Christopher Bram

In the years following World War II a group of gay writers established themselves as major cultural figures in American life. Truman Capote, the enfant terrible, whose finely wrought fiction and nonfiction captured the nation's imagination. Gore Vidal, the wry, withering chronicler of politics, sex, and history. Tennessee Williams, whose powerful plays rocketed him to the top of the American theater. James Baldwin, the harrowingly perceptive novelist and social critic. Christopher Isherwood, the English novelist who became a thoroughly American novelist. And the exuberant Allen Ginsberg, whose poetry defied censorship and exploded minds. Together, their writing introduced America to gay experience and sensibility, and changed our literary culture. But the change was only beginning. A new generation of gay writers followed, taking more risks and writing about their sexuality more openly. Edward Albee brought his prickly iconoclasm to the American theater. Edmund White laid bare his own life in stylized, autobiographical works. Armistead Maupin wove a rich tapestry of the counterculture, queer and straight. Mart Crowley brought gay men's lives out of the closet and onto the stage. And Tony Kushner took them beyond the stage, to the center of American ideas. With authority and humor, Christopher Bram weaves these men's ambitions, affairs, feuds, loves, and appetites into a single sweeping narrative. Chronicling over fifty years of momentous change-from civil rights to Stonewall to AIDS and beyond-EMINENT OUTLAWS is an inspiring, illuminating tale: one that reveals how the lives of these men are crucial to understanding the social and cultural history of the American twentieth century.

The Gay Writers Who Changed America

Eminent Outlaws

“Nazi intrigue in a homosexual brothel . . . a spy thriller that breaks new ground.”—Kirkus Reviews Hank Fayette, Seaman Second Class, had enlisted in his Texas hometown, used his shore leave to visit a movie house on 42nd Street, and ended up in a gay brothel near Manhattan’s West piers. It was the wrong place to be at the wrong time. When this big, lanky blond with a country boy’s drawl—and a country boy’s hard muscular body—couldn’t fight his way clear of the Shore Patrol who raided the place, he figured he was on his way to the brig or a dishonorable discharge. But in 1942, a few months after Pearl Harbor, the Navy was more interested in capturing spies than in punishing “sex offenders,” and Hank was just the kind of sailor they had in mind. Their offer to Hank was simple: go back to the brothel, work undercover as a prostitute, and risk your life to entrap Nazi spies. This erotic, suspenseful novel captures the big-band feel of New York City in the forties, the intensity of a nation at war, and the passion of men for their country—and for each other. “Entertaining, sexy, and touching . . .”—Stephen McCauley “Strong, action-filled . . . a tightly knit plot . . . a very engaging story about murder and intrigue that is hard to put down.”—Lambda Rising Book Report

A Novel

Hold Tight

The last days of James Whale, the acclaimed director of such horror movies as Frankenstein. In ill health, his mind projecting never-ending rushes from his life, he directs his own death at the hands of his homosexual gardener. By the author of In Memory of Angel Clare.

Father of Frankenstein

Previously titled Father of Frankenstein, this acclaimed novel was the basis for the 1998 film starring Sir Ian McKellen, Lynn Redgrave, and Brendan Fraser. It journeys back to 1957 Los Angeles, where James Whale, the once-famous director of such classics as Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein, is living in retirement, haunted by his past. Rescuing him from his too-vivid imagination is his gardener, a handsome ex-marine. The friendship between these two very different men is sometimes tentative, sometimes touching, often dangerous—and always captivating. This P.S. edition features an extra 16 pages of insights into the book, including author interviews, recommended reading, and more.

Gods and Monsters

Jim Goodall joins the foreign service during the 1950s and is sent to the Phillipines, where he observes the United States' treacherous dealings with the Marcos regime, dealings that shake his belief in his government and himself

Almost History

A group of worldly New Yorkers inherit a friend’s last lover A year after the AIDS-related death of filmmaker Clarence Laird, known to friends as Angel Clare, his young boyfriend, Michael, is still in deep mourning. Clarence’s older, sophisticated friends—male and female, gay and straight—find themselves the custodians of Michael, a callow kid they never liked much to begin with. What follows is a dark, intimate comedy about real grief and false grief, misunderstanding, friendship, love, and forgiveness.

In Memory of Angel Clare

Zack Knowles, a psychologist, and Daniel Wexler, an art teacher at a college in Virginia, have been together for twenty-one years. In the fall of 2002, a few months before the Iraq War, a new artist in residence, Abbas Rohani, arrives with his Russian wife, Elena, and their two children. But Abbas is not quite what he seems, and he begins an affair with Daniel. Soon politics intrude upon two families thrown together by love, threatening the future of both in ways no one could have predicted. A novel that explores how the personal becomes political, Exiles in America offers an intimate look at the meaning of marriage, gay and straight.

Exiles in America

One has to look no further than the audiences hungry for the narratives served up by Downton Abbey or Wolf Hall to know that the lure of the past is as seductive as ever. But incorporating historical events and figures into a shapely narrative is no simple task. The acclaimed novelist Christopher Bram examines how writers as disparate as Gabriel García Márquez, David McCullough, Toni Morrison, Leo Tolstoy, and many others have employed history in their work. Unique among the "Art Of" series, The Art of History engages with both fiction and narrative nonfiction to reveal varied strategies of incorporating and dramatizing historical detail. Bram challenges popular notions about historical narratives as he examines both successful and flawed passages to illustrate how authors from different genres treat subjects that loom large in American history, such as slavery and the Civil War. And he delves deep into the reasons why War and Peace endures as a classic of historical fiction. Bram's keen insight and close reading of a wide array of authors make The Art of History an essential volume for any lover of historical narrative.

Unlocking the Past in Fiction and Nonfiction

The Art of History

Having shared a partnership with psychiatrist Zack for more than twenty years, college art instructor Daniel begins an affair with a married Iranian painter, a situation that turns explosive when the painter's brother, a high-ranking member of the Iranian government, arrives for a visit with the FBI in tow. By the author of Gods and Monsters. 20,000 first printing.

« La révolution gay fut d’abord et avant tout une révolution littéraire. » Au lendemain de la Seconde Guerre mondiale, une nouvelle génération d’écrivains américains s’est imposée. Leurs noms ? Truman Capote, Gore Vidal, Tennessee Williams, James Baldwin, Allen Ginsberg ou encore, plus près de nous, Christopher Isherwood, Edmund White, Tony Kushner, Armistead Maupin. Point commun de tous ces écrivains, outre l’insolence de leur talent ? Leur homosexualité – cachée pour les uns, revendiquée pour les autres, envers et contre toutes les discriminations. Du mouvement des droits civiques à l’apparition du sida, loin des cortèges de manifestants et sans jamais avoir fait école ni sacrifié à l’esprit de chapelle, c’est par leurs œuvres que ces « anges batailleurs » ont brisé les préjugés et ouvert la voie à une modernité littéraire, politique et sociale aujourd’hui encore bousculée. Dans cet essai émaillé d’anecdotes et de portraits passionnants, Christopher Bram nous invite à découvrir ou à relire quelques-uns des plus grands auteurs américains sous un jour inédit. Preuve que la littérature est toujours à l’avant-garde.

Les écrivains gays en Amérique, de Tennessee Williams à Armistead Maupin

Anges batailleurs

Christopher Bram tells the story of Augustus Fitzwilliam Boyd, alias Dr. August, a clairvoyant pianist who communes with ghosts, and who finds meaning in his life through a strange love triangle with a righteous ex-slave and nervous white governess. Spanning the years between the Civil War and the early 1920's, this riveting and ambitious historical novel displays the immense talents of a prodigious, highly esteemed author working at the height of his powers.

Christopher Bram

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