Queer* bookcase. In the future I will post fiction, theory and graphic novels (which take up other shelves).
Keep On, Keeping On
-Rebecca (moderator of KNOWhomo)
Left to Right:
Summers, Claude J. The QUEER Encyclopedia of Music, Dance & Musical Theatre. San Francisco, CA.: Cleis, 2004.
McGarry, Molly, and Fred Wasserman. Becoming Visible: An Illustrated History of Lesbian and Gay Life in Twentieth-century America. New York: Penguin Studio, 1998.
Trachtenberg, Robert, and Tom Bachtell. When I Knew. New York, NY: Regan, 2005
Boswell, John. Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality: Gay People in Western Europe from the Beginning of the Christian Era to the Fourteenth Century. Chicago: University of Chicago, 1980.
Shilts, Randy. Conduct Unbecoming: Lesbians and Gays in the U.S. Military : Vietnam to the Persian Gulf. New York: St. Martin’s, 1993.
Witt, Lynn, Sherry Thomas, and Eric Marcus. Out in All Directions: The Almanac of Gay and Lesbian America. New York: Warner, 1995.
Russo, Vito. The Celluloid Closet: Homosexuality in the Movies. Revised Edition New York: Quality Paperback Book Club, 1995.
Vidal, Gore, and Donald Weise. Sexually Speaking: Collected Sex Writings. San Francisco, CA: Cleis, 2001.
Bernstein, Robin. Cast Out: Queer Lives in Theater. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 2006.
Smith, Patricia Juliana. The Queer Sixties. New York: Routledge, 1999.
Ayres, Ian, and Jennifer Gerarda Brown. Straightforward: How to Mobilize Heterosexual Support for Gay Rights. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 2005.
Bronski, Michael. A Queer History of the United States. Boston: Beacon, 2011.
Fischer, Erica. Aimée & Jaguar: A Love Story, Berlin 1943. Los Angeles, CA: Alyson, 1998.
Etheridge, Melissa, and Laura Morton. The Truth Is— : My Life in Love and Music. New York: Villard, 2001.
Heger, Heinz. The Men with the Pink Triangle. Boston, MA: Alyson Publications, 1980.
Gray, Mary L. Out in the Country: Youth, Media, and Queer Visibility in Rural America. New York: New York UP, 2009.
Kennedy, Pagan. The First Man-made Man: The Story of Two Sex Changes, One Love Affair, and a Twentieth-century Medical Revolution. New York, NY: Bloomsbury, 2007.
Reuter, Donald F. Gay 2 Zee: The Visualised Guide to Gay Words, Slang, Phrases, People, Places and Things. New York: Griffin, 2006.
Jennings, Kevin. One Teacher in 10: LGBT Educators Share Their Stories. Los Angeles: Alyson, 2005.
Vincent, Norah. Self-made Man: One Woman’s Year Disguised as a Man. New York: Penguin, 2006.
Richards, Dell. Lesbian Lists: A Look at Lesbian Culture, History, and Personalities. Boston: Alyson Publications, 1990.
Solomon, Alisa, and Framji Minwalla. The Queerest Art: Essays on Lesbian and Gay Theater. New York: New York UP, 2002.
DeGeneres, Betty. Love, Ellen: A Mother/daughter Journey. New York: Rob Weisbach, 1999.
Doty, Alexander. Making Things Perfectly Queer: Interpreting Mass Culture. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota, 1993.
Marcus, Eric, and Eric Marcus. Making Gay History: The Half-century Fight for Lesbian and Gay Equal Rights. New York: Perennial, 2002.
Faderman, Lillian, and Brigitte Eriksson. Lesbians in Germany: 1890’s-1920’s. Tallahassee, FL: Naiad, 1990.
Bornstein, Kate. Hello, Cruel World: 101 Alternatives to Suicide for Teens, Freaks, and Other Outlaws. New York: Seven Stories, 2006.
LGBTQ* Literature You May Want To Know
Rubyfruit Jungle - Rita Mae Brown
About KNOWhomo
A blog about our history,
our society, our loves,
our fears and us
--the LGBTQ*
(which is inclusive to all who find comfort under the umbrella).
Never assume anyone who is posted on/follows this blog is LGBTQ*, heterosexual, queer, out or in the closet .
Never assume anything.
This is a blog about being -
Not fitting a particular noun or adjective.
Keep On, Keeping On!
email: knowhomo@gmail.com
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Ruth Elizabeth
Riley
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Questions? Comments? Want To Start A Dialogue With Other People? Go to KnowHomo's Question Page.
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Posts I Like
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glitter ≠ liberation either, shockingly enough
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Decriminalization of Homosexuality by decades worldwide (click for larger image)
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I recently finished another collection of Alison Bechdel’s amazing Dykes to Watch Out For. It struck me that her comics dealt with the same issues...
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Five Ways to Spot Somebody Suffering from Transphobia
