Gay Writers Quotes

Imaginative writers often project their own monsters and meanings on basic facts. ~ Christopher Bram

Vidal himself joked that at a certain age lawsuits took the place of sex. ~ Christopher Bram

We all perform balancing acts between self and family, individual and community, private desire and group expectation. Gay people in particular must break with the groupthink of church and society in order to live their own lives. (It's why you still see half-read copies of Atlas Shrugged on the night tables of otherwise intelligent gay men.) ~ Christopher Bram

Stories have the ability to take us inside all kinds of life. ~ Christopher Bram

Trust the tale, not the teller. ~ Christopher Bram

A younger writer, David Leavitt, would later say he envied White for having "such a representative life". And it's true: the zeitgeist blew through White more easily than it did through most people. ~ Christopher Bram

Few writers in history have ever been 'politically correct' (a notion that rapidly changes in any case), and there's no reason to imagine that gay writers will ever suit their readers, especially since that readership is splintered into ghettos within ghettos. ~ Edmund White

Maybe the most interesting thing gay writers can do is show the tension between the breadth of gay experiences and the unity of what they have in common. ~ Vestal McIntyre

Directly after Rock Hudson's death came the fears that gay writers and actors and directors would be denied jobs; who knew if they would live long enough to finish a feature film or television series? And would the unions force directors to give blood tests and ban actors who tested positive? ~ Michael Shnayerson

A writer who can't use his firsthand experience must turn to secondhand experience, which can lead to thirdhand clichés. ~ Christopher Bram

It took me a long time to realise how many of our classic books on animals were by gay writers who wrote of their relationships with animals in lieu of human loves of which they could not speak. ~ Helen Macdonald

Yeats was straight, but as Auden wrote in 'In Memory of WB Yeats': "You were silly like us. ~ Christopher Bram

Good prose is solitary work. ~ Christopher Bram

An obsessed reader figured that 'Armistead Maupin' was an anagram for 'is a man I dreamt up'. ~ Christopher Bram

Free to call a spade a spade (and a cock a cock). ~ Christopher Bram

Most straight people, and many gay people, especially those who came of age more recently, don't understand how momentous and difficult coming out was to men and women of this generation. It seems so obvious now, so banal. ~ Christopher Bram

You spend hours alone, only with your thoughts, and you torture yourself. It's a tendency of many writers to temper the self-destructive act of writing with other self-destructive acts. I certainly was one of those people for a long time. ~ Ben Gibbard

Contemplating while barefoot on the grounds my father and grandfather walked, I saw my life clearly. With African sun nibbling on my dark skin and gentle winds soothing my foreboding, my past life and current responsibilities overwhelmed me occasionally. Abundant tears flowed freely. Dripping on my face and clothes. Travelling through the ancient roads created by my forefathers, grasslands, trees and anthills kept me company. A lonely journey. I knew that nothing remains the same, but ones past never changes. Even in the loneliness of my past, I accepted that you cannot effectively go forward without knowing how and where you started your journey. Even in that state of near dejection I was aware that my sojourn in foreign lands is not forever, but my lording of this beautiful land, my own Africa, where my spent body will finally rest someday, is for eternity. Nothing remains the same, but nothing ever changes. It depends on how you look at your life. ~ Fidelis O. Mkparu

I can't stand it when a player whines to me or his teammates or his wife or the writers or anyone else. A whiner is almost always wrong. A winner never whines. ~ Paul Brown

Scarcely a word has been written on the fact that along with the millions whom Hitler had butchered on grounds of "race," hundreds of thousands of people were sadistically tortured to death simply for having homosexual feelings. Scarcely anyone has publicized the fact that the madness of Hitler and his gang was not directed just against the Jews, but also against us homosexuals, in both cases leading to the "final solution" of seeking the total annihilation of these human beings.

May they never be forgotten,
these multitudes of dead,
our anonymous, immortal martyrs. ~ Heinz Heger

Nature fits all her children with something to do, he who would write and can't write, can surely review. ~ James Russell Lowell

Texts on a lifeless strings of facts, but the keys to unlocking the character of human beings, people with likes and dislikes, diocese and foibles, errors and convictions. Words have texture and shape, and it is their almost tactile quality that leads readers to sculpt images of the writers who use them. These images are then interrogated, mocked, congratulated, or dismissed, depending on the context of the reading and the disposition of the reader. ~ Sam Wineburg

You can't be an openly gay movie star. You can't be an openly gay pop star, really - minus Ricky Martin. ~ Rashida Jones

Second, I have taken it for granted that Jesus of Nazareth existed. Some writers feel a need to justify this assumption at length against people who try from time to time to deny it. It would be easier, frankly, to believe that Tiberius Caesar, Jesus' contemporary, was a figment of the imagination than to believe that there never was such a person as Jesus. Those who persist in denying this obvious point will probably not want to read a book like this anyway. ~ N. T. Wright

I know that no reader ever asks a question. A writer must force his favors upon his readers. ~ Jan Neruda

I give this book 5 Stars and highly recommend it to all fiction, nonfiction, and poetry writers, aspiring writers, bloggers or journalists. ~ Sunny

All really good writers use fragments. ~ Priscilla Long

Before he could stop himself, Carlos pulled Michael down into a kiss, letting his lips and tongue communicate everything he'd been bottling up for days – months, if he was being honest with himself. Michael responded with a tenderness that begged to be answered, plying his mouth with soft, teasing kisses until Carlos pulled away, moving until their lips were a hairsbreadth apart.

"We don't have to stop," Michael whispered. ~ Sara Winters

...oh, believe me, I feel that I'm the least homophobic person...

...I hate putting labels on people...

...I came up with a term, I call them 'Limbo Gay,' that's one, and I came up with another term, 'Straight Gay,' and then there's a new one I made up, I call them 'Dry Gay,' and then there's also 'Gay Gay' which is really the same as 'Really Gay'...

...but this doesn't mean I'm being homophobic, and this is something the gay community needs to be educated about...

...and a man who likes penis doesn't have to call himself gay, or bi, or confused, all he has to do is say to the woman, 'Look, I love you, but I'm a penis man, I like penis...'

...these gay men spend their entire lives lying about who they are, and so lying just becomes a way of life to them...

...these gay men are trying to live a life that isn't theirs to live, they don't belong in the straight world, they belong in the gay world...

...that doesn't make me homophobic... ~ Bonnie Kaye

She was making the case that we should resist on principle, even though it might be futile. I had just begun trying to make the case for hope in writing, and I argued that you don't know if your actions are futile; that you don't have the memory of the future; that the future is indeed dark, which is the best thing it could be; and that, in the end, we always act in the dark. The effects of your actions may unfold in ways you cannot foresee or even imagine. They may unfold long after your death. That is when the words of so many writers often resonate most. ~ Rebecca Solnit

People like to say being gay isn't like skin color, isn't anything physical. They tell us we always have the option of hiding.
But if that's true, why do they always find us? ~ David Levithan

News, if unreported, has no impact. It might as well have not happened at all. ~ Gay Talese

[Home Economics Textbook from 1950]: "Prepare yourself. Take fifteen minutes to rest so you'll look refreshed when hubby comes home from work. Touch up makeup and put a ribbon in your hair. He's just been with work-weary people. Be a little gay. His boring day needs a lift."
Mama Celia: "Get knee-walking drunk. You've earned it. You've been with four kids under the age of seven all day. Put a ribbon in your nose and try to pull it out of your mouth. You're wasted, after all. Announce you're gay. The look on his face will give you a lift. ~ Celia Rivenbark

It was a saying of an ancient philosopher, which I find some of our writers have ascribed to Queen Elizabeth, who perhaps might have taken occasion to repeat it, that a good face is a letter of recommendation. ~ Joseph Addison

Loafing is the most productive part of a writer's life. ~ James Norman Hall

She saw none of them in their natural state. She asserts that though there may be women distinguished as writers in England, there are no ladies who have any great conversational and political influence in society, of that kind which, during the old regime, was obtained in France by what they would call their femmes marquantes2, such as Madame de Tencin, Madame de Deffand, Mademoiselle de l'Espinasse. This remark stung me to the quick, for my country and for myself, and raised in me a foolish, vainglorious emulation, an ambition false in its objects, and unsuited to the manners, domestic habits, and public virtue of our country. I ~ Maria Edgeworth

Many novice writers try to avoid using 'said' by substituting synonyms: 'he uttered,' 'she murmured,' 'he questioned.' It's true that any word repeated too often becomes monotonous, but substitutions for 'said' can be worse than its repetition. ~ Nancy Kress

You're the perfect combination of everything that makes me horny. ~ Wade Kelly

Another mistake is presenting too much background information, and doing so in the first few pages. Writers should begin their stories with the event that kicks off the story, and then spoon-feed us background information only when it's needed to understand what's going on."

[A Conversation with Evan Marshall (Writers Write, September 1999)] ~ Evan Marshall

All writers recognize this surge of striking; in its energies the objects of the world are made new, alchemized by their passage through the imaginal, musical, world-foraging and word-forging mind.

This altered vision is the secret happiness of poems, of poets. It is as if the poem encounters the world and finds in it a hidden language, a Braille unreadable except when raised by the awakened imaginative mind. ~ Jane Hirshfield

There's a really nice moment in the life of a piece of writing where the writer starts to get a feeling of it outgrowing him - or he starts to see it having a life of its own that doesn't have anything to do with his ego or his desire to 'be a good writer.' ~ George Saunders

Many healings of other physical troubles have occurred in my clients after they started to integrate breathing practices into their lives. There is a simple but encompassing reason that may explain this. The human body is designed to discharge 70% of its toxins through breathing. Only a small percentage of toxins are discharged through sweat, defecation and urination. If your breathing is not operating at peak efficiency, you are not ridding yourself of toxins properly. ~ Gay Hendricks

I did that for 40 years or more. I never had any writer's block. I got up in the morning, sat down at the typewriter - now, computer - lit up a cigarette. ~ Frederik Pohl

I appreciate the decision made by Gov. Brewer to veto this legislation. I hope that we can now move on from this controversy and assure the American people that everyone is welcome to live, work and enjoy our beautiful State of Arizona. ~ John McCain

Writers don't get time off. Every moment - waking or sleeping - a writer is working, observing, thinking and creating. ~ Graeme Roberts

Unless you're a doubter and a worrier, a nail-biter, an apologizer, a rethinker, then memoir may not be your playpen. That's the quality I've found most consistently in those life-story writers I've met. ~ Mary Karr

I think writer's block is simply the dread that you are going to write something horrible. But as a writer, I believe that if you sit down at the keys long enough, sooner or later something will come out. ~ Roy Blount, Jr.

The man is in his work,read it if you want to know about him. ~ R.M. Engelhardt

When I was young,
I was so gay and mean,
And I drank and chased the girls,
Just like young St Augustine.
Saint Augustine,
He got to be a saint.
So if I get to be one, also. ~ Kurt Vonnegut

Now, that's what you call a vicious French queen. I never discussed your penis size – "
"Bet you did," Kevin said, "at the beginning. I've heard the way gay guys talk at the gym. Nothing's sacred. Not even my poor little penis. ~ Edmund White

Give me an old house full of memories and I will give you hundred novels! ~ Mehmet Murat Ildan

It's important to stress what I didn't find. I did not prove that homosexuality is genetic, or find a genetic cause for being gay. I didn't show that gay men are born that way, the most common mistake people make in interpreting my work. Nor did I locate a gay center in the brain. ~ Simon LeVay

Our perceptions of reality are only a relationship to what is actually out there. Perceptions are influenced by context, by previous life experience, and by our tendency to seek out
evidence to confirm our expectations. This drive to confirm, as
argued by social physiologists, results in what is known as self fulfilling prophecy. ~ Derric Yuh Ndim

The simple truth is that the only real 'ex-gay' person is a dead gay person - and even then I am not too sure about the validity of that statement. ~ Christina Engela

The heart of a story gives it life. ~ A.D. Posey