IT WAS IN 1974 that Patricia Nell Warren (1936-2019) submitted a manuscript about a gay love story to her agent of record John Hawkins at Paul Reynolds Inc. A week later, William Morrow and Co. bought the English-language publishing rights for $7,500 (considered a standard advance for a first novel). Jim Landis was the editor in charge. He punched up the narrative pace but requested no changes for sexual content. “This is a subject whose time has come,” he said.
The Front Runner told the story of Billy, a 22-year-old distance runner who falls in love with his coach Harlan and participates in the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal (anticipated by two years). Billy wins the 10,000-meter race; one week later, at the 5,000-meter race, as Billy pulls away in his finishing sprint to win the gold medal and set a new world record, tragedy strikes. But that’s not the whole story.
Nikolai Endres, a professor of world litera-ture at Western Kentucky University, is the author of the forthcoming Patricia Nell Warren: A Front Runner’s Life and Works,.
