[ilds] Mention of the Alexandria Quartet in an Interesting and Controversial New Book

Sat May 31 15:36:01 PDT 2014

Well argued, my friend! But don't people tend to gravitate to their own kind? I don't recall there being a great number of homosexuals in LD's inner circle. In fact most were quite straight and anything but asexual. Contrast this with the highly closeted Jack Kerouac, almost all of whose inner circle were gay, despite his life long cultivation of a solid heterosexual public image. 

I'm curious what others, who knew LD, have to say? MacNiven, for example?  What about Haag, having known Eve Cohen so well? 

Finally, LD got involved with some beautiful, sexy women, and had as friends others. If he was gay, he certainly had a great heterosexual picker! 

Finally, trying to decide if LD was gay based only on highly tenuous circumstantial evidence will be as difficult as the attempt to determine if TE Lawrence was gay or just a severely repressed asexual personality. Good luck!

Billy

WILLIAM APT
Attorney at Law
812 San Antonio St, Ste 401
Austin TX 78701
512/708-8300
512/708-8011 FAX

> On May 31, 2014, at 2:10 PM, Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net> wrote:
> 
> Billy, thanks for the response.  Any evidence for Durrell's repressed homosexuality?  No, certainly none that would satisfy a court of law.  But to be argumentative, MacNiven bases his biography in part on what Durrell told him, and would you expect Lawrence Durrell to admit homosexual tendencies, especially given the opprobrium attached to such a confession?  (By the way, I don't mean to disparage MacNiven's tremendous work — I have the greatest respect for what he accomplished.)  My evidence is circumstantial and largely based on Durrell's writings and the prominence of homosexuality as a topic of treatment.  As D. H. Lawrence says, "Never trust the artist.  Trust the tale."  I'm much in line with what Boone writes.  Here, of course, the big objection is what literary critics are fond of making — namely, don't confuse the author with his or her writings!  There's some validity to this, but I don't always buy the objection and attribute it to the prejudices of New Criticism, whose ideas still linger and influence.  So, I'm saying, as Boone seems to suggest, let's look at Durrell's writings and his obsessions and see where all that leads us.  Finally, remember the lesson of Thomas Mann, author of Death in Venice.  For a long time, Mann's treatment of homosexuality was analyzed as a literary trope (much as Durrell's is).  After all, Mann was an upright German, married with a large family, and no inkling of homosexuality.  But as Anthony Heilbut shows in his biography, Thomas Mann:  Eros and Literature (1996), Mann had repressed homosexual tendencies.  Death in Venice and Gustav von Aschenbach's infatuation with the boy Tadzio is based on Mann's own personal experience.  I see something similar going on with Durrell.
> 
> Bruce
> 
> 
> 
>> On May 31, 2014, at 11:26 AM, William Apt <billyapt at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> Bruce: 
>> 
>> I seem to recall that, according to MacNiven's bio, when LD was confronted with the opportunity for homoerotic encounters while in prep school in England, he realized he was unstimulated by boys. That is typically the hallmark of a heterosexual mindset. Do you have any evidence other than LD's occasional bad behavior toward women that might otherwise support your theory? 
>> 
>> Billy
>> 
>> WILLIAM APT
>> Attorney at Law
>> 812 San Antonio St, Ste 401
>> Austin TX 78701
>> 512/708-8300
>> 512/708-8011 FAX
>> 
>>> On May 31, 2014, at 10:40 AM, Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Merrianne,
>>> 
>>> Thanks.  Some years ago Boone wrote a provocative article on homosexuality in the Quartet.  It begins by discussing Durrell's reference to Tropic of Cancer as a "man-size piece of work" in his famous introductory letter to Miller.  Boone took this as an example of Durrell's repressed homosexuality, if I recall correctly.  That is roughly equivalent to "you've shown me yours, now I'll show you mine."  Years ago I pursued this line of argument on the ILDS List and was roundly scoffed at.  "Durrell is gay!  Nonsense!"  Personally I think he was a repressed homosexual, which might account for some of his strange and violent behavior.  The guy was pretty screwed up.  Perhaps we can resume this discussion.
>>> 
>>> Bruce
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Sent from my iPhone
>>> 
>>>> On May 31, 2014, at 6:31 AM, "Merrianne" <timlot at comcast.net> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> Before attending the OMG conference in Vancouver, I purchased a recently published book – The Homoerotics of Orientalism by Joseph Allen Boone, published by Columbia University Press. The book is generating some controversy. Having spent many years researching 19th century orientalist art, I am finding this book very interesting, but not your usual summer read. It weaves together many diverse threads – art, literature, gender, sexuality, colonialism, mass marketing, etc., and introduces some unique analysis. Illustrations range from traditional Ingres nudes to Norman Mailer as a pharaoh on the cover of New York magazine.
>>>>  
>>>> Included in the chapter “Epic Ambitions and Epicurean Appetites” is a subchapter titled “The Return of the Repressed in Durrell’s Alexandria Quartet” that focuses on the depiction of Darley. Footnote 70 for this chapter cites James Gifford’s “The Frontiers of Love: Sexual and Territorial Ambiguity in Lawrence Durrell’s Monsieur.”
>>>>  
>>>> Bottom line – this is a book that some of you might want to peruse. For me, it provides new insight into the many “textbook” images of orientalism I have enjoyed over the years, and introduces me to many “new” contemporary photographs, paintings, and ideas.
>>>>  
>>>> Best,
>>>> Merrianne Timko
>>>>  
>>>>  
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