THERE’S an arresting portrait of Harry Count Kessler, painted by Edvard Munch in 1906, that hangs in the Nationalgalerie, Berlin. A handsome, mustached, fine-featured man looks at us from beneath a rakishly tilted white summer hat. Wearing a dark suit, leaning slightly on a stylish thin cane, Count Kessler is elegant and impeccable, and appears younger than his 38 years. …
MoreIN THE EPILOGUE to his 1995 book, The Pink and the Black, which was arguably the first real history of the gay-rights movement in France, Frédéric Martel questions the notion of “gay pride.” …
MoreIN JUNE 1997, the Centre Pompidou hosted the first conference on queer theory in France. When the presentations were done and the discussion was opened to the floor, I was surprised by the hostile tone of many of the questions and reactions from the audience. …
MoreON MAY 7, 2004, in Krakow, skinheads from a far right parliamentary party, the League of Polish Families, attacked a peaceful demonstration of gays, lesbians, and their supporters with slurs and stones and caustic acid. On November 20, in Poznan, skinheads of the League fired teargas at the feminist and anti-homophobic March of Equality. Assaults on women and minorities have risen since Poland joined the European Union on May 1, 2004. Poland’s joining the EU was seen by the League of Polish Families as a national humiliation, and support for the League has been growing in the intervening year. …
MoreGay scholar and poet David Bergman called him the gayest poet of World War II, and National Endowment for the Arts chief Dana Gioia called him the best Catholic poet of the latter half of the 20th Century. This is Dunstan Thompson, who has always been one of my favorite poets. But, today, who has ever heard of him? …
MoreLAURA J. MERRELL’S response to my review of Beyond Shame, by Patrick Moore, in the January-February 2005 issue of this journal was in several ways so strangely unmeasured a rejoinder-half the length of my entire review-that I felt that it deserved attention and response. …
More
All these temporary critics have masters degrees with the exception of Merrill, whose reading was nevertheless extensive enough to make his essays on Cavafy, Dante, Ponge, and Bishop more than exercises in pure appreciation.
More
… At any rate, psychologist Tripp did most vigorously barge into the realm of history. What the historians didn’t fully grasp, I think, is that Tripp was barging in with the sex-research perspective front and center. They must have known to some degree, because, after all, Tripp had published Matrix and had worked for Kinsey. …
MoreThe following is the Preface from the recently published book by C. A. Tripp, The Intimate World of Abraham Lincoln (Free Press, 2005).
More
