Subject: Teaching Queer Literature
Date: 27 May 1995 14:47:43 +0100
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TEACHING QUEER MEN'S POETRY - A RESOURCE-LIST
(Version: May 1995)
by ianthe@duende.demon.co.uk
*** This list only includes those works which
deal with more than one author. There are
also a large number of journal articles and
books which deal (positively or negatively)
with the affections/desires/sexualities of
specific authors. Many of the books listed
below are quite daunting for the beginner who
is not fluent in academic "jargonese". The
easiest ones for the interested general reader
to begin with are probably: Lilly (1993),
and then try Woods (1987) and Aldrich (1992) ***
(Bartlett (1993), although not strictly
'lit.crit.', is also highly recommended as a
starting point for non-academic adult students)
Aldrich, Robert. The Seduction of The Mediterranean
- writing, art and the homosexual fantasy. London,
Routledge, 1992.
[Last chapter departs from the emphasis on
biography and looks at themes in the writings.
Scholarship has been savaged by those-who-know]
Bartlett, Neil. Who Was That Man ? - A present for
Oscar Wilde. London, Penguin, 1993.
[Especially good on the codes of London
gay life in the late 1800s. Highly readable]
Bergman, David. Gaity Transfigured - gay
self-representation in American literature.
University of Wisconsin Press, 1991.
[First two chapters define experience of
being sexually 'Other'.]
Bristow, Joseph. (Ed.) Sexual Sameness -
textual differences in lesbian and gay
writing. London, Routledge, 1992.
[Demonstrates how literature has been
valuable space for expressing 'other' sexual
desires.]
Bronski, Micheal. Culture Clash - The making
of gay sensibility. Boston (USA), South End
Press, 1984.
Buchen, Irving. (Ed.) The Perverse Imagination -
sexuality and literary culture. New York, ?, 1970.
Butters, Ronald, R., Clum, J.M., and Moon, M.
(Eds). Displacing Homophobia - gay male
perspectives in literature and culture. USA,
?, 1989.
Craft, Christopher. Another Kind of Love -
homosexual desire in English discourse,
1850-1920. University of California Press, 1994.
Dellamora, Richard. Masculine Desire - the
sexual politics of Victorian aestheticism.
University of North Caroline Press, 1990.
Dollimore, Johnathon. Sexual Dissidence -
Augustine to Wilde, Frued to Foucault.
Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1991.
Dynes, W.R. and Donaldson, S. Homosexual
Themes in Literary Studies - Studies in
Homosexuality, Vol VIII. USA, Garland
Publishing, 1992.
[Useful overview and round-up of
hard-to-find articles.]
Fone, Bryrne. (1983)
This Other Eden - Arcadia and the homosexual
imagination.
JOURNAL OF HOMOSEXUALITY, Vol.8, No's.3/4, 1983.
Foster, Stephen Wayne. (1982)
Beauty's Purple Flame - some minor American
gay poets, 1786-1936.
GAY BOOKS BULLETIN, No.7, Spring 1982. pp. 15-17.
[Reprinted in: Dynes, W.R. and
Donaldson, S. 1992.]
Kellogg, Stuart. (Ed.) Literary Visions
of Homosexuality. ?, ?, 1983.
Kellogg, Stuart. (Ed.) Essays on Gay Literature.
New York, Harrington Park Press, 1985.
Lilly, Mark. Lesbian and Gay Writing - an
anthology of critical essays. MacMillan, London, 1990.
[Contains: Woods, Gregory. 'Absurd!
Ridiculous! Disgusting!' - Paradox in
Poetry by Gay Men'. pp. 175-198.]
Lilly, Mark. Gay Men's Literature in the Twentieth
Century. MacMillan, London, 1993.
[Rounds up all the usual suspects.
Good introduction.]
Martin, Robert K. (Ed.) The Homosexual Tradition
in American Poetry. USA, University of Texas
Press, 1979.
Meyers, Jeffery. Homosexuality and Literature,
1890-1930. The Athlone Press, London, 1977.
[Much criticised by subsequent scholars.]
Minton, Henry L. (Ed.) Gay and Lesbian
Studies. New York. Harrington park Press, 1992.
[Especially Flannigan-Saint-Aubin,
Arthur. 'The Mark of Sexual Preference in the
Interpretation of Texts'. pp. 65-88. and other
essays by Joseph Cady and Will Roscoe.]
Norton, Rictor C. The Homosexual Literary Tradition
- an interpretation. New York, Revisionist Press, 1974.
[Looks at archetypal patterns in Graeco-Roman
and Elizabethan poetry. Not highly regarded by
later gay critics.]
Plummer, Kenneth. (Ed.) The Making of the Modern
Homosexual. London, Hutchinson, 1981.
[A useful resource, along with the work of
Jeffrey Weeks and Frank Mort, for putting poems
and poets into historical context. Increasingly dated.]
Sedgwick, Eve Kosofsky. Between Men - English Literature
and Male Homosocial Desire. Second Edition.
London, Longman, 1994.
Simes, Gary. (1984)
Gai Saber - homosexuality and the poetic imagination.
GAY INFORMATION (Sydney, Australia), No's. 14/15,
1984. pp. 21-33.
Smith, Timothy D'Arch. Love In Earnest; some
notes on the lives and writings of English
'Uranian' poets from 1889 to 1930. London.
Routledge, 1970.
[Classic study of the Uranian paederastic tradition
in England, with rigourous standards of scholarship
which are only just beginning to be matched.]
Woods, Gregory. Articulate Flesh - male homo-eroticism
and modern poetry. USA, Yale University Press, 1989.
[Well worth reading, if you can find a
copy. Rather rambling and discursive at times,
but is an important work. Argues in part that
homoerotic verse is part of the mainstream, not
a distinct category. Looks at Lawrence, Crane, Auden,
Ginsberg, Gunn. Woods is currently writing a book
on gay lit. for Yale, and can be contacted at Nottingham
Trent University, UK.]
* ON TEACHING QUEER LITERATURE
Cady, Joseph. Teaching Homosexual Literature as a
'subversive' act. IN: Minton, Henry. Gay and Lesbian Studies,
Harrington Park Press, USA, 1992. pp. 89-109.
[The whole volume can also be highly recommended]
Rubin, G. 'Thinking Sex - notes for a radical
theory of the politics of sexuality'. IN: Abelove,
H., Barale, M.A., and Halperin, D.M. The Lesbian
and Gay Studies Reader. London, Routledge, 1994.
[Updated version of the famous essay - the
standard starting-point for critical thinking
on the subject. 'The Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader'
also contains a useful, lengthy and up-to-date
overview/bibliography of work in this fast developing
field.]
* SOME MAJOR ANTHOLOGIES (In date order.)
The Greek Anthology
[Various versions.]
Ibn Sana al-Mulk. (Ed.) Dar al-tiraz.
[Anthology of Hebrew homoerotic poetry
from medieval al-Andalus, Spain. No
translation known, but some of the less
explicit poems can be found in:
Compton, Linda Fish. 'Andalusian Lyric
poetry and Old Spanish Love Songs'.
New York, 1976.]
Kupffer, Elisar von. (Ed.) Lieblingsminne
und Freundesliebe in der Welt-literature.
Berlin, Adolf Brand, 1900. 202 pp.
[German. No translation known.]
Carpenter, Edward. (Ed.) Iolaus - anthology
of friendship. London, Swan Sonnenschein /
Manchester, S. Clarke. Second edition, 1906.
pp. vi. 234. Third Edition 1927.
[Edward Carpenter Archives, Sheffield, UK,
have accessible copy. British Library seem
to guard their copy with killer-librarians...
:-( ]
Sutherland, Alistair. and Anderson, Patrick.
(Eds.) Eros - an anthology of male friendship.
London, Blond, 1961.
Reade, Brian. (Ed.) Sexual Heretics; Male
Homosexuality in English literature from 1850-1900 -
an anthology. London, Routledge, Keegan and Paul,
1970.
Young, Ian. The Male Muse - a gay anthology.
Traumansburg, New York, 1973.
Leyland, Winston. (Ed.) Angels of The
Lyre - a gay poetry anthology. San Fransisco,
1975.
Hafkamp, Hans. Naar vriendshap zulk een
mateloos verlangen - bloemlezing uit de
Nethelandse homo-erotische poezie, 1880-nu.
Amsterdam, Bert Bakker, 1979.
[Dutch poetry, no translation known.]
Galloway, David and Sabisch, Christian.
(Eds.) Calamus: male homosexuality in
twentieth-century literature - an anthology.
New York, Morrow, 1982.
Coote, Stephen. The Penguin Book of Homosexual
Verse. London, Penguin, 1983.
[Widely available in bookshops and
secondhand. Ancient times to 1970s.]
Stehling, Thomas, trans., Medieval Latin
Poems of Male Love and Friendship.
New York, Garland Press, 198?
[Gay medieval literature from the
Roman Empire to 1300. Alcuin, Ausonius,
Luxorius, Abelard, Baudri or
Bourgueil, Hilderbert of Lauardin.]
Morse, Carl. and Larkin, Joan. (Eds.) Gay
and Lesbian Poetry in Our Time - an anthology.
New York, St. Martin's Press, 1988.
[200 poems from 94 poets, 1950-present.]
Reid, Anthony. (Ed.) The Eternal Flame -
a world anthology of homosexual verse,
2000 B.C.- 2000 A.D. Volume 1 - Greece,
Italy, Islam, France. New York, Dyanthus Press, 1992.
[Available mail-order in the EC from Prinz
Eisenhart, Berlin - ask for the poetry list.]
Ianthe. (Ed.) Child-loving in Poetry and Literature -
an anthology. Published as e-text only. No paper version.
[94,000 words, with samples from most of the various
paederastic traditions, Ancients to the present.
Copies can be had free from ianthe@duende.demon.co.uk]
e-mail: LGBT Co-op at Yale
This file was last updated 07Feb96.
Copyright ©1994-1996 by the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgendered Cooperative at Yale (New Haven, Connecticut, USA)