Edmund White
Edmund White
Edmund Valentine White IIIis an American novelist, memoirist, and an essayist on literary and social topics. Much of his writing is on the theme of same-sex love. Probably his best-known books are The Joy of Gay Sexand his trio of autobiographic novels, A Boy's Own Story, The Beautiful Room Is Emptyand The Farewell Symphony...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth13 January 1940
CountryUnited States of America
characters fables writers
Some writers are so enthralled by ideas (one thinks of Doris Lessing) that their characters become debaters, and their fables approach allegory.
When I was in college, I was always saying I was a socialist.
fix lover trying
When my lover Hubert Sorin was dying of AIDS, he was always trying to fix me up - posthumously, as it were - with the cute busboy at the hotel.
believe convinced explain falls keeps love obstinacy pure scarcely silly
When a woman falls in love with me, I feel guilty. I am convinced that it's pure obstinacy that keeps me from reciprocating her passion. As I explain to her that I'm gay, it sounds, even to me, like a silly excuse; I scarcely believe it myself.
accept america case convincing equality fair families leaders mainstream marriage spirit straight
Why did mainstream America come to accept marriage equality? Gay leaders had made a convincing case that gay families were like straight families and should have the same rights. The American spirit of fair play had been invoked.
novel novelist straight
A straight writer can write a gay novel and not worry about it, and a gay novelist can write about straight people.
esteem good work written
Fiction is the thing I esteem most in my own work; I feel that, even if it's no good, only I could have written those books.
basically clothes drag historical maybe modern novelists people putting sort taking
There are a lot of historical novelists who do the research about the clothes and maybe even the eating utensils, but they're basically taking modern people and putting them in old drag - it's sort of the 'Gone With the Wind' approach.
behalf campaign marriage married
I don't have to get married myself in order to campaign on behalf of gay marriage.
novels published six until written
I didn't get anything published until I was thirty-three, and yet I'd written five novels and six or seven plays. The plays, I should point out, were dreadful.
tend worse writers
Most writers tend to get worse rather than better. I'm determined to be one that gets better.
benefits bigger closet side staying
One of the side benefits of staying in the closet is you can have a much bigger career.
endure episodic form hundred length novel rigorous town
'One Hundred Years of Solitude' is a masterpiece because it is an episodic novel that has a rigorous form - an unprecedented combination. From the very beginning we know the town of Macondo will endure only a century, so there is a limit to the length of the narrative.
absurd bookstore french jewish nobody people though
Nobody in France would ever say 'He's a Jewish novelist' or 'She's a black novelist,' even though people do write about those subjects. It would look absurd to a French person to go into a bookstore and see a 'Gay Studies' section.