I admit that my knowledge of Janet Flanner was hazy when I bought this book, my exposure to the "New Yorker" limited to a few issues per year only in the last ten years. That wasn't the selling point for me -- I had read good reviews that this was the memoir of a boy raised in a non-traditional home in the 1940s and that detail fascinated me.

This is a crisply written, completely fascinating account of William Murray's gypsy childhood in the literary circles of New York, Fire Island and Rome. It is a story of becoming a man, of weathering stormy relations with parents, and about his own struggles to make a life for himself as a writer.

There are two generations of literary lives detailed: I was fascinated to learn how much professional writers struggle even after achieving success. Janet Flanner lived in hotels across the world, constantly missing her deadlines; the author himself resorted throughout his 20s and 30s to gambling and part time jobs to scrape by. Even his first two years working as a writer for the New Yorker came and went without him getting an article published. This is the dark side of the artist's life, and one we hear too little of.

My only disappointment with this book -- and it's minor-- is that it is really the story of an artist's life, not the story of being the child of a lesbian. Janet Flanner's role in the author life could just as well be that of a step-father; the fact that she is a lesbian is superfluous. But, maybe that in and of itself makes a point.

A fascinating and well written memoir -- worth reading.

I just finished this book and enjoyed it tremendously. This book appealed to me on several levels. As an American ex-patriate living outside Paris, I could relate to many of the comments Janet made. Although I love France, I will always be an outsider. This book is not so much an homosexual story as it is a love story among these people. It is a testament to how love can endure long distances, different cultures and social constraints. I recommend this book highly to anyone who enjoys reading historically based biographies with a love story intertwined. Besides, I can't resist buying a good book with good photographs.

When I look back on the many books I've read over the past year (easily 50 or more), I can say emphatically that this was one of the best and most memorable. I can remember where I sat (by a fountain) when I began the book, and where I was (at a garden) when I closed its cover for the final time. Murray captured the essence of a very complex, yet loving relationship between two sophisticated, intelligent women. After I finished his book, I yearned to learn more about them, and read a biography of Flanner, Murray's mother's book of correspondence between herself and Flanner, and several of Flanner's New Yorker compilations. A heartfelt thanks, William Murray.

As the late Irish writer, scholar and philosopher, Iris Murdoch, observed, early Greek history 'is a game with very few pieces, where the skill of the player lies in complicating the rules'. It is the nature of this 'game' which underlies William Armstrong Percy's detailed examination of the origin and spread of pederasty in ancient Greece. Sparse and fragmentary evidence together with the consequent difficulties of interpretation pose particular problems for the objective historian: speculative play is inevitable, and to some extent, the juggling of sources as a means of furthering the author's historical predilections.

It is nonetheless an impressive study in which the technicalities do not obscure - for the less informed reader - the enjoyment of a closely argued and richly diversified discussion. Percy's espousal of the theory of a seventh century Cretan origin of institutionalized pederasty subsequently spread by the Spartans to Greece, is persuasive rather than compelling. As is clearly acknowledged in the Introduction, the Archaic period provides virtually no evidence: reliance is placed on later writers such as Plutarch, Lucian and Athenaeus. Historical texts survive in many versions about which scholars disagree more often than not: 'almost every detail of early Greek history, especially of Greek sexuality is open to doubt and indeed is hotly debated'. Repeated references to Aristotle's observation about the curbing of overpopulation by encouraging male sexual relations does little to advance the argument.

Percy is an enthusiast for his subject, though in no sense an apologist. The book is outstanding by virtue - as the author points out - of the paucity of works which treat fairly and without distaste of the topic of Greek pederasty, a term which he defines unequivocally from the outset as a love-bond (whether spiritual or sexual) between men and adolescent boys. The Greeks, it seems, showed little sexual interest in adult males, and indeed 'would be quick to condemn our prevalent androphilia as extremely distasteful and even reprehensible in that it serves no pedagogical purpose'.

This then is the crucial element in Percy's thesis: the link between pederastic custom and the rise of Hellas and the 'Greek Miracle', in spite of the acknowledged absence of surviving documents giving more precise testimony to that link. At the outset, he stresses that 'the Greeks we most admire almost always practised pederasty, at least before marriage.' The list is impressive, embracing poets, statesmen and philosophers. The Epilogue which looks forward to the 'Golden Age of Greek love' seeks to underline the argument that the intimate bonding of youths and older males transcended mere eroticism, quoting the Platonic dialogues, Aristotle and others who debated the spiritual versus the physical aspects of the 'erastes' and 'eromenos' relationship. In the wide, though detailed overview offered by this book, the argument is palpable.

The place of women in Greek society is perhaps understandably neglected in this study, except to argue a causal link between 'seclusion of women' and the proliferation of male love. The description of Spartan marriage customs and the attempt by Sparta 'to correlate marriage patterns and birthrates with population pressures' introduces a wider perspective, as does the reference to the 'love poetry' of Alcman and his 'sensual glorification of beautiful Spartan girls'. To the Greek mind, pederastic desire and heterosexual love were clearly not incompatible, on which point the author chooses to reserve comment. A brief reference to Sappho's poetry as 'a clear parallel in the world of females to cardinal features of Greek pederastic practice' has the odour of a starkly irrelevant concession to contemporary sexual politics. Similarly, the chapter entitled 'Situational Homosexuality and Demography' in its descriptions of 'womenless colonists', comradeship on voyages, and the 'parastates' (battle companion) smacks of modern sexology in its attempt to establish 'elements in the background to institutionalized pederasty'. Nevertheless, the case for the 'uniqueness' of Greek pederasty is well made.

The author intends the book for a wide audience and not just specialists or homosexual sympathizers in the hope 'that a true understanding of Greek institutionalized pederasty will at long last permit the educated world to confront the accomplishments of that practice honestly, without embarrassment or outrage'.

I'm both surprised at and in admiration of just how much Percy's study relies on ancient texts, and considering the trickiness of doing just that, he's pulled off a wonderful work. The arguments for a Cretan institutionalization of pederasty/pedagogy are compelling, but equally of interest are the associated discussions of different cities, regions, and customs throughout archaic and classical Greece.

if this book is anywhere near true, men have been missing out on a lot of action for almost two thousand years

mind boggling if true

jimmy

I knew was in for a trashy read as soon as I opened this book. The first giveaway was the 32 point Dick and Jane primer typeface. The second was two murders within the first three pages, where the victims were discovered wearing exorbitantly expensive "Draqualian" silk slips. Both of the victims were men.

The luxurious intimates the dead men were wearing are traced back to Stud Draqual, the "Prince of Silk Nighties" who is probably the only man in the book that doesn't wear the unique lingerie he designs and sells. In addition to his profession, Stud's physical attributes...a too finely chiseled face, too thick, dark and long eyelashes, too purple eyes, too bee-stung lips, too slight physique and too tiny penis...all contradict his name. And naturally everyone in the book, including his shrink, thinks he is gay. Too, too, too much since the love of his life is his hand. The book is subtitled "A Stud Draqual Mystery," but the only mystery seems to be Stud, himself.

The book is full of plot holes, sexual innuendoes and unbelievable dialog; in other words, it has everything a good trashy book needs!

I highly recommend this book. I first heard about it from an article in Publishers Weekly and was intrigued by its clever title "A Slip to Die For" and by the the idea of silkworms, after being fed a special secret diet , producing "gossamer strands of protein in every color of the rainbow." So I bought the book. Poor Stud Draqual (yes, Stud . . . a cruel parental joke perhaps?) finds himself in the middle of a series of murders. He is a suspect . . . maybe. His colleagues Gerald Kamey and Don deZinn, friends, lovers? have been found murdered. The catch is that each is found dressed in exclusive, exorbitantly expensive Draqualian silk nighties. Suspicion abounds and poor Stud has to navigate many twisting dangerous trails to save himself. On one side is the former porn publisher Stan Greenlyne, now head of Telaman Press whose connection the dead men is unclear and murky. Is Stan friend or foe? Whatever, he is unsavory and menacing. Another threat to Poor Stud is Clem Rollins a nasty character, crime syndicate boss, whose sexuality just might be exposed by a new book by the murdered men. Finally police inspector O'Malley is a constant threat to Stud, or is he rather a friend? There are times when it seems that Inspector O'Malley may not just trying to solve a crime but may actually have a "thing" for Stud.

Poor Stud. He is a straight man but everyone thinks he's gay. Why? Consider his business: he's CEO of Draqual Fashions making lingerie for Women . . . What straight man would be in that business? Not only that but he's incredibly good looking. As one character states, "He's too good looking to be straight." He's witty, well-read, has impeccable taste in fashions, furnishings, wine, restaurants . . . he must be gay! But such stereotypes have labeled many a man unfairly. Stud is not gay. Just let a beautiful woman bat her eyes at poor Stud and he can hardly keep his "interest" from being visibly seen "down there." One of my favorite characters in this witty, tightly written little mystery is Stud's psychologist, Dr. Melissa. Her bitchy sessions with Stud are a hoot. Those scenes, written with skill and humor, had me laughing out loud. Stud does NOT NEED a counselor but his sessions with Dr. Melissa seem to refresh is energies and send him on his way to triumph! And triumph he does. There are so many other interesting characters, so many plot twists, I could go on and on. But it's time to end this.

Like many people I tend to read in bed and since this is a somewhat short book I figured two or three nights would do it. But once I began reading I was having such fun that I just couldn't put it down and read it all in one night. I have recommended this book to many personal friends and now want to recommend it to the general public. Perhaps you won't put it on your bookshelf next to Dostoevsky and Shakespeare, but you will enjoy it.

Why didn't the publisher have the foresight to list this book under Gay, Gay Literature, Gay Fiction . . . et al? Was it decided, in some boardroom, that all of Mr. Maltese's gay readers would just assume this, his crossover-into-mainstream novel, has a lot of the same great "stuff" that makes his gay erotica (CALIFORNIA CREAMIN', SUMMER SWEAT), as popular as it is? Wrong! in that while a rose may be a rose may be a rose, authors have been known to have the same name and write entirely different kinds of books. I'm thinking of one gay author whose straight namesake publishes books on mathematics. A SLIP TO DIE FOR's publishers having done a major injustice to William Maltese's gay readers in making us guess this really great novel is not only by "that" writes-for-gays William Maltese, but that this book does, indeed, appeal to "us". Had I only known, before I inadvertently stumbled upon the fact, I would have had this book "grabbed up" long before now. I suspect, there are still hundreds of gays out there who haven't yet wised up to the fact this book is gay, this book is great, this book deserves a gay readership it likely now misses. The detective hero in this book is fantastic. The theme (haute-coutre lingerie) is one of a kind. If the protagnoist can't seem to decide if he's gay, straight, or bi, let me clue him in. "You're gay . . .Gay . . . GAY! and, I love you!" Any gay aficionado of the gay detective genre won't be able to help himself from loving him, either. All of us looking forward to Book II of this impressie "gay" series. Which, when it arrives on the shelves, can only hope its publisher has sense enough to get its you-know-what out of its you-know-where to wake up to the fact gays are as much interested in a good read as any straight audience.

You know you are in the company of a great writer when the very first page of a book wrenches your heart. With such an auspicious start, William Taylor begins his moving account of teenage Marco coming to terms with the loss of his life-long friend, Jerome, in an apparent hunting accident. He writes to Jerome's former 'girlfriend' Kate and their correspondence comprises most of this little book. He deals with his great loss, his loneliness, drinking, and the realization that Kate is gay. Then Marco must deal with Jerome's true nature and, finally, his feelings for his lost friend.

There are many heart-rending moments in the unfolding of his wonderful tale, and Mr. Taylor leaves us with hope for these wonderful kids, with their gaining of healing knowledge, and humanity.

This short novella explores the reactions of two friends (Marco and Kate) to the apparent suicide of another friend (Jerome). Through an exchange of letters and e-mails, the truth of their respective relationship with the deceased (Jerome of the title) becomes clear.

Slowly, Marco and Kate reveal their own personalities anf this proves to be a very shocking for Marco.

The book is very well put together, the story is moving and thought provoking. It's not a long read; I managed it in under an hour, but it IS a deep read.

When Jerome dies, his two best friends, Marco and Katie, try to commiserate each other. To do so they have to fall back on the Internet, since one of them is in the US and the other in NZ. As the email messages fly back and forth half way around the world, the two unlikely friends find out more and more about each other and about themselves.

If Jerome hadn't died, however, Marco might never have found a way to come to terms with himself and honor his friend in the process. In this, the book reflects real life. The list is long of people who have had to die before their friends and family came to grow into reason. And still, parents turns their sons onto the streets, or one-time pals harrass and abuse former friends.

Still, this book is does not sink into self-indulgence. The dialogue carried on between the two survivors leads them out of sorrow into the light of self-awareness. For this reason, it is a valuable resource for any young person. It shows a way to reach understanding without throwing in the towel. It can prepare young people and adults to face the unimaginable together.

Jerome can speak to us all.

This is possibly my favorite, I remember a lot about it. Just as if not more so on the lines of Wild Boys, except those boys are replaced renegade military types who go haywire and destroy the civilized control towers and such with the ubiquitous words "Calling partisans of all nations-Shift linquals, vibrate tourists-Word falling, photo falling-break through in grey room!" Wonderful. Mostly stream-of-conciousness, including the immensely garbled and mind blowing (atleast to me) chapter "Trak!Trak!Trak!" (either that or Trek)...he just keeps going and going, but not like the Energizer Bunny becuase that peice of fluffy pink machinery is a commercialized 'soft machine' and Burroughs is its arch enemy. Wouldn't it just be marvelous if the 2 duked it out on some adulterated Japanese animation like Cowboy Bebob? Err. BREAK THROUGH TO THE OTHER SIDE...OF LITERATURE AND LUNACY!

Other particularly memorable scenes that stuck in my internal synapses include a chapter where a news reporter infiltrates backward Mayan codices (where a hollogram image of an old master controls the migrant workers) and penetrates the machine and punches the hollogram in the gut and screams out freedom and aw, it was beautiful. Also feast your eyes on voodoo doctors taking advantage of their drug induced patients, boys in the forgotten hills, traveling shifty, where am I going with this? Whatever, just read it, boys and girls.

When I first started reading this book not much of it made any sense. I just let it from whatever it had to feed in my right brain (visuals). The second step came on the chapter Public Agent where I kept with the imaging and connected this imaging together so that it made some intellictual sense. From these experiences I found out that in this book Burroughs communicates in a language that streams together the sound, image,word. This book with its cut/up induces creativity and will also boost anybody's vocabulary skills. If you liked the cut/up used in Natural Born Killers then you'll like this book,which Natural Born Killers was probably born from.

I think the genius comes in when Burroughs takes the stories apart and scrambles them back together to make silly but surreptitiously truthful little sideswipes at reality.

As far as beach reading goes, this book is the ultimate beach read. I would have loved to have had this book around 15 years ago when I needed it. Now, I just see it as 4 paint by the number stories that portray gay life as shallow, unsatisying and sadly hollow. Many of these stories end up with the same plot twists (which any astute reader can see coming a mile away)and cookie cutter characters who seem to think only of sex, liquor and men (not always in that order.) The worst offender is Ben Tyler, who wraps up the collection. Tyler has a lot to learn about writing, with his junior high-level style writing and jaw droppingly bad similes. The other three stories fare a bit better ... but not much. Characters fall in love in minutes, hearts are broken, men are cast aside like Kleenex, and the reader is supposed to think "Oh, what romance!" The two middle stories, "A Perfect Husband" and "The Outline of a Torso" fare somewhat better since the writing style is a bit more professional, but the stories themselves are a bit weak and suffer, as the other two stories do, from protagonists who are so self involved and shallow that they left me cold.

This leads to the question as to why I bothered to even give it 2 and a half stars? The reason being is that while this book is not something I liked or go for, why CAN'T we have such books? After being fed a steady diet of similar stories in our lifetime from a heterosexual point of view, the gay community should also have a variety of nice, frothy reads, even if I realized I don't like this style book. As I said, had this book been around 15 years ago when i needed it, I'd have loved it. No doubt there are guys out there who need this book now ... and it's important that it's here, whether I like it or not.

4 simple stories of finding and rediscovering love, gay-style... I find that in 3 of them, they fall in love way too fast and the resolutions are way too pat and too perky. BUt who wants to read a party-pooper of a book in the bright, sunny days of summer anyway. But they are all charming in their own way.

But I gave this book 5 stars just because of 1 story - Andy Schell's The Outline of a Torso. It is light, unassuming and sweet at the start but suddenly, you willingly allow yourself to get swept up in the story in order to discover the tangled relationship between Rusty and Ethan. Schell sets up situations and uses other supporting characters to pave that way for a happy ending, but he does it so cleverly that I wished that he could have turned this short story into a novel. I would have loved to delve deeper into this rediscovery of first love.

I didn't know what to expect when I purchased Summer Share. The only reason I bought the book was because I wanted to read more gay authors and figured that I could hit 4 birds with one stone. It was the ultimate surprise!

I immediately became engulfed in the worlds that each author created. In this world, true love was paramount and although each protagonist had his share of heartbreaks, each man never gave up hope that one day they would find what they were searching for.

I would recommend this work to anyone, and will probably make my friends read it. If you enjoy reading love stories or are weary of every falling inlove again, this is the book for you! It will change your perspectives and give you hope!

Ancient Rome merits a contemporary investigation of its attitudes towards sexuality and homosexuality but sadly Craig A Williams book "Roman Homosexuality" is not capable of the task. Apart from the dull prose and paucity of illustrations. A pathetic eight pages of miniscule black and white photos, including the front cover which is repeated again inside the book itself. Williams actually has the audacity to state in the introduction that he will refrain from translating Roman sexual terms such as catamite, virgo, virtus, irrumator struprum, cinaedus, pudicitia, lingis, futuis, fututor, and fellator. The reader is therefore greatly hampered from the beginning by the absence of a Latin glossary and dictionary to guide them through Roman terminology.

William's book is liberally sprinkled with extracts from conservative poetry and plays which express mock outrage at licentiousness and addictive sexual behavior. In Seneca "Naturales Quaestiones" the character Hostius Quadra confesses that

"I simultaneously submit both to a man and to a woman. Yet I also play the man's role to someone else's disgrace, using, that redundant part of mine. My entire body is engaged in stupra (1.16)

Williams without exception considers the playwrights sexual prudery as being typical of all Romans tastes which is a dangerous assumption because reading actual Romans graffiti in which ordinary Romans brag about the numerous men and women they have slept with implies that the Romans could not be classified as sexually up tight. Their puns, jokes and pranks suggest a high voltage spiritual but bawdy people who considered every sexual act a blessing from the gods. You would hardly know this from Williams dry historical accounts, weighed down inappropriately as they are with references to contemporary French and American philosophers and social theorists. Their inclusion only makes the reading of his book more laborious. However quotes from actual Romans give fleeting insight into their culture and everyday lives. Such as a prayer to the Roman phallic god Priapus from Julius Agathemerus which asks that the following wishes be fulfilled.

"Grant me a flowering youth: grant that I may please good boys and girls with my naughty penis, and that with frequent fun and games I may chase away the worries that harm the soul, and that I may not fear old age too much" (Cil 14, 3565,2-7)

Who could not identify with this lament so universal is its longing to starve of the loneliness of old age? The most striking thing about Roman culture is that unlike the Greeks the Romans had no terms for gender specific sexuality. There were no homosexuals or heterosexuals only sexuality in Rome and it was craved constantly. ON this matter Williams selects extracts from Roman playwrights and poets that were openly critical of promiscuous men and women, who they termed lewd and greedy. However laws restraining adulterous conduct tended to fall on deaf ears. The average Roman parent when seeking a personal tutor for their beautiful son had to take into consideration the risk of his being seduced by his teacher. The parents themselves had access to both male and female slaves and freeborn lovers some of whom were notorious lesbians, concubines and male prostitutes.

In fact the Romans would provide male and female lovers to bribe jurors to ensure a legal case produced a favorable outcome, if they could afford it. The Romans though lusty did not approve of pedophilia and past laws banning what they classified as Amicitiae mos Graecorum or the " Greek practices". Where an adolescent would come under the wing of an older man. The vast majority of Roman men would be classified today as bi-sexual though exclusive homosexuality existed as well. There was no social criticism because some men married other men, but castrati and effeminacy was disliked. This is because the Romans were a warrior society so they did not approve of extreme femininity in men which was associated with the promiscuity of womanizers and male prostitutes. Excessive attention to personal appearance was considered effeminate or feminine behavior not appropriate to a warrior. Who had to be ready to brandish the sword at a moments notice. But in reality it was a free for all and some people flaunted their camp-ness regardless. However the Romans disliked slobs. They expected high standards of personal hygiene from both their men and woman, no nose hair, no dirty armpits, no shapeless haircuts, no frumpy tunics and no sloppy shoes. The Romans admired beauty both male and female as much as they did sex. And celebrated their awe struck wonder of love in their text an example of which can be found in "Satyricon' by the Roman author Petronius

"Ye gods and goddesses, what a night that was! How soft the bed! We clung together hot, and on this side and that we exchanged our wandering souls by our lips"

Sadly juicy extracts such as these are few and far between because their lost within pages of Williams dull pontifications. A better book would be one that simply presented page after page of original Roman comments on their sex lives. accompanied by hundreds of fabulous illustrations.

This is one of the very best books ever written on gay history.

Strong words! Why would I say that?

I say that simply because I have been studying gay history (off and on) for my entire life, and, while the general picture of male love in ancient Greece became clear quite early, I was never able to quite make sense of what the Roman attitudes were. And frankly -- neither was anyone else working in the field. About the best you could come up with was: "contradictory evidence." Plenty of evidence for male love, quite a bit of evidence that it was, in some circumstances at least, a Very Bad Thing.

Now the picture is clear. Williams brilliantly dispenses with the term "homosexuality" in the very first pages, and paints a very persuasive picture of Roman sexuality in general.

The important -- overriding -- overwhelming factor here was not some idea of "gay" or "straight" -- it was "citizen" versus "non-citizen." Sexual behavior between citizens was a disgrace. It was scandalous. It was totally forbidden -- unless of course the two citizens were married. The wife in such a marriage was expected to be faithful. The male, apparently, was not. But his outside activity was limited to slaves and prostitutes, both of which were relatively abundant in ancient Rome. There a male could sow his wild oats, always provided that he took the "masculine" role. If he took the "passive" role, well, that was a dead secret that could not ever be spoken of.

Now, if you think of it, eliminating slavery and prostitution would wind up giving that Roman male no sexual freedom at all. Even more interesting is the startling contrast that emerges with the practice of the ancient Greeks.

In Greek culture, the normative form of male love was expected to occur between citizens: one was older than the other, but they were of (eventually) equal status. It was therefore possible to express love for fellow citizens -- and the love affairs were very much expected to be honorable and long-lasting. Anal intercourse was specifically outlawed in such relationships.

In ancient Rome, on the other hand, it was IMPOSSIBLE to form a significant love relationship with another male citizen. Such attentions had to be diverted to slaves and prostitutes. One fairly predictable result is that a lot of slaves had sexual experiences unwillingly, and that the Roman Empire became hated among its subject people precisely for such very bad behavior. This widespread rape of male slaves (apparently rape is the correct term) could well have accounted for a lot of the violent homophobia of later times.

Highly recommended!

In college, I took Professor William's class on "Greek and Roman Sexuality" and looked forward to attending his lectures every other day and his excellent insights on the erotica of the time, as well as the social commentaries. I learned more from that class than from many others and still enjoy reading the books, poetry, and plays reflective of that period that we explored in that class. Williams is a woderful teacher, and this book puts so much of what he taught to his classes into the written word..its an excellent reference material I would recommend to all.

Identity, sexuality, and emotion in learning to teach, is the subtitle to this remarkable book, Negotiating the Self, written by Kate Evans. Evans examines the experiences of gay and lesbian teachers in the school setting. She uses several different pre-service teachers and their experiences of teaching to convey the message of the difficulties homosexual educators have in the school systems. Then Evans goes further in this realm of experiencing difficulties while teaching to include any teacher, regardless of race, sexual orientation, religion, or creed. Every educator negotiations themselves during teaching because of their own personal identities that they do not wish to reveal to their students.
Why do teachers withhold or avoid answering certain questions their students' pose? This was a key question that I held throughout the entire reading and I still have not answered it. Evan's writing allows the reader to question and think about the conditions she sets forth in her writing about the gay and lesbian pre-service teachers and how they relate to the readers own life, no matter the sexual orientation. Negotiations take place to maintain the social order that is present in any school system, that is the avoidance or not answering a personal question that is posed by a student.
In conclusion, this is an excellent read that makes the reader consider the constraints placed upon them that may involve their sexual orientation, religion, political position, and any other factors that are considered personal by the educator. How one answers, does not answer a question, or withholds information is a process of negotiating the self in relationship to others, which affect all the people involved in the interaction. Evans offers a point of view that openly addresses issues that educators face on a daily basis. Read it to find out how you negotiate yourself!

The author, Kate Evans, writes an interesting book about the self-identity of gay and lesbian teachers. Through several interviews with gay teachers, and even student teachers the reader learns about the struggle that gay teachers go through in today's society. Do they tell their students their sexual orientation or do they negotiate themselves in order to keep a job and maintain respect in their school.

The book is an easy to read book that is hard to put down. Negotiating the self is based on events and personal experiences that happened to the writer and the several people who were interviewed. The stories told by those in the book are ones that will make you want to laugh and cry in the same reading.

This book made me realize how much information teacher's sensor from their students, and should they really have too? You don't have to be gay to know that there is some information that may not be accepted by your students, parents and other staff members. It could be the fact that you've been divorced, among other things that you don't feel will be accepted by others. There are things that happen in while in school but they are not education. Such as being a role model. So many people that believe since you have a gay teacher, your teacher is going to touch you and "boom" you're gay. The big question in this book is "Why couldn't I just keep my "private life" out of teaching?" (Evans, 3) Is this really possible? Read and form your own opinions.

I originally was not interested in reading this book, but I am glad I did read it. I was entertained and compelled to stop and reflect on how and why we send the messages we do. The journey travels on four different lives that have pain, personal struggles, and laughter, which are things that we all share. Just like any other good book, I couldn¡¯t put it down until I found out what became of these four people. Unlike a fictional story, Kate Evans eloquently narrates the stories, and brings the importance of the common theme, self-identity, to the more national issue of the education and gay/lesbian mix.

The book centers on gay and lesbian teachers in-training, but more importantly, it looks into the way we interact with one another. We get to see a rare look into these professionals through their self-examination and interviews with Kate Evans. This book is a thought-provoking look into negotiating the self.

¡°What happens when one¡¯s senses of self interact with a new role or identity?¡± (Evans, p. 5) I found this to be a major question the Kate Evans addresses. How would you answer this question? How do you believe the one¡¯s sense of self interacts with a new role or identity? Imagine going back to school after years of being out of school, or becoming a parent for the first time. Events like these will affect how you think, interact with others, and who you are. You will forever be changed. Just because the issues in this book are about education and homosexuality, it is still relevant to communities other than the gay and lesbian community and the education community. I recommend this book for anyone who wants to know one¡¯s self better, to examine why we behave the way we do.

I first read a William Gay story in Harper's magazine. What a great story, I thought. Who is this guy? What else has he written? He's a fiftysomething ex-carpenter. And he's written "The Long Home."

The first 100 pages or so immediately hooked me, making me think I had found the next Cormac McCarthy. And at times, when the prose was clicking, it didn't feel as if I was reading a book as walking in someone else's dream. In a fit of joy I almost posted a review without finishing the book. I'm glad I finished it, though, because the last half doesn't fufill the first half's promise.

The last read like a primer on how to construct a formulaic Southern goth romance. It's very pedestrian, very planned. Will Winer side with the forces of good with Oliver or will Hardin infect him with his evil? Will he get Amber Rose? It's all very melodramatic and conventional in the end. Cormac McCarthy did it better with "All The Pretty Horses", mixing melodrama and lyricism to a potent affecting mix. "The Long Home" has moments where the prose doesn't seem to be written as it is handed down from God himself. And then it collapses into a "Cold Mountain" mush. And I truly and deeply dispised "Cold Mountain."

All in all, the man has talent and I will read his stuff. But I'll be wary.

I read this book with an increasing sense of wonder and awe. William Gay has written a moving, heartbreaking novel with people I believe and believe in, with language both poetic and taut, with detail to die for, with humor and wisdom and heart and darkness and a sense of place you might read a thousand books and never find. Buy this book and wrap it in Mylar and stand it on the shelf with your Faulkner and your Cormac McCarthy, and then take it down and start reading it over again. We all keep hearing about the next new voice in American fiction. Well folks, William Gay is a whole varied chorus of voices, all singing in perfect harmony. The song is dark, god yes, but you can't stop listening.

The title of this review may seem pretentious, but, as an author, I rejoice in the literary art of story-telling at it's highest level. Mr. Gay, who I had the pleasure of meeting in Nashville at The Southern Festival of the Book, is a masterful story-teller. His characters are lively and real. The inner-workings of the mind and the tenacity of the southern male are reborn in this tale. Though some critics have said his work is Faulknerian in tone, Mr. Gay's prose is far more readable and, in my opinion, lyrical. His love for the area and the people about which he writes are reminiscent of Pat Conroy and his attachment of South Carolina's Low Country. Congratulations to William Gay for a job well done.

'As you like it' is one of those Shakespearean plays that is considered 'great' by critics, but never really found true popular acclaim, perhaps due to the absence of charismatic characters (the romantic hero is particularly wet) or compelling dilemmas.

It shares many features with the great comedies - the notion of the forest as a magic or transformative space away from tyrannical society ('A Midsummer night's dream'); the theme of unrequited love and gender switching from 'Twelfth night'; the exiled Duke and his playful daughter from 'The Tempest'. But these comparisons only point to 'AYLI''s comparative failure (as a reading experience anyway) - it lacks the magical sense of play of the first; the yearning melancholy of the second; or the elegiac complexity of the third.

It starts off brilliantly with a first act dominated by tyrants: an heir who neglects his younger brother, and a Duke who resents the popularity of his exiled brother's daughter (Rosalind). there is an eccentric wrestling sequence in which a callow youth (Orlando) overthrows a giant. Then the good characters are exiled to Arden searching for relatives and loved ones.

Theoretically, this should be good fun, and you can see why post-modernist critics enjoy it, with its courtiers arriving to civilise the forest in the language of contemporary explorers, and the gender fluidity and role-play; but, in truth, plot is minimal, with tiresomely pedantic 'wit' to the fore, especially when the melancholy scholar-courtier Jacques and Fool Touchstone are around, with the latter's travesties of classical learning presumably hilarious if you're an expert on Theocritus and the like.

As an English pastoral, 'AYLI' doesn't approach Sidney's 'Arcadia' - maybe it soars on stage. (Latham's Arden edition is as frustrating as ever, with scholarly cavilling creating a stumbling read, and an introduction which characteristically neuters everything that makes Shakespeare so exciting and challenging)

Anyone with a working knowledge of Shakespeare's plays knows that As You Like It is a light, airy comedy. It is clearly not one of Shakespeare's greatest plays. As You Like It is more obscure than famous. Even amongst the comedies it comes nowhere close to the popularity of plays such as A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Tempest, or Twelfth Night. That said, it is a treasure in its own right. This is so, if for nothing else, because it contains one of the greatest pictures of a woman to be found in Shakespeare's works, excluding the Sonnets.

Ah, sweet Rosalind. In her are encapsulated so many ideas about the nature of woman. She is first pictured in a rather faux-Petrarchan manner. This quickly fades as an intelligent woman comes to the fore. While the intelligence remains, she is also torn by the savage winds of romantic love. Rosalind, in all her complexity and self-contradiction, is a truly modern female character.

Most of the women in Shakespeare's tragedies and historical plays are either window dressing (as in Julius Caesar) or woefully one-sided (Ophelia, Lady Macbeth). This is not the case with Rosalind. Rather than being marginalized, she is the focus of a good chunk of the play. Instead of being static and [standard], she is a complex evolving character.

When Rosalind first appears, she outwardly looks much like any other lady of the court. She is a stunning beauty. She is much praised for her virtue. Both of these elements factor in the Duke's decision to banish or [do away with] her.

Rosalind falls in love immediately upon seeing Orlando. In this way she at first seems to back up a typically courtly idea of "love at first sight." Also, she initially seems quite unattainable to Orlando. These are echoes of Petrarchan notions that proclaim love to be a painful thing. This dynamic is stood on its head following her banishment.

Rosalind begins to question the certainty of Orlando's affection. She criticizes his doggerel when she finds it nailed to a tree. Rather than wilting like some medieval flower, she puts into effect a plan. She seeks to test the validity of her pretty-boy's love. In the guise of a boy herself, she questions the deceived Orlando about his love.

Yet Rosalind is not always so assured. Her steadfastness is not cut and dried. Composed in his presence, Rosalind melts the second Orlando goes away. She starts spouting romantic drivel worthy of Judith Krantz. Even her best friend Celia seems to tire of her love talk. This hesitating, yet consuming passion is thrown into stark relief with her crystal clear dealings with the unwanted advances of the shepherdess Phebe.

Rosalind contradicts herself in taking the side of Silvius in his pursuit of Phebe. She seeks to help Silvius win the love of Phebe because of his endearing constancy. Yet the whole reason she tests Orlando is the supposed inconstancy of men's affections.

This idea of Male inconstancy has made its way down to the present day. Men are seen, in many circles, as basically incapable of fidelity. Though a contradiction to her treatment of Silvius' cause, Rosalind's knowing subscription to pessimistic views on the constancy of a man's love places her on the same playing field as many modern women.

Rosalind takes charge of her own fate. Until and even during Shakespeare's own time women largely were at the mercy of the men around them. This is satirized in Rosalind's assuming the appearance of a man. Yet she had taken charge of her life even before taking on the dress and likeness of a man. She gives her token to Orlando. She decides to go to the Forest. She makes the choice of appearing like a man to ensure her safety and the safety of Celia.

Rosalind finally finds balance and happiness when she comes to love not as a test or game, but as an equal partnership. Shakespeare is clearly critiquing the contemporary notions of love in his day. His play also condemns society's underestimation and marginalization of women. However, the Bard's main point is more profound.

As You Like It makes it clear that the world is never picture perfect, even when there are fairy-tale endings. Men and women both fail. Love is the most important thing. With love all things are possible.

"As You Like It" is bar none, one of Shakespeare's VERY best works. It is probably the most poetic of the comedies and contains perhaps as many famous quotations as any other of his plays. Rosalind is perhaps his greatest female character and this work, along with the equally (or even more) brilliant "Midsummer Night's Dream," is the best example of Shakespeare's theme of the "dream world" vs. the "real" world. This play, especially the scenes in the forest, is a celebration of language and the power of the freedom of the imagination. It consequently can be read as a criticism of the "real world," here represented by Duke Ferdinand's court. Like many of the other comedies, Shakespeare is mocking the "ideal" which many in his society would have praised. Though this play deals with some pretty dark themes (which of his plays doesn't?) it is a light-hearted and fully enjoyable read!