by EdmundWhite (Author)
No one has been more frank, lucid, rueful and entertaining about growing up gay in Middle America than Edmund White. Best known for his autobiographical novels, starting with "A Boy's Own Story", here in his memoir White takes the fiction out of his story and delivers the facts in all their shocking and absorbing verity. From an adolescence in the 1950s, an era which tried to 'cure' homosexuality, but found him 'unsalvageable', he emerged into a 1960s society which re-designated his orientation as 'acceptable (nearly)'. He describes a life touched by psychotherapy in every decade, starting with his flamboyant and demanding therapist mother, who considered him her own personal test case - not to mention her escort to cocktail lounges after her divorce. His father thought that even wearing a wristwatch was effeminate, though custodial visits to Dad in Cincinnati inadvertently initiated White into the culture of 'hustlers and johns' that changed his life. White introduces us to his lovers and predilections - past and present, and on the way gives his striking and eloquent opinions on art, life and other artists. "My Lives" is a spectacular treat: by turns moving and hilarious, outrageous and enlightening.
Format: Hardcover
Pages: 368
Edition: First Edition
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Published: 05 Sep 2005
ISBN 10: 0747575223
ISBN 13: 9780747575221
Book Overview: A brilliantly shocking, irreverent, enlightening and entertaining autobiography by one of the greatest chroniclers of gay life Major publicity tour and author promotion National press serialisation under negotiation