January-February 2022
Why was I so moved at the end of Maurice? I may never have watched an LGBT-themed movie or read a book with gay protagonists, but I had seen queer characters in media before. The names and faces changed but the story remained the same …
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MoreDURING the 76th session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), the Third Committee adopted the resolution “Strengthening the role of the United Nations in the promotion of democratization and enhancing periodic and genuine elections,” which included an explicit reference to sexual orientation and gender identity. This is only the second UNGA resolution that explicitly mentions these two categories.
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The essays in Willa Cather’s Pittsburgh look at the novelist’s creative incubation from idiosyncratic angles. They describe Cather’s work, connections, and ambitions as a young adult, and several neatly assess characters in her early fiction who disdain heteronormative expectations. The book’s notes are useful, though a brief chronology might make it easier to navigate these essays.
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THE “FEMME FATALE” gained a popular foothold in the detective fiction of the 1930s and then, even more visibly, in the great films noir of the 1940s and ’50s. In these narratives, the femme fatale often seizes command of the straight male gaze and harnesses it to her own purposes, her own pursuit of power. …
MoreTHIS ISSUE’S THEME has a subtitle: “The postwar origins of LGBT sex culture.” The “sexual awakenings” of the title are ones that began to stir after World War II and…More
