Gay Fiction Speaks

A collection of in-depth analytical interviews with twelve of the best-known gay novelists writing in English today, including Armistead Maupin, David Leavitt, Alan Garganus, and others.

Today's most celebrated, prominent, and promising authors of gay fiction in English explore the literary influences and themes of their work in these revealing interviews with Richard Canning. Though the interviews touch upon a wide range of issues—including gay culture, AIDS, politics, art, and activism—what truly distinguishes them is the extent to which Canning encourages the authors to reflect on their writing practices, published work, literary forebears, and their writing peers—gay and straight.

• Edmund White talks about narrative style and the story behind the cover of A Boy's Own Story.

• Armistead Maupin discusses his method of writing and how his work has adapted to television.

• Dennis Cooper thinks about L.A., AIDS, Try, and pop music.

• Alan Hollinghurst considers structure and point of view in The Folding Star, and why The Swimming-Pool Library is exactly 366 pages long.

• David Leavitt muses on the identity of the gay reader—and the extent to which that readership defined a tradition.

• Andrew Holleran wonders how he might have made The Beauty of Men "more forlorn, romantic, lost" by writing in the first person.

Richard Canning is lecturer in English and American literature at Sheffield University. He has written for The Guardian, The New Statesman, The Independent, and Attitude.

The pleasure of the interviews comes from Canning's ability to prompt quirky and ingenious responses from his subjects... as a whole, the book illustrates how these serious artists negotiate the cultural minefields of literary and identity politics in a marketplace that both values and devalues them as 'gay.'

Culled from incisive interviews, Canning strives for in-depth dialogues with scintillating results. He's captured the genius and energy of our finest generation of gay writers and its impact on today's reader. Brimming with vitality, attitude, individuality and innovation, this anthology of interviews uncovers the stories behind your favorite creative players.

Martin Wilson:
Delightful and illuminating interviews... I closed this book feeling wiser and more informed about gay literature and the craft of writing in general.

A meaty compendium of worthwhile thoughts and ideas to mull over. The interviewer and the authors have collaborated to bring forth a wealth of colorful authorial confessions, personal and historical anecdotes, prescriptions for a host of the world's ills, and takes on the intersections of life and fiction.