"Over the past fifty years, the line between what is "straight" and what is "gay" has blurred to the point where most heterosexuals are unaware of the vast contribution gay men have made to American culture. The "queering" of America has gradually been shaping the way straight people talk, think, dress, and eat.
How the Homosexuals Saved Civilization presents a broad yet incisive look at how an unusual "immigrant" group, homosexual men, has influenced mainstream American society, and has, in many ways, become mainstream itself. From the way camp, irony, and the gay aesthetic have become part and parcel of our national sensibility to the undeniable effect gay cognoscenti have had on film, literatue, music, and television, Cathy Crimmins examines how gay men have irrevocably changed the concepts of community, family, sex, fashion, entertainment, and beauty.
A shrewd and irreverent cultural history of the customs, fashions, and figures of gay life in the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, How the Homosexuals Saved Civilization celebrates the unique perspective of gay men and explains how essential their vitality has been to our civilization- and tells us something about ourselves as a society."

RELEASE NOTES:

Mailed to LeishaCamden in Norway for the mass release at the Oslo Gay & Lesbian Film Festival in June

This arrived in the mail today and was picked up by LeishaCamden, in a box along with twelve (!!) other books. Thank you so much, pzarks!! A fantastic donation for our project which we appreciate tremendously. It'll be so much fun to see what the future holds for this book! :-)

It probably holds at least one reader here in Oslo ... LeishaCamden is quite intrigued by this book and doesn't think she'll have many other chances to come across a copy. Fortunately the release isn't until June, so hopefully LC'll have time to read it before then. :-)

Thank you, pzarks!!

LeishaCamden's taken the liberty of reading this book while it's in her possession. :-) April 27th through May 1st.

This was an interesting book, but maybe should not have been read as quickly as I read it. It may do better in smaller doses. I liked many of the anecdotes and little historical tidbits - though some weren't that interesting as they dealt with things that I'm only familiar with theoretically, eg TV shows that have only been on in the US and not here. But some things are universal ... :-)

But what appealed to me much less was the ... basically the tone, is that what it is? No, not really. Maybe what I mean is the underlying assumption that permeates the book. It seems kind of extreme to me. But maybe it's true and I just don't know any better? Maybe this really is the gay experience, and I as a straight person just don't ... see it? But it seems really sad, if that's the word I want, if this is what it's like - that we, the straight majority, 'hate' the gay minority so much that they have to construct this whole second culture to live in to get away from that. I hope it's an American thing, I hope things aren't that extreme here. Aren't gay people mainly just normal boring everyday people with normal boring everyday lives just like the rest of us? I mean, what is a 'gay restaurant' - how is a restaurant gay?? (I understand how, actually. It just sounds so stupid. :-)

Is there really such a deep divide?

I also got kind of tired of the constant emphasis - overemphasis, I'd say - on how everything is gay, gay, gay. Is it really true that if a person is gay then EVERYTHING that person touches is by extension gay too? That person can do NOTHING that isn't completely informed by that one fact? Is homosexuality really that overwhelmingly important to someone that it overshadows everything else to that extent? That if a person was straight instead of gay they would be a totally different person than who they are?

This seems to me to be what the author is saying and if so, goes rather powerfully against the argument that is often heard - at least round these parts - that a person's sexual orientation is just a tiny little piece of them and shouldn't determine the treatment of the individual. I agree with that, totally. But Crimmins seems to be saying the exact opposite, than one's sexual orientation is everything and determines everything.

Then again, maybe the book is intended much more jokingly than I think and I just OD'd on it. :-)

I would love to hear a gay reader's take on this; on both the book and on my thoughts about it. Here's hoping the book manages to find such a reader in June! :-)

Back to the shelf in LC's basement ... :-)

RELEASE NOTES:

The book will be released somewhere in the lobby of the Cinematheque, or in the café.