NEW YORK (AP) 鈥� Andrew Sean Greer, a Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist, remembers the first time he read . It was the summer of 1989, he was beginning his second year at Brown University and he had just come out.
Having learned that White would be teaching at Brown, he found a copy of White's celebrated coming-of-age novel, 鈥淎 Boy's Own Story.鈥�
鈥淚鈥檇 never read anything like it 鈥� nobody had 鈥� and what strikes me looking back is the lack of shame or self-hatred or misery that imbued so many other gay male works of fiction of that time,鈥� says Greer, whose 鈥淟ess鈥� won the Pulitzer for fiction in 2018. "I, of course, did not know then I was reading a truly important literary work. All I knew is I wanted to read more.
鈥淩eading was all we had in those days 鈥� the private, unshared experience that could help you explore your private life," he said. "Ed invented so many of us."
White, a pioneer of contemporary gay literature, died this week at age 85. He left behind such widely read works as 鈥淎 Boy鈥檚 Own Story鈥� and 鈥淭he Beautiful Room Is Empty鈥� and a gift to countless younger writers: Validation of their lives, the discovery of themselves through the stories of others.
Greer and other authors speak of White's work as more than just an influence, but as a rite of passage: "How a queer man might begin to question all of the deeply held, deeply religious, deeply American assumptions about desire, love, and sex 鈥� who is entitled to have it, how it must be had, what it looks like,鈥� says Robert Jones Jr., whose novel above love between two enslaved men, 鈥� ,鈥� was a National Book Award finalist in 2021.
Jones remembers being a teenager in the 1980s when he read 鈥滱 Boy's Own Story." He found the book at a store in a gay neighborhood in Manhattan's , 鈥渢he safest place for a person to be openly queer in New York City,鈥� he said.
鈥淚t was a scary time for me because all the news stories about queer men revolved around AIDS and dying, and how the disease was the Christian god鈥檚 vengeance against the 'sin of homosexuality,'鈥� Jones added.
鈥淚t was the first time that I had come across any literature that confirmed that queer men have a childhood; that my own desires were not, in fact, some aberration, but were natural; and that any suffering and loneliness I was experiencing wasn鈥檛 divine retribution, but was the intention of a human-made bigotry that could be, if I had the courage and the community, confronted and perhaps defeated," he said.
Starting in the 1970s, White published more than 25 books, including novels, memoirs, plays, biographies and 鈥淭he Joy of Gay Sex,鈥� a response to the 1970s bestseller 鈥淭he Joy of Sex." He held the rare stature for a living author of having a prize named for him, the Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction, as presented by the Publishing Triangle.
鈥淲hite was very supportive of young writers, encouraging them to explore and expand new and individual visions,鈥� said Carol Rosenfeld, chair of the Triangle. The award was 鈥渙ne way of honoring that support.鈥�
Winners such the prize was founded, in 2006, have included 鈥淭he Prophets,鈥� 's 鈥淒ahlia Season鈥� and Joe Okonkwo's 鈥淛azz Moon.鈥� Earlier this year, the award was given to Jiaming Tang's 鈥� ,鈥� a story of gay men in rural China.
Tang remembered reading 鈥淎 Boy's Own Story鈥� in his early 20s, and said that both the book and White were 鈥渆ssential touchpoints in my gay coming-of-age.鈥�
鈥淗e writes with intimate specificity and humor, and no other writer has captured the electric excitement and crushing loneliness that gay men experience as they come of age,鈥� Tang said. "He鈥檚 a towering figure. There鈥檇 be no gay literature in America without Edmund White.鈥�
Hillel Italie, The Associated Press
