Posted by Editors on Oct 06, 2009 at 04:03 PM in Arts, Bo Young, Books, Community, Culture, Current Affairs, Elders, Entertainment, Friends, Gay Wisdom, Literature, Malcolm Boyd, Men, Radical Faerie, White Crane Books | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Philip Pullman, the irrepressible agnostic author who scandalized Christians for portraying the church as evil in his His Dark Materials series and for bragging that his books are about "killing God," is, thankfully, at it again.
Posted by Editors on Sep 10, 2009 at 05:20 AM in Arts, Bo Young, Community, Culture, Current Affairs, Entertainment, Film, Literature, Religion, Right Wingers | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Our friend, White Crane contributor, and author of Stonewall: The Riot That Sparked The Gay Revolution, David Carter sends this...
Dear Friends, The first rough cut of the full-length PBS film on the Stonewall Riots -- now one and a half hours long -- is close to being assembled and we are looking for era maps of Greenwich Village to use in the film.
I will make inquiries at the usual and obvious archives and collections, but we all know that one can't assume that one will find the best such map in any one collection ... and that any friend who either lived in New York at the time or has moved here since and who loves the Village might have a much better map than even New York's most famous archives might own: so if any of you happen to own a map that was made in the late 1960s or early 1970s of Greenwich Village, especially one that is detailed or features the area around the Stonewall Inn, and you would be happy to share it with the world in an American Experience documentary ... please let me know. The filmmakers are on deadline for submission of the rough cut to a film festival and need a PDF of such a map ASAP ... they'd like to receive the PDF this coming week if possible.
If you have a map that they can use and can help, please contact David at History69@aol.com or the editors at White Crane at editors@gaywisdom.org
Posted by Editors on Jul 27, 2009 at 08:00 AM in Ancestors, Arts, Bo Young, Call for Submissions, Community, Culture, Elders, Entertainment, Film, Friends, Gay History, History, Homophobia, Literature, Men, Politics, Right Wingers, Television | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Whatever happened to the word “Gay”? If you go down to the Community Center on Market Street in San Francisco, you’ll have to look long and hard until you find it. Likewise if you visit the Historical Center on Castro Street. Not to mention that it fell out of the term “Pride Week” a long time ago.
The situation reminds me of the pre-Stonewall era. Many in our community in those days were embarrassed by the word. They balked when new groups appeared calling themselves the Gay Liberation Front and the Gay Activists Alliance. But these were the groups that triggered the Gay revolution.
After Stonewall, politicians eventually deigned to talk to us, but some still choked on the word “Gay.” I remember how this reticence infuriated Chris Perry, a founder of the San Francisco Gay Democratic Club.
In the late 1970s, Chris got the club to go after Quentin Kopp, a local politician, because he couldn’t bring himself to utter the word in public. Ironically, that group today calls itself the San Francisco LGBT Democratic Club. The word has shrunk to a letter, and in second place.
The taboo on the word “Gay” developed because lesbians, bisexuals, and transgender people saw the word as referring only to homosexual males. However, such a limitation was never intended. In effect, we let the popular media take a word away from us and redefine it for their own purposes, diminishing us all in the process.
Some academicians have added to the problem. They claim that the word with its present double meaning of both cheerful and homosexual doesn’t go back before the 19th century. Apparently, they never heard of the myth of Ganymede, the beloved of Zeus. In ancient Greek, the word “Ganymede” (Ganumedes) means both cheerful and homosexual, just like our word “Gay.” Both words come from a common Indo-European root (ga-).
The word “queer,” which has supplanted “Gay” in some quarters, is an insult. It means odd or unnatural. But there is nothing odd or unnatural about being Gay. Homophobia is the thing that’s odd and unnatural.
I acknowledge the right of other people to call themselves GLBT, or G, or queer, if they want to. But please don’t dump any those terms on me. I’m still Gay and proud.
Yours for gay liberation, Arthur Evans
Posted by Editors on Jul 06, 2009 at 10:31 AM in Ancestors, Bo Young, Community, Culture, Current Affairs, Elders, Friends, Gay Health, Gay History, Gay Wisdom, History, Homophobia, Literature, Men, Politics, Radical Faerie | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
We received word that Harold Norse passed away on Monday. He was 92.
The Beat Museum will be hosting a Memorial for Harold Norse on Sunday, July 12th, time TBA.
From the Beat Museum: "In 1951, Norse's talent was recognized by William Carlos Williams, who invited him to read at the Museum of Modern Art in early 1952. Williams remarked on Norse's ability to "use the direct image on its own," and became an important mentor to Harold. Williams would later call Norse "the best poet of his generation," a profound accolade considering Williams was mentor to such figures as Charles Olson, Denise Levertov, and Allen Ginsberg. Following the 1953 publication of his first book of poetry, The Undersea Mountain, which was reviewed in The New York Times and Poetry magazine, Norse left America for Italy.
"In 1957, Norse was nearly deported from Italy when the Italian government deemed his poem "Victor Emmanuel Monument (Rome)," political fodder for the Communists.
"Norse moved to Paris in 1960, on a tip from Williams and, at the Beat Hotel, met Allen Ginsberg, Gregory Corso, William S. Burroughs, Brion Gysin, and others, drawn by their interest in Buddhist meditation, which Norse had recently taken up. Using the cut-up technique devised by Gysin and Burroughs, Norse wrote his experimental novel, Beat Hotel. Originally titled Sniffing Keyholes, the first chapter—which he describes as "a sex/dope scene between a muscular black youth called Melo and a blond Russian princess called Z.Z."— made even the often stoic Burroughs laugh. During his time at the Beat Hotel, Norse began creating his 'random paintings' or Cosmographs (using the hotel's bidet).
"Norse returned to America in 1969 and, with Carnivorous Saint: Gay Poems 1941-1976, became a leading gay liberation poet. For the last 35 years he lived in San Francisco’s Mission District."
Friends have created a memorial website http://haroldnorse.com/ But apparently the bandwidth has been exceeded and you may have difficulty reaching the site.
Posted by Editors on Jun 11, 2009 at 09:49 AM in Arts, Bo Young, Books, Community, Culture, Current Affairs, Elders, Gay History, Gay Wisdom, History, Literature, Men, Politics | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)
Posted by Jesse Monteagudo on May 31, 2009 at 12:01 AM in Ancestors, Community, Culture, Current Affairs, Elders, Friends, Gay Health, Gay History, History, Homophobia, Jesse Monteagudo, Literature, Politics, Right Wingers | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Join the NYC Circle of Radical Faeries for an evening of readings, ritual, high drag and magic! Celebrate the 35th anniversary of RFD,
the digest of the Radical Faerie community.
Saturday, May 30th at BLUESTOCKINGS
6:00 PM Meet, Greet, Drum and Chant
7:00 PM Readings...and...
DRESS WITCHIE!
The current issue explores the relationship between the Radical Faerie's ritual practices and Starhawk's Reclaiming Collective. It includes articles on the life of Faeries and Witches in the 1970', 80's and 90's
as well as meditations on the current practice of Faerie Ritual. Rare back copies from the last 35 years of quarterly publication will also be available for sale.
BLUESTOCKINGS
a bookstore, fair trade cafe, and activist center
in the Lower East Side of Manhattan.
172 Allen St.
New York, NY 10002
212.777.6028
Directions:
Bluestockings is located in the Lower East Side of Manhattan at 172 Allen Street between Stanton and Rivington, one block south of Houston and First Avenue.
By train: F train to 2nd Ave , exit at 1st Ave , and walk one block south.
By car: If you take the Houston exit off of the FDR, then turn left onto Essex
(a.k.a. Avenue A), then right on Rivington, and finally right on Allen, you will
be very, very close.
Posted by Editors on May 27, 2009 at 09:50 AM in Ancestors, Arts, Bo Young, Community, Culture, Current Affairs, Elders, Entertainment, Fellow Travelers, Food and Drink, Friends, Gay History, Gay Wisdom, Gay Wisdom Events, History, Humor, Literature, Men, Music, Nature, Poetry, Politics, Radical Faerie | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
It's Monday.
It's raining. I'm going to be lazy and put up this lovely video with it's gorgeous music (from Hans Zimmer's The DaVinci Code score). Enjoy:
Posted by Editors on May 04, 2009 at 05:42 PM in Ancestors, Arts, Bo Young, Culture, Elders, Entertainment, Gay Health, Gay History, Gay Wisdom, History, Literature, Men, Music, Politics, Religion, Science, Sports, Television | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Kim Roberts, a frequent contributor and reviewer of books for White Crane, sent us this notice of two new books that have received laurels:
The Arts Club of Washington has announced the winners of the third annual National Award for Arts Writing. The $15,000 Award, although relatively new, has one of the largest purses of any annual book award in the U.S., and is the only award for non-fiction books on the arts for a general audience.
Winners must be living American authors, and books must be published in the U.S. in the previous year. The award honors and encourages excellence in writing (“prose that is lucid, luminous, clear and inspiring”) and can be on any artistic discipline. Considering how jargon-laden much arts writing has become in recent years (particularly writing about the visual and literary arts), this emphasis on a general, rather than specialist, audience is refreshing. The award goes to books that help readers build a strong connection with arts and artists.
For the first time in the Award’s history, there are two winners, and the books make a fascinating study in contrasts. The winners are:
Michael Sragow, for
Victor Fleming: An American Movie Master (Pantheon Books)
and
Brenda Wineapple, for
White Heat: The Friendship of Emily Dickinson & Thomas Wentworth Higginson (Knopf)
Fleming was the movie director best known for Gone With the Wind and The Wizard of Oz, and Sragow’s book is the first full-length
biography of this fascinating man. Some of the strongest writing in the book describes how Fleming developed screen personas for such leading men as Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, and Gary Cooper, often based on his own experiences. Sragow argues that Fleming developed characters of idealized American masculinity, creating a new definition for a “strong, silent type” who was forceful, charismatic, and vigorous.
He writes, “The stars he helped create have never stopped hovering over the heads of Hollywood actors, who still try to emulate their careers, or of American men in general, who still try to live up to their examples. The director’s combination of gritty nobility and erotic frankness and his ability to mix action and rumination helped mint a new composite image for the American male. Fleming’s big-screen alter egos melded nineteenth-century beliefs in individual strength and family with twentieth-century appetites for sex, speed, and inner and outer exploration. His heroes were unpretentious, direct, and honest, though not sloppily self-revealing.”
Wineapple’s book, in contrast, captures something of Emily Dickinson’s elusive spirit, as she initiated and sustained a friendship with Thomas Wentworth Higginson, her long-time confidant. Wineapple argues that Dickinson cannily sensed that he would be a sympathetic reader, because Higginson, a former pastor who frequently wrote for The Atlantic Monthly, was also outspoken on issues of abolition of slavery and women’s rights. She was also befriending the man who would later make the posthumous publication of her poems possible.
On the selection of the two winners, judge David Kipen says, “The idea of the passionate but chaste Emily Dickinson on a blind date with Byronic, swashbuckling Victor Fleming, if only for one night, encompasses precisely the breadth of inspiration that these awards exist to honor.”
The Arts Club of Washington will begin accepting books published in 2009 in June for consideration for the next award. There is no entry fee. Publishers, agents, or authors may submit books; three copies of each book and the official entry form are required. The deadline for the next award is October 1, 2009. Full guidelines and entry forms may be found at: http://www.artsclubofwashington.org/award.html.
Kim Roberts is the administrator for the National Award for Arts Writing. She previously wrote about Emily Dickinson’s Herbarium for White Crane (Issue #73).
Posted by Editors on Apr 29, 2009 at 12:04 PM in Books, Entertainment, Gay History, History, Literature | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Is that a lovely face or what?...
Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick was an American theorist in the fields of gender studies, queer theory (queer studies) and critical theory, which mainly means she was concerned with how many queer angels were dancing on the heads of academic pins. Influenced by Michel Foucault, Judith Butler, feminism, psychoanalysis and deconstruction, her work reflected an abiding interest in a wide range of issues and topics including something called queer "performativity"...whatever the hell that is...and performance; experimental critical writing; the works of Marcel Proust; artists' books; Buddhism and pedagogy. Academic polemic gobble-de-gook aside...she was a friend to the LGBTQ community.
Surprising to some, she was married for 40 years to her husband, Hal Sedgwick, a CUNY professor of visual perception (optometry), but apparently only saw him on weekends. She would also prefer it to be reported in that manner, i.e. she was married to a man, as opposed to assigning her the "straight" or "hetero/homo" categorizations (a too conveniently neat division rejected by Sedgwick.)
Sedgwick wasn’t a household name, unless you count the brouhaha over her 1989 essay Jane Austen and the Masturbating Girl, which featured in many of the ritualistic first-kill-all-the-professors stories from our long culture war.
Sedgwick’s books, including “Between Men” and “Epistemology of the Closet,” were on the shelves of most of the graduate students and comp-lit survivors, Gay and non-Gay, queer and non-queer, back in the 1990s. She virtually invented the field, or at least brought it to new heights. My personal favorite was an essay entitled How To Bring Your Kids Up Gay: The War on Effeminate Boys. If that was all she ever wrote she'd be worthy of laurels, from the aeries of the academe and the mundane streets alike.
Sedgwick’s radical challenge to heteronormative ways of reading and living may seem quaint (if that’s the word) in a time when people are celebrating same-sex weddings in Iowa and the White House Easter egg hunt conspicuously includes Gay and Lesbian families. Perhaps the misty future evoked in Pace University professor of English and women's studies, Karla Jay’s review of “Tendencies” — one where Sedgwick would be photographed shaving fellow queer-studies scholar Terry Castle on the cover of Time magazine, à la Cindy Crawford and K. D. Lang — isn’t quite here.
But alas, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, one of the foundational non-Gay allies, won't be around to see that future. She died April 12 of breast cancer. She was 58.
Our sincere condolences to her family and friends. In an age of anti-intellectualism and religious mythopoesis run amok, we need all the rational, intelligent voices we can find.
Posted by Editors on Apr 16, 2009 at 08:47 AM in Bo Young, Community, Culture, Current Affairs, Elders, Fellow Travelers, Friends, Gay Health, Gay History, Gay Wisdom, Health, History, Homophobia, Literature, Politics, Science | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)














