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Before the 1969 Stonewall Riots, LGBTQ life was dominated by the negative image of "the closet"--the metaphorical space where that which was deemed "queer" was hidden from a hostile public view. Literary studies of queer themes and characters in crime fiction have tended to focus on the more positive and explicit representations since the riots, while pre-Stonewall works are thought to reference queer only negatively or obliquely. This collection of new essays questions that view with an investigation of queer aspects in crime fiction published over eight decades, from the corseted Victorian era to the unbuttoned 1960s.
This intriguing, authoritative book tracks stage representations of lesbians and gay men from Oscar Wilde to the present day and examines scores of British and American plays and playwrights, including works by Wilde, Maugham, Coward, Hellman, O'Neill, Le Roi Jones, and Joe Orton.
Explores how the characters in Oscar Wilde's plays, though not specifically gay, epitomize today's image of the effeminate male, how they relate to British theatrical fops and other characters since early modern times, how the representation of same-sex passion was altered by Wilde's expose and trial as a homosexual, and how the stereotype of the gay man became established in the 20th century. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
What did families hide in the past and why? By delving into the familial dynamics of shame and guilt, Family Secrets investigates the part that families, so often regarded as the agents of repression, have played in the transformation of social mores from the Victorian era to the present day.
This biography re-creates Nichols's lively role in the English social milieu between and after the wars. Nichols consorted with the best and brightest (or the most written and talked about, anyway) for more than 40 years. He spent time with the Greek royal family, interviewed President Coolidge, and maintained friendships with Cecil Beaton, Noel Coward, and Somerset Maugham. Somehow he found time not only to create and care for gardens but also to write about them, and putting the man in the setting helps to understand and further appreciate his garden writings.
"Cyril's story is Matt Houlbrook's point of entry into the queer worlds of early twentieth-century London. Drawing on previously unknown sources, from police reports and newspaper exposes to personal letters, diaries, and the first queer guidebook ever written, Houlbrook here explores the relationship between queer sexualities and modern urban culture that we take for granted today. He revisits the diverse queer lives that took hold in London's parks and streets; its restaurants, pubs, and dancehalls; and its Turkish bathhouses and hotels - as well as attempts by municipal authorities to crack down on those worlds."--Jacket.
Sexual blackmail first reached public notice in the late eighteenth century when laws against sodomy were exploited by the unscrupulous to extort money from those they could entrap. Angus McLaren chronicles this parasitic crime, tracing its expansion in England and the United States through the Victorian era and into the first half of the twentieth century. The labeling of certain sexual acts as disreputable, if not actually criminal--abortion, infidelity, prostitution, and homosexuality--armed would-be blackmailers and led to a crescendo of court cases and public scandals in the 1920s and 1930s. As the importance of sexual respectability was inflated, so too was the spectacle of its loss. C...
A concise history of the drag tradition—from 13th century to today Men have been dressing as women on stage for hundreds of years, dating back to the thirteenth century when the Church forbade the appearance of female actors but condoned that of men and boys disguised as the opposite sex. Forms of transvestism can be traced back to the dawn of theatre and are found in all corners of the world, notably in China and Japan. In recent years, of course, drag has witnessed a dramatic and widespread revival. Newsday recently observed, People are talking about all those fabulous heterosexual film idols who now can't seem to wait to get tarted up in drag and do their screen bits as fishnet queens. ...
The definitive biography of one of the twentieth century’s most celebrated and controversial dramatists. To several generations, actor, playwright, songwriter, and filmmaker Noël Coward (1899-1973) was the very personification of wit, glamour, and elegance. Given unprecedented access to the private papers and correspondence of Coward family members, compatriots, and numerous lovers, Samuel Johnson Prize-winning biographer Philip Hoare has produced an illuminating and sophisticated biography of Coward, whose relentless drive for success and approval fueled the stunning bursts of creativity that launched the once-painfully middle class boy from the suburbs of London into a pantheon of theat...
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