#paul monette

[nobeerreviews]

Summer has always been good to me, even the bittersweet end, with the slanted yellow light.

-- Paul Monette

(Bistrița, Romania)

[man-reading]

Becoming a Man: Half a Life Story

by Paul Monette

The National Book Award–winning coming-out memoir. “One of the most complex, moral, personal, and political books to have been written about gay life” (LA Weekly). Paul Monette grew up all-American, Catholic, overachieving . . . and closeted. As a child of the 1950s, a time when a kid suspected of being a “homo” would routinely be beaten up, Monette kept his secret throughout his adolescence. He wrestled with his sexuality for the first thirty years of his life, priding himself on his ability to “pass” for straight. The story of his journey to adulthood and to self-acceptance with grace and honesty, this intimate portrait of a young man’s struggle with his own desires is witty, humorous, and deeply felt. Before his death of complications from AIDS in 1995, Monette was an outspoken activist crusading for gay rights. Becoming a Man shows his courageous path to stand up for his own right to love and be loved.

[uselessgay10101]

"I am a daughter of the light

It's a truth I hold tight..

"I AM a daughter of the light"

I swear I'm right.

...But at night-

You catch my sight

How do you tangle me in a sin so bright?"

[havingapoemwithyou]

he worrying by Paul Monette

[onebluebookworm]

Ranking Books I Read on 2023: 25-21

25. Gallant - V.E. Schwab

This book is weird. There's no dancing around it. And not even really in a "holy shit what did I just read" kind of way that I might have liked more, more like reading out of the dream journal of a particularly creative and fandom-obsessed teen girl. Which is fine. That's not my jam as an adult, but I can appreciate weird books written specifically for weird little girls. If you have any of those in your life, they'd like this. Not really for me tho.

24. Afterlife by Paul Monette

This book will rip you open. What I went into thinking was gonna be a sort of serious found family romp turned out to be pretty bleak, but with a smidgen of hope at the end. This book is basically "not everyone who grieves can be saved from the self-destruction unhealthy coping mechanisms they have, and you can try to help them as much as you can, but not at the expense of your own health and well-being" and yes that's an immensely painful lesson to learn, but in the AIDS epidemic? That was basically a survival mantra. A little too much for me, but I can appreciate what it was doing.

23. The Skull - Jon Klassen

Does anyone remember that Twitter post with this author asking if any librarians could help him find a fairy tale he randomly stumbled across in an Alaskan librarian and couldn't remember the name of? Yeah, that was Jon Klassen, and that fairy tale inspired this book. That alone is pretty neat, but this book actually succeeds in being really charming and cute. I've always like Klassen's art style, and it's put to good use here. Plus, I'm always a sucker for skeletons. I just am.

22. Nobody: Casualties of America's War on the Vulnerable, from Ferguson to Flint and Beyond

Another hurty read. Although it occasionally gets a bit stuffy and historical, it does provide a lot of context for everything, and the book is so short otherwise you can basically forgive it. This book will make you feel bad about everything though.

21. The Only One Left - Riley Sager

This book is silly, alright? It's pure, unadulterated, melodramatic nonsense. And it was honestly really refreshing. Maybe it was because I read this right after I finished The Poisonwood Bible and Lives of Girls and Women and just needed a breather, but it was fun and dumb and I actually had fun trying to guess the mystery. A good palate cleanser book if you're into these sorts of things.

[samufigueiredo]

Thinking about when Paul Monette said "What all the meaningless pain and horror cannot take away - that all there is is love. Pity us not." and Richard Siken said “We have not touched the stars, nor are we forgiven, which brings us back to the hero’s shoulders and the gentleness that comes, not from the absence of violence, but despite the abundance of it.” and Ocean Vuong said "Grief is the final translation of love".

[alightinthelantern]

book reviews: No Witnesses (Paul Monette)

Although published in 1981, the poems in this book are in the style of the Imagists, like William Carlos Williams, of the mid-20th century. But these poems are so singular in voice and accomplishment that they don't feel old-fashioned, instead achieving a timeless quality that only the best poetry achieves. This book gathers together a small number of very long poems, many of them taking the form of letters from famous figures in literature to others. One is a letter from Hansel to his sister Gretel concerning her impending marriage, and another is a letter from Noel Coward to Marlene Dietrich. All command a strong voice and rich variety of imagery and world-play, providing one of the most enriching and enjoyable reads I've had in a long time. I can't recommend this book highly enough.

[radiogornjigrad]

O knjizi Paula Monette: Postati muško - polovica jednog života

Paul Monette: Postati muško – polovica jednog života, izd. Petrine knjige, Zagreb, 2022. Piše: Đurđa Knežević “Zašto nas mrze? Zašto strahuju od nas? Zašto žele da ostanemo nevidljivi?”, pitanja su koja postavlja Paul Monette na samom početku knjige Postati muško – polovica jednog života. Međutim, autor se ne bavi traženjem odgovora na tako postavljena pitanja, o tim nekima koji mrze, strahuju,…

[floralisolation]

just finished Borrowed Time: an Aids Memoir and I am losing it.

Nothing I can say justifies the power of Paul Monette’s words. He simply writes with his whole soul.

[onenakedfarmer]

PAUL MONETTE "Everything Extraneous Has Burned Away"

everything extraneous has burned away this is how burning feels in the fall of the final year not like leaves in a blue October but as if the skies were a paper lantern full of trapped moths beating their fired wings and yet I can lie on this hill just above you a foot beside where I will lie myself soon soon and for all the wrack and blubber feel still how we were warriors when the merest morning sun in the garden was a kingdom after Room 1010 war in not all death it turns out war is what little thing you hold onto refugees and far from home oh sweetie will you please forgive me this that every time I opened a box of anything Glad Bags One-A-Days KINGSIZE was the worst I’d think will you still be here when the bus is empty Rog Rog who will play boy with me now that I bucket with tears through it all when I’d cling beside you sobbing you’d shrug it off with the quietest I’m still here I have your watch in the top drawer which I don’t dare wear yet help me please the boxes grocery home day after day the junk that keeps men spotless but it doesn’t matter now how long they last or I the day has taken you with it and all there is now is burning dark the only green is up by the grave and this little thing of telling the hill I’m here oh I’m here

[remembertheplunge]

From such fragments you have to make your way when the sky goes dark

10/28/2023

“From such fragments you have to make your way when the sky goes dark.”

"Borrowed Time" An Aids Memoir p. 284 by Paul Monette (1988)

 Paul Monette and his partner Roger had Aids in the days before there was a cure. Aids pretty much meant death in a relatively short time. Paul said to  Roger about their impending deaths “We’d never really talked about what either of us wanted at the end." Roger’s response “You take care of  all that.”

Paul then wrote of Roger’s response “From such fragments you have to make your way when the sky goes dark.”

That resonates with me.

 “You have to make your way when the sky goes dark.” 

 In the two weeks (May 1-May 14 2023) between my sister Zoe’s diagnosis of pancreatic cancer and her death, we experienced several “such fragments”.  And now, 5 months after her death, I turn those fragments over and over in my mind.

When she said “I’m sorry that I have to leave you”. When she returned a painting I had done of our grand parent’s house” She said, “Take it, I’m dying.”  When,  due to her body shutting down due to the cancer, she was left with only the edges of herself, she asked me , “When will this end?” And, I said “When you let go.”

“When the sky goes dark”.

The sky has gone dark.

 And, those fragments and a few others are all I have to attempt to decipher the language and the geography of her last two weeks of life. A geography in which I was not yet welcome. Not until it is my time to die.

Last night  I felt someone touch my forearm. I was in a sleep state, but, the touch didn't seem to be dreamed , It felt actual enough that it startled me. I was in the bedroom alone. Could it have been Zoe, providing yet another fragment, another piece of the death puzzl?. The piece that says  “we go on”.

[tomwambsgans]

i'd bet that tom has always been more or less a courtier even as far back as high school. not only does he seem like the type who simply has that sort of social role come easily bc of his caretaking and ass-kissing nature but i can vividly imagine a teenaged, closeted tom finding his groove in being a sort of gay-best-friend-who-doesn't-know-he's-gay. an unaware hagfag if you will. like making himself so popular with girls, often being a favorite of entire groups of them, so as to craft a plausible image of heterosexual desirability/approval in the Sensitive Boy way. he does theatre but he's also on the lacrosse team to "balance it out" sort of thing. he's probably suspected by most to be gay if only subconsciously (he's just so "safe" yknow), but there's just enough doubt that no one says anything, least of all him. maybe one of those female friends has that whole "all the good ones are gay" dilemmas and tom is so desperate for love and repressed anyway that he "proves" her wrong and they date and it's easy bc it's more of the same of what he's been doing, so he realizes nothing for decades to come

[will80sbyers]

— Paul Monette (Becoming a Man) || insp. x

[gaypolls]

Not a poll, but some questions for you or your followers. if that's okay. :)

Do you have any LGBTQ+ songs you'd recommend?

Do you have any LGBTQ+ books you'd recommend?

Do you know any asexual couples/love stories? (could be books, tv series, movies)

Do you have any favourite LGBTQ+ artists?

so heads up, all my recs are gay man-centric, but YES i've got tons. at least with music and books.

gay musicians I like (whose lyrics are often overtly gay or at least have gay themes): The Smiths/Morrissey, The Magnetic Fields, Orville Peck, Bronski Beat, The Psychadelic Furs, Bonnie Parker, Kevin Abstract

gay authors/books: Alan Hollinghurst and Paul Monette are both novelists with pretty decent lineups that go back to the 70s. They basically both low-stakes slice-of-life period dramas surrounding gay life with a heaping dollop of casual eroticism. Those are the two authors that I always rec right off the bat but otherwise I'll just link my goodreads account bc it's easier lol

[onebluebookworm]

June 2023 Book Club Picks

Outlaw Marriages: The Hidden History of Fifteen Extraordinary Same-Sex Couples - Rodger Streitmatter: One of the most popular (and irritating) things LGBT people hear from scared reactionaries is "This is a recent trend that kids learn about on tiktok! There are no LGBT people in history." Rodger Streitmatter sets out to prove that assertion wrong by showcasing fifteen same-sex couples that were, for all intents and purposes, close enough to be considered married, from grandfather of American poetry Walt Whitman to glamorous actress Greta Garbo to social reformist Jane Addams.

The Trauma Cleaner: One Woman's Extraordinary Life in Death, Decay, and Disaster by Sarah Krasnostein: Husband, father, drag queen, sex worker, wife - Sandra Pankhurst was all of these things over the course of her life. By the time Sarah Krasnostein met her, Sandra had made a business out of handling trauma. In the filthy homes of hoarders and the lonely flats of overdose deaths, Sandra sashays in with a kind word and an understanding air to help people clean up when life becomes overwhelming. As Krasnostein explores Sandra's life leading up to the founding of her business, we learn what Sandra had to go through to become the Trauma Cleaner.

Afterlife: Steven, Sonny, and Del are "widows" - all three met in the hospital when their lovers died within a week of each other from AIDS complications. Through potluck dinners and emotional phone calls, they've tried to help each other pick up the pieces and move on, but things are quickly changing, and not entirely for the better. Del has turned to political activism to distract himself from his anger and pain. Sonny indulges in shallow hook-ups and new-age spirituality to find something to numb himself. And Steven is running himself ragged to take care of everyone but himself. When another friend falls ill, all three must make decisions that may effect the course of their entire lives and the future of their friendship.

I'm Afraid of Men by Vivek Shraya: Vivek Shraya has reason to be afraid. The world of the masculine has never been much to her but cruel and aggressive, forcing her to perform at masculinity to get out of her childhood alive. Even as an adult, that fear haunts her, forcing her to make compromises to steel herself against heartbreak, threats, and her own mental health.

Foolish Hearts by Emma Mills: Claudia didn't mean to eavesdrop on the breakup of power couple Paige and Iris. All she wanted to do was use the bathroom. But now Claudia is on the wrong side of prickly Iris's temper, and will do anything to make amends. Unfortunately for Claudia, that means being thrown into a production of A Midsummer Night's Dream against her will. But all that changes when she meets the goofiest, most charming boy she's ever known and she starts to legitimately bond with Iris.

[bassiter2]

hey so i know you purposefully seek out gay media. and i need some more of that in my life. do you have any recs?

okay so i've made 3 letterboxd lists

gay movies i'd reccommend (varies between romances, gay-themed comedies, documentaries, etc - but all are lgbt-centered)

movies with gay characters, sensibility, and/or themes (doesn't overtly focus on gay stuff, some have actual gay content and some don't, but all are fun/compelling in a gay way)

not canon gay but so homoerotic it counts (has some overlap with the list above this; i mostly only put movies on this list if the homoeroticism is practically textual and only unspoken)

as for books, I'd reccommend:

literally everything by Paul Monette (includes fiction, memoir, and poetry)

also everything by Alan Hollinghurst (fiction with gay protags and casual eroticism)

the Buddies trilogy by Ethan Mordden (autobiographical essays/vignettes)

The Lost Language of Cranes by David Leavitt (fiction)

Richie McMullen's memoirs Enchanted Youth and Enchanted Boy

Peter Darling by Austin Chant (reimagining of peter pan where wendy is trans and peter is his boysona)

Maurice by E.M. Forster (the film adaptation is also on my letterboxd list but it is INSANE to read it knowing how long ago it was written)

City of Night by John Rechy (semi-autobiographical accounts of being a gay hustler in NYC in the 60s)

for gay history specifically, Gay New York and Same-Sex Affairs: Constructing and Controlling Homosexuality in the Pacific Northwest are both very thorough, extremely interesting, and great sister-books imo.

anyway honestly i go to my local bookstores all the time and just peruse the lgbt section and for a while i was constantly coming away with so many books i had to start putting a limit on it and just keeping a long to-read list.