Another Queer Jewish Buddhist

Genre Transgression: Between Yü and me, how many queer Buddhist reincarnation revenge mystery historical romance stories can there be?

It’s no secret to (the admittedly few) regular readers of this blog that I have interests in gay fiction, Asia in general and Japan in particular, as well as Buddhism and mysticism.  Earlier this year I was surprised to discover there is, like yayoi, a whole subgenre of gay fiction that could be described as Queer Supernatural Asian Mystery Erotic Historical Romance Novels. I came across these books through Librarything.com — a kind of social network for book lovers that matches similar book collections by members and then makes recommendations based on these shared affinities — and started reading some of them.

Shortly after I’d finished reading a couple of Sedonia Guillone’s “Beautiful Samurai” novels in this subgenre I received an email from Joy Shayne Laughter, the author of a book that fits most of the categories in this subgenre — but let me be clear immediately that her book, Yü: A Ross Lamos Mystery,” does not tick off the “erotic” check box in this subgenre. Yü is more of an intellectual and spiritual effort (this is not to suggest it’s not fun — the many pleasures of this book will keep your hands above the table and turning pages relentlessly).

The appearance of Yü in my mailbox got me to thinking about the history of this subgenre. After all, in 2006 I had a short story, called Musuko Dojoji, published in an anthology of gay fantasy fiction called Charmed Lives: Gay Spirit in Storytelling. Musuko Dojoji was a retelling of a thousand year old Japanese folktale (Musume Dojoji) framed by a contemporary gay love story. The folktale is connected to the contemporary story by a reincarnation motif. I wrote this story out of love for my late boyfriend, Hiroshi Aoki, as a way of keeping his memory alive through our shared love of folktales and mysticism. It was one way of honoring our connection — a connection I always felt was something that went beyond my limited understanding of reality.

As I thought about reincarnation as a plot device in queer love stories, I realized this motif is hardly new. One of the things Hiroshi and I shared was a love of kabuki — and we were both great fans of the classic kabuki play, Sakura Hime Azuma Bunshô: The Scarlet Princess of Edo.

This play’s prologue is the story of two lovers fleeing an angry mob of monks. Indeed, the two who are running away are the monk Seigen, and his young chigo ( temple acolyte), Shiragiku.

The chorus sings of same-sex love as they climb the cliff at Enoshima, a site famous for love suicides named Chigo ga Fuchi (Chigo Falls) in memory of this particularly notorious plunge:

Not only woman can be in this mortal world
closet companion to man, his dearest lover.

Seigen and the boy pledge to die together rather than be kept apart by the world  —supposedly not because this is a same-sex or intergenerational relationship but because Seigen is a monk and thus has broken his vows of celibacy. Of course, the audience knew that these relationships were nothing out of the ordinary.

Before jumping, Shiragiku prayed for a rebirth as a woman so he could marry Seigen. And then he threw himself to the rocks below. You can see the two in the moment before Shiragiku jumped in the photo below — the boy is the young Tamasaburo Bando in his very first role on the kabuki stage before becoming world famous as an onnagata, a man who traditionally plays female roles. One of Tamasaburo’s most acclaimed roles is that of Sakurahime.

Back to the story: after the boy jumped, the monk Seigen, seeing the body of his lover broken on the rocks below, reveals himself as a faithless coward:

I would die for you without a thought, but…

Seigen has second thoughts, and runs away. The prologue ends and then the real action of the play begins, 17 years later, when the boy acolyte, now reincarnated as the Scarlet Princess, and meets the cowardly and duplicitous Seigen once more.

Written by Tsuruya Namboku and first performed in 1817, this is the earliest example of a romance/revenge/reincarnation/ghost story centered around a male/male relationship that I am aware of. If you know of anything earlier, I’d love to hear about it. Oh, and if the whole story sounds over the top operatic, you’ll be pleased to know David Henry Hwang, author of M. Butterfly, wrote the libretto for an English language opera based on the story, composed by Alexina Louie, called The Scarlet Princess.

But enough about me and my interest in this genre — let’s talk about Yü. Promoted as the first in a series of books about Ross Lamos “karmic detective,” Yü is the story of a gay antique art appraiser who has psychic touch — simply by holding an object, he will not only know its provenance, he’ll go into a trance, reliving the experiences of everyone else who touched it.

When a woman walks into the gallery where Lamos is employed (and where he keeps this supernatural gift secret from his employer) and presents him with three exquisite Han Dynasty jades he is plunged into a 2,000-year-old murder mystery. His touch reveals that all the players in that long forgotten drama have reincarnated around this woman today.

Lamos also discovers that his employer is planning to replace the jades with fakes because he’s running an art forgery operation. And while Lamos is busy trying to solve an ancient mystery and save the jades from being stolen, he’s doing his best to reconcile himself to the fact that his philandering ex-boyfriend has become a celibate Buddhist monk at the temple where he began his own spiritual practice.

There’s a lot of movement between past and present in this story — though really the crux of the action takes place in the Han Dynasty, a little more than 2,000 years ago. It’s a tale of passion and philosophy — desire and Taoist thought in the imperial  court. And the confusions of physical and spiritual love in this story of palace intrigue are reflected in the story of Lamos, his clients and friends today.

Each section of the book begins with a translated text from a famous Chinese Taoist philosopher or historian that gives further depth to the action. The parts of the story that take place in ancient China captured all the beauty and tension that is heightened by the restrained expression of Chinese imperial court life.

If there were anything I would have wished for in Yü it would be more of Ross Lamos today rather than in his previous incarnation. The Chinese story is really a story of heterosexual love. And Ross is so caught up in his work, and this old mystery, that his personal life, and love life, today suffers. I don’t need to read about someone with a problem like that — I can just look at my own life (cue the violins).

Ross is a character I want to get to know better — not only in his previous incarnations, and I assume that if there are going to be more in this series, in each volume we’ll not only follow his current life, but his previous lives as well. I just want more of a balance between the two. Or more of an intersection between the two next time.

A Ross Lamos series holds the promise of both past and present, sexuality and spirituality, coming together in a way that heals and reveals reality at its deepest, while giving the reader the pleasure of a page-turning mystery. So I look forward to more books in this promised series.

Another series of books that fits the romance/reincarnation/revenge motif (and given that it appears enough times in stories at this point I think it has to be recognized as a motif) are the “Beautiful Samurai” books by Sedonia Guillone.

In contrast to the more spiritually entertaining goals of Yü, the Guillone’s Beautiful Samurai books are described as m/m erotic fiction (with all the other subgenre categories appended). However I found the long passages describing sexual acts in overblown (ahem) prose so graphic as to cross the line from erotic to pornographic.

 

This is all a question of taste. I didn’t want to like the Guillone books. However, I did like the stories if not the writing or the lengthy erotic digressions. The characters she has created are interesting, if not fully drawn in depth. There is so much more possible here that the graphic sex scenes actually seem to get in the way — even though passionate sex is what draws a demonic force to manifest and recreate an Edo period murder in the first book.

Here we are introduced to John Holmes — an American Gulf War veteran, who also has psychic touch and other psychic abilities. He is brought to Tokyo to help solve some weird crimes, and there he meets a young Japanese detective, Toshi. They fall in love and have lots of sex. And in the process they solve the murder mystery that is several centuries old, while solving the current crimes of passion taking place in Tokyo.

As I say, I didn’t want to like the Guillone books. There were spelling errors. Mistakes about Japanese culture that bothered me. And more sex than was really necessary unless you wanted to read the books with one hand below the waist. But as I say, I thought the stories were interesting — better than the prose they were written in.  And the characters were interesting too, if one-dimensionally drawn. These books had potential the author gave up by putting more energy into the sexual escapades and to me they suffer for it.

As for the physical book itself, I can forgive the fact that the typesetting is amateurish — this is clearly a publishing house that exists because computers make printing easier and cheaper than ever. But spell checking and professional editing, often invisible to readers in the final product, as they should be, are glaringly absent here. This publisher, Torquere Books, is one of the centers of the new m/m pulp fiction (oddly written by straight women) and some of their writers have been recognized with awards for writing queer science fiction.

So how many more books can we expect that mash up all these genres to create a subgenre that even Marion Zimmer Bradley (whose queer pulp science fiction Darkover series was groundbreaking back in 1975 with The Heritage of Hastur) would never have imagined? Well, given the mainstream appetite for vampires, werewolves and wizards in film and print I doubt we’ll see the end of this almost Jacobean fascination any time soon. And when a good book like Yü: A Ross Lamos Mystery comes along, I’m not complaining.

Queer Midrash: Retelling and Reclaiming Our Stories

Andrew Ramer has just published his collection of Queer Midrash, Queering the Text, in which he writes our stories back into the history — and the sacred texts — of the Jewish people.

Midrash is an ancient custom of creating stories the fill in the blank spaces, or explain the seeming contradictions in the Torah. The best example is the story almost all Jews know — that of Abraham smashing the statues of idols in his father's shop. Many Jews believe this story is in the Torah. It isn't. It was a midrach created by a rabbi centuries after the Torah was redacted into the form we have it today.

Midrash is kind of a sacred literary jazz riff on the story, giving it new meaning and relevance to later generations.

In the story Andrew reads in the video, he takes a text from Genesis and uses it as a window into the Biblical landscape to create a story of the first gay male lovers — and how their love was recognized as sacred.

You can read an interview with Andrew in Zeek. You'll find other posts about him and his work elsewhere on this blog. And you can order Queering The Text online.

Apologies for the poor quality of the image, but you can hear him read clearly, and if this kind of story is meaningful to you, you can be sure it will be a heart-opening experience. By rewriting the story, we can set ourselves free from the tyranny of the story. By recognizing it is a story created by others, we don't have to live out the old scripts — we can write new ones and truly live happily, in the moment, ever after.

 

Arising and passing away: The Bodhi Tree Bookstore in Los Angeles is closing.

I remember my first trip to the Bodhi Tree bookstore in L.A. — I spent an hour sitting cross-legged on the floor reading Bodhi Leaves, the thin chap books printed by the Buddhist Publication Society. I left that day with two shopping bags worth of books that I couldn't find anywhere in New York City. Even Weiser's the venerable occult book shop and publisher in NYC didn't have the titles I found at Bodhi Tree.

Today, Weiser's is long gone. And the Bodhi Tree has just announced that they will be closing after this year. Another victim of real estate interests.

Of course, business is off because many of the books sold there are now available at most Barnes and Noble stores. And if you can't find it brick and mortar, it's always found online. In fact, one of my favorite little chap books from BPS is now available free online, along with dozens of other Bodhi Leaves at the BPS website.

While I am happy that the information is more easily found by those who seek it, I will miss the community aspect of the store, where conversation with the owners and staff was always a doorway to a new discovery — and a heartfelt connection happening in the moment. And I am happy for the owners, who, faced with declining sales find that the property sale will provide for them now that they are in their 70s. Still, I find myself wondering about the future of the book community. And the future of browsing — since so many of my discoveries came from browsing titles and sitting cross-legged on a floor in a bookstore.

Then again, as one teacher of mine once said — you already have the tools, now you have to use them. So I guess I should be spending more time sitting cross-legged on the floor without a book. Watching phenomena as they arise and pass away.

Is Facebook Going Amazon On Us? Social Networking, Homophobia, Advertising and Censorhip

Gay activist and prolific author, Perry Brass, finds that his latest book, The Manly Art of Seduction, has been banned from advertising on Facebook. This is peculiar, since I've seen advertising for male "massage" therapists on Facebook who offer services that are not part of the licensing process. Not that I am in favor of FB posting those "massage" ads. If you're looking for that sort of think you know where to go. But Perry's book is not of that order. It's about how men connect with men — energetically, romantically, spiritually, physically, emotionally, sexually. And since you can buy it on the famously messed up for gay writers, Amazon, FB shouldn't have a problem with it. But they seem to, as noted here at Out In Jersey.

Meanwhile, if you're interested in learning some of these skills first hand, Perry's got a workshop in NYC on the 20th of this month at the Center. I imagine it will be a lot of fun — and enlightening on many levels. 

The Gay-O-Meter

What is the correlation between homophobia and attraction to men in the same person? This ad for a website in New Zealand makes the case that Max Blumenthal so eloquently makes in his book, Republican Gomorrah.

Gay men and prostate cancer: A good reason to bend over.

According to the National Cancer Institute, one out of every six men will develop prostate cancer. And while for gay men, AIDS is the health scourge that must be addressed, prostate cancer affects many of us and should not be ignored. In fact in the last year, two friends of mine were diagnosed — one of them  has been HIV+ for more than 20 years and when he got a diagnosis of prostate cancer it was a real crisis. Not merely because of the risks he faced being positive, but because the treatment of prostate cancer can radically change a man's sex life. The prospects are physically, emotionally and psychologically daunting to say the least. So what do you need to know, and what are the resources available to you?

First thing to know: if you're over 50, your doctor should be giving you a PSA test every year, not to mention a digital rectal exam. Many straight men are squeamish about this. Even some doctors are squeamish about it. Too bad. It's necessary if you want to save your life.

Next thing to know: if you're diagnosed with prostate cancer you probably don't have to act right away. It is often a rather slow growing cancer, and you should wait at least six weeks before making a decision about what to do, since you have many options depending on your particular diagnosis. You need to learn all about your options and get the facts. If you are in NYC, you are very lucky because there is a Gay Men's Prostate Cancer Support Group that meets at St. Vincent's once a month. You can learn a lot from these men, and get the emotional support you need. For more information, you can also email [email protected]   

There are two important books to read:

• Dr. Patrick Walsh's Guide To Surviving Prostate Cancer
• A Gay Man's Guide to Prostate Cancer, by Gerald Perlman, PhD and Jack Drescher, MD

There are things gay men will want to know or think about that aren't part of the experience or thought process of a straight man or doctor. So the queer resources mentioned above can be very useful.

I bring all this up because even though September is about to end, this is prostate cancer awareness month. And as it turns out, there's a new novel about a gay man dealing with the effects of prostate cancer on his life. I haven't read it yet, but I wanted to share the information with you..

Benediction is a new novel by Jim Arnold, the author/director of feature film screenplays and teleplays

including the documentary short "Our Brothers, Our Sons," about generational differences around HIV/AIDS in gay men.

For general information, the sites at Johns Hopkins, Memorial Sloan Kettering and the Cleveland Clinic are full of good information.

Christopher Isherwood died of prostate cancer at a time when it couldn't bet detected until it was too late to do anything. No gay man need face that fate today. Get the facts, get tested. And pay attention to your diet — there are very specific things you can do to reduce your risk by eating right. The sites mentioned above have information about this as well.

To paraphrase the song: take good care of yourself, we belong to each other.

Ang Lee and Taking Woodstock, Elliot Tiber and Queering Woodstock

Ang Lee’s film of Elliot Tiber’s book, Taking Woodstock, is set to open next weekend. This will be the third Ang Lee film with a gay man as the gay character. Elliot Tiber was a semi-closeted designer living in NYC during the week and running his parent’s failing motel upstate on the weekends. And his memoir of how he used his position as head of the chamber of commerce in White Lake to bring the Woodstock festival from Bethel to his benighted community is a wild ride through the summer of 1969, starting with the Stonewall uprising.

Yes, as Tiber tells the story, he was at the Stonewall that fateful night in June. So we get another eyewitness story. But what makes Tiber’s story compelling reading is his own self-examination and his willingness to explore the relationship between internalized homophobia, sex addiction and sado-masochism. It’s explosive reading, and don’t expect to see this in Ang Lee’s film. After all, Woodstock is the ultimate feel good story, and in Tiber’s memoir, the combination of Stonewall and Woodstock are what began his liberation from internalized homophobia and a life of sex without love — but along the way, it’s not very pretty. Tiber doesn’t shy away from telling about his experience with sex at the trucks, in 42^nd street theaters and in back room bars.

Rather we can expect Liev Schrieber in his role as Vilma, the ex-marine dominatrix drag queen, perhaps the most memorable character in the memoir, apart from Tiber’s quite seriously disturbed mother, for shock value. Schrieber may do much for the cause gender transgression and the wisdom of boundary crossing, since this character is a true wizard, magically running off bigots and opening minds. And Tiber’s experience was clearly amazing.

My experience of Woodstock was somewhat less liberated. While there were banners for the nascent Gay Liberation Front in the campsite where I was staying, most of the young men there were very touchy about what there affectional orientation might be (and thus not so willing to be touched). Some guys beat up one guy I know because he was verbally open about expressing his attraction to men. No, Woodstock was not Paradise for everyone. But that’s not why I am writing about the book.

I think Tiber’s memoir is extremely important, and shouldn’t be forgotten in the rush to see the movie. Every gay man (and lesbian and transperson) should read this thoughtful exploration of how our expression of love can be stunted and twisted by the self-hate we take in with the mother’s milk of our culture, so much so we can be completely unaware we are victims of it.  

Tiber went on to become a novelist, a teacher, and most importantly for many in our generation, a happy gay man who found love. More than Ang Lee, I’d love to hear an interview with Tiber following the movie about what was included and what wasn’t.

That said, I’m really looking forward to the movie. But if you’re reading this, definitely go read the book. And let me know what you think of each.

Meanwhile, I just want to say that Ang Lee has made more interesting movies with good gay characters than Gus Van Sant. Interesting and good being the operative words.

Gay Poet, James Kirkup, dies at 91

I'd read James Kirkup's memoir of Japan, These Horned Isles, years back when I first moved to Japan. I was introduced to his poetry by the gay Canadian poet, bibliographer, archivist and activist, Ian Young, back in the 1970s.

His work stirred up a lot of trouble in Britain when one of his poems, about the love of a Roman Centurion for Christ on the cross, led to the last successful prosecution for blasphemy in that country. The Japanese of course, honored Kirkup, and he received prizes for his writing from the Heisei Emperor.

I will dig thru my books later to post something of his.

Boycott Amazon: Take action against censorship of LGBT Titles

A few minutes ago I was about to post a link to a book to a friend on Facebook — at Amazon. But in my newsfeed, writer Lawrence Schimel had a link to a story about Amazon removing the sales rankings for many lgbt titles from another writer. And he went to check his own books (many of which I own and love) and found that indeed, the rankings were gone.

Schimel linked to a blog entry by Mark R. Probst, in which he posts a response from Amazon that I find completely unacceptable.

I will not link to books sold by Amazon here again, and I will no longer buy online from them. I urge everyone to do the same and to make your decision known to Amazon along with the reason why.

In New York City, this is all the more chilling a development considering the recent closing of the Oscar Wilde Memorial Bookshop. The gay "community" may not remember a time when finding queer titles was difficult if not impossible. And we must be watchful for corporate bigotry and censorship.

The growing list of titles with their ranking stripped reads like the usual list of books people try to ban. It's very disturbing.

I remember the first time I saw art work by Joe Brainard

I was standing in a store on Spring St. in Manhattan called Untitled that sold art post cards. Some time in the mid 70s I went there and bought several dozen — 10 of which I laid out on my bed with the intention of creating a narrative from the images and then writing a little chapter of the story on the back of each to mail to a boyfriend who was away at college in Bennington. One of the postcards I didn't use was the one above, which was a limited edition postcard created by Joe Brainard. I didn't even know who he was or that he was an artist and a poet.

Around the same time, I started reading poetry by the New York School after coming across some poems from the group in Mouth of The Dragon. And it led me to Brainard's memoir, I Remember.... This hypnotically beautiful mantra of memories moved me greatly. It didn't shy away from his queer life and loves, juxtaposing the most soul stirring moments with the absolutely everyday — all related in a way that spoke to all the senses. What is so amazing is that this poem has become the template for teachers in schools around the country for teaching children how to write poetry (minus the racier bits).

What a handsome man he was. I first saw a photo of him at a retrospective of his  work  that traveled the country — I happened to see it at a museum in Berkeley. Recently a book was published of his artwork that centered around a popular 20th Century comic character, Nancy. If you don't know his work, go take a look at his website. You'll be surprised to discover just how much of his work informed everything that came after him — and how much of his work inspired Warhol. I actually think Brainard was the wittier and more accomplished artist — Warhol was just more of a merchant and showman than Brainard was interested in being.  If you like what you see of JB's work, you should also check out the site of his friend and sometime companion, Kenward Elmslie.