Queer Representations: Reading Lives, Reading Cultures (A Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies Book) (Gay and Lesbian Studies) - Tapa blanda

Queer Representations celebrates the eclectic, diverse nature of gay and lesbian culture and its production.

The volume begins by asking how we can interpret an image--is the image homosexual and if so, how can we understand it? Closely connected to its interpretation is how we visualize homosexuality, or, in Allen Ellenzweig's term, how we picture the homoerotic, the organizing principle of a section devoted to American cinema and performance in general. The crucial role of biography and autobiography is the central preoccupation of the next section, with essays on Radclyffe Hall, Langston Hughes, and Louisa May Alcott.

Featuring many of the most respected figures in queer studies and contemporary queer literature, among them Dorothy Allison, Edmund White, Barbara Smith, Essex Hemphill, Michael Cunningham, Allen Ginsberg, Samuel R. Delany, Dale Peck, Jewelle Gomez, Joan Nestle, a final section explores the creation of queer literature, birthpangs, growing pains, and achievements.

By emphasizing the interconnectedness of gay and lesbian lives and the literature which has been instrumental in defining, reconstructing, and representing these lives, this anthology serves as a diverse introduction to queer culture and literature.

Martin Duberman, Distinguished Professor of History at Lehman and the Graduate School of the City University of New York, is the founding director of the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies. He is the author of seventeen books, including Black Mountain, Paul Robeson, In White America, Cures, Stonewall, Midlife Queer and Queer Representations. As both historian and playwright, he has received numerous awards, including the Bancroft Prize, two Lambda awards, the George Freedly Memorial Award, and a Special Citation from the National Academy of Arts and letters for his “contributions to literature.”