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berto:
"A fresh, clever coming-of-age tale"


--- Quote ---Reviewed By Rebecca Swain
Special to the Sentinel

It's a scene worthy of The O.C.: Boy meets girl. Boy gets drunk and sleeps with girl. Boy has serious regrets in the morning. Oh, and by the way: Boy is gay.

Nico Medina mixes up the high-school drama in his debut novel, The Straight Road to Kylie. It is Jonathan Parish's senior year, and he's proud to finally be out of the closet. But a tequila-fueled lapse in judgment during his friend's birthday party gives rise to the rumor that he's straight and on the market. Uh, hello. That's news to Jonathan -- though it certainly explains why every girl in his Winter Park high school is suddenly trying to snag his attention.

Things get really complicated when popular rich girl Laura makes him an offer he can't refuse: Be her hottie boyfriend for a while, and she will take him to gay icon Kylie Minogue's London concert.

What is a boy to do? Jonathan and his group of best girlfriends don't particularly like witchy Laura's demands, but if it means he gets to meet the fabtastic Kylie Minogue in person, then maybe certain sacrifices must be made. Then Jonathan meets a cute guy from a nearby school, and suddenly staying in the closet is the last thing Jonathan wants to do -- but how else can he see Kylie?
--- End quote ---

berto:
Sean Horlor, unconventional queer poet


--- Quote ---When asked what he believes poets are supposed to look like, Horlor concedes that Vancouver's West Coast sensibilities have probably influenced people's perceptions, so that when they see a poet without a black turtleneck and thick black glasses, not to mention bongos or empty liquor bottles, they get confused.

He goes on to describe how he often gets mistaken as straight and that when people find out that he's gay, let alone a gay poet, it sometimes takes them a few moments to process the information.

[...]

That this gay poet also used to work for Premier Gordon Campbell as a speech writer; or that he used to work at Butchart Gardens and can name all the flowers and plants as he walks down a street; or that he runs half-marathons; or that after partying all night he'd hang out in his tight t-shirt with 80-year-old nuns in Victoria to talk about the lives of Saints—"I came for books, but stayed for the sister-to-sister chats," he says; or the fact that much of this interview took place around the ping-pong table in Horlor's living room can only complicate people's perceptions. (For the record, Horlor is a much better writer than ping-pong player.)

"I think there's sort of a definite expectation for gays to be smarter, be cleverer, be wittier, to be more things to more people," he says. "Most of the time I feel like an actor. How much can I get away with?"

[...]

"There's a gay poet and a poet who is gay," says Horlor. "They don't necessarily have to be exclusive, but there are those two terms. I had to mature personally in order to feel comfortable to write gay themes and realize that I belong to a long gay tradition. I'm proud of the fact that I can walk down the street holding hands with my boyfriend and it's because of the hard work of those people 10, 20, 50 years ago. To pretend not to be a gay writer is a slap in the face of those people."

On his inclusion in the groundbreaking anthology of Canadian gay male poets, Horlor reflects on his years of feeling isolated in the writing department at the University of Victoria, where he was the only male poet, let alone gay one. "I would have loved to have had access to such a book and all its poets. Sometimes I felt like such a unicorn. I hope my work, along with the other contributors, inspires a new generation of poets."
--- End quote ---

berto:
'Taboo' story takes African prize


--- Quote ---The Ugandan writer who won the Caine Prize for African Writing with a story about lesbianism, often a taboo topic in Africa, says she is "very excited".
Monica Arac de Nyeko beat four other finalists to get the $20,000 (£10,000) prize for her story Jambula Tree. It is about a relationship between young girls in a country where homosexuality is illegal.

"I'm not a lesbian but I do think it's a difficult subject, like... writing about Uganda's history," she said.

The Caine Prize, announced in Oxford on Monday night, is considered a major award in African creative writing. Jambula Tree was described as "witty and mischievous" by the judges.

Her publisher Becky Ayebia Clarke said when she first read the story she thought "how brave" Ms Arac de Nyeko was to take on the subject. "In Africa these are not the kind of stories we're allowed to tell. She's taking on a theme that Africans have been in denial about - a theme about same-sex love."

"The Jambula Tree is about the relationship between two young girls in a very complex social setting in a community which does not look kindly at that relationship," Ms Arac de Nyeko told the BBC's Network Africa programme. "It's a combination of struggle and the power to dream and love," she said.

"There are a lot of difficult things that I think we need to talk about and not build walls of huge emotion so that they're almost impassable."
--- End quote ---

berto:
"Desert Hearts" author to receive Order of Canada


--- Quote ---Jane Rule, 76, a writer of lesbian-themed novels, is to be appointed to the Order of Canada, the country's highest civilian honour, in recognition of her lifetime contribution to literature.

Ms Rule has won many awards over the years as a writer, educator, gay rights activist, including the Order of British Colombia 2004.

[...]

In 1964 her first novel Desert of the Heart, a lesbian love story, was published and Ms Rule was publicly outed.  It was made into an award-winning film, Desert Hearts, starring Helen Shaver, in 1985.

In recent years, Ms Rule has opposed gay marriage on the basis that it 'mainstreams' gay and lesbian relationships. "To be forced back into the heterosexual cage of coupledom is not a step forward but a step back into state-imposed definitions of relationships," she told the paper.
--- End quote ---

berto:
Gay poem still contrary to 'law of the land'


--- Quote ---Today marks the 30th anniversary of the day when Denis Lemon was found guilty of committing libel against Christianity. He was the editor of the now defunct but iconic UK newspaper Gay News.

Mary Whitehouse, founder of the National Viewers and Listeners Association, (NVLA) announced her intention to sue in December 1976 after she read the poem entitled The Love Which Cannot Speak Its Name by James Kirkup, published in Gay News.

Denis Lemon was sentenced to nine months suspended imprisonment and fined £500. Publisher Gay News Limited was fined £1,000.

They were represented by creator of Rumpole of the Bailey and defence counsel at the Oz "conspiracy" trial in 1971 John Mortimer QC at the Old Bailey.

An appeal against the conviction was rejected by the House of Lords.

It still 'illegal' to publish the poem in the UK. However, it was published again in two socialist newspapers few days after the original trial the offending poem as a protest against censorship
--- End quote ---

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