A list of my ten favorite.most impactful LGBTQ@Novels Novelists mentioned: Armisted Maupin Carter Sickles Akweke Emezi Jackie Ess E.M. Forster James Baldwin Imogen Binnie Rose Allitini Eva Baltasar Carolina DeRobertis
Excellent list! I’ve read Giovanni’s Room, Nevada, and The Death of Vivek Oji…all of which I loved. Definitely added some of the modern books to the TBR. I’m super excited because I just bought a copy of Emezi’s Little Rot and am looking forward to reading it. :
Great list, Brian, and great idea for a video. I’ve read E.M. Forster and Baldwin. A few titles that I might include: Rita Mae Brown’s Rubyfruit Jungle ( dated now as it’s from 1973, but it’s iconic); Michael Cunningham’s The Hours; and Allison Bechdel’s Fun Home. One I’d like to read is Audrey Lorde’s Zami, but haven’t gotten around to it yet. Thanks for this video, Brian.
@@BookishTexan I think RubyFruit was considered a welcome relief after years of the depressing Well of Loneliness being the only book available about lesbians. It's a very life-affirming novel. I also adored the film, THE HOURS, adapted from the novel. I think it's the best book that Michael Cunningham ever wrote.
Good show, you always have a different slant on things. I appreciate that. My favorite L.B.G.T.Q. plus novel will always be Remembrance of Things Past by Proust. I also like Midnight Cowboy by James Leo Herlihy.
Great list! I looked for a copy of Despised and Rejected while I was in Ireland and Scotland but never found it. The Prettiest Star is a book I think a lot more people should read.
My all time favorite is The Rushes by John Rechy. It is about a group of bar buddies who show up at a bar called The Rushes, and the adventures that ensue. It starts out around 8pm and ends at around 8am. Each character's emotions and issues are displayed as they intertwine; making for an interesting evening.
A few of these are new to me. It's nice to see Tales of the City get some love. The Prettiest Star sounds quite interesting to me, I'll need to keep an eye out for that. Did you ever watch the mini series "It's A Sin" by Russell T Davies? That was very good/tragic and might have similar beats.
Most of the contemporary books I wasn't familiar with, but I've added Nevada, The Prettiest Star, and Despised and Rejected to my to read list. I love those under the radar classics.
Great list, Brian. I would also have Despised and Rejected and the Baldwin novels on my list. I will recommend A Burning by Megha Majumdar which has a trans character who has to make decisions akin to what you mentioned about Vivek Oji. I thought it was very good.
City of Night by John Rechy was written in the early sixties. It's now considered a cult classic. I purchased the paperback in a drugstore and hid the book in my school locker. I created a book cover so no one would know what I was reading. I'm so happy times are different today. And I got to experience them at age 77.
I still haven’t read _Freshwater_ which I have, but I’ve begun to think that since Akwaeke Emezi has so many books maybe I should choose a little more carefully and go for _Vivek Oji_ or something newer.
Sharing good books is always welcome! Fun fact I recently became aware of. Most of my reading this year has been queer, as SFF seems to have found it easier to include queer characters without making their trauma the topic of their inclusion or existence. I find myself not reaching for the literary LGBTQIA+ books as so often they deal with struggles and drama and not saying tht''s not valid or important, just I'd much rather have more fun stories where it's a side note that the characters are queer and they get to have other things going on as books about cis people do. I hope you understand what I want to say with this.
I think I do. I think it’s great to have LGBTQIA+ characters in books where that part if their identity isn’t the focus of the book and the book is fun. That was true for me with Darryl and Nevada from my list.
Know half of them One of My favourite authors is Paul Russell Sea of Tranquility The Coming Storm Both great books in My opinión. Thanks for putting this list !
As a literary list, you might start with Djuna Barnes' seminal modernist fiction Nightwood. There's others mentioned by other commenters but in terms of major American 20thC fiction, Nightwood tops the list for its humor and structuralist weirdness. The placement and combination of practically every word makes you wonder. As you slide off the Pont Vecchio into the Arno.
If I understood Nightwood better I might have listed it. There is some beautiful writing, great characters, cool modernist touches, and it is a very important book. But not quite in my own top 10
Interesting list. I"m unfamiliar with the new authors, but Baldwin and Forester I do know. If I had to come up with authors I'd have Gore Vidal's "City and the Pillar" and "Myra Breckenridge." The latter is hilarious and amazing it was a top 10 best seller. Jean Genet's "Our Lady of the Flowers" and Wilfred Owen's poetry, are some authors that immediately come to mind.
'Two Serious Ladies', the sole novel (published in 1943) by Jane Bowles (1917-1973), is a singular work with strong lesbian themes created by a lesbian writer. The story traces the path of two women acquaintances towards an idiosyncratically realized state of sanctity; I know of no other novel quite like it. 'The Carnivorous Lamb' ('L'Agneau carnivore' in the original French) is a strange 1975 novel by the Spaniard Agustín Gómez-Arcos (1933-1998) that uses the shocking motif of an incestuous romance between two brothers to comment sardonically on the stagnant, ossified state of Franco's Spain (from which regime the author had fled to France). Both these novels are provocative and challenging, but rewarding.
Why do we constantly gravitate to pain filled novels and films? I find the ones which just accept the fact that the characters are gay and tell us the story they want to tell are far better than the doom and gloom novels you listed.
I don’t think all of the books on my list are doom and gloom, Tales of the City, Darryl, Nevada, are all more funny than doom and gloom, but I see your point.
@thomasscott4877 Perhaps because until recently being gay was often a cause of doom & gloom? If you were open about it you were subject to social ostracized, discremination, and perhaps even violence & imprisonment. If you were "closeted" you'd be lonely, frustrated, & unhappy. It has gotten somewhat better in most Western countries, but it is still true to a certain extent.
You are the second person to recommend them. I will definitely look them up. Thanks!
24 дня назад
British Gay literature not here. ' The Swimming Pool Library ' by Alan Hollinghurst, and that is just for starters and no European Gay literature either.
Alitini and Forester were British. Baltasar is Catalan. Emezi is Nigerian. De Robertis is Uraguayan American. So three European writers out of 10 and two who, though they now live in the US were born outside the US.
The whole notion of an LGBTQIA+ novel is ridiculous, no? I mean, the novels are always about something that goes beyond mere identity. Proust? Mann? Henry James? The list is kind of endless. In any case, Hollinghurst's "The Line of Beauty" is simply a great novel, mainly about real politics rather than identity politics. Please, let's dispense with the reductive labeling.
Thanks for recommending the Hollinghurst. I am hopeful that we are close to a time when it doesn’t feel necessary to identify a work with an aspect of its author’s identity, I just don’t think we are there yet. I think identifying great books by traditionally marginalized people is still a valuable exercise.
They may be your favorites but they aren’t the best ones; any list of gay novels ( as though novels have any sexuality as opposed to gay themes or characters!)which doesn’t include Isherwood isn’t a good list.
