From the ‘One-More-Memoir’ file, The New York Times (Apr. 24) profiled former Chicagoan Augusten Burroughs, the gay author who gave us Running With Scissors and has now written a fifth memoir, A Wolf at the Table. In this latest chapter of his life, he takes on the person missing from the first four: his father. The tone of the book differs considerably from the humor of the previous books: This is ‘ … a chilling and terrifying depiction of a soulless sociopath who can barely contain a murderous rage toward his youngest son and mentally unstable wife. It’s more Stephen King than David Sedaris.’ The father, a psoriasis-ridden philosophy professor at Amherst, was a heavy drinker who put cigarettes out on little Augusten’s forehead and who threatened to kill him to hurt Augusten’s mother. This book will probably not make it to the cute movie stage.
Along these depressing lines, The Harper’s Index (Harper’s Magazine, May) reports that the factor by which a gay U.S. college student is more likely to attempt suicide than a straight one is two; the factor by which a closeted student will do the same is six.
From the ‘Both-Sides-Now’ file, a long essay on the Modern Love page of The New York Times (Apr. 20), ‘The Joy of Marriage Was Ours, for a While’ tells of a lesbian couple’s fairy-tale (yeah, a cliche and a pun) love, marriage and divorce. Torie Osborn and her partner, a doctor, married in San Francisco when it was legal for a short time. They were amazed at how their gay and straight friends responded: a white carpet to their front door strewn with rose petals, plants from Christian neighbors and traditional wooden ducks from Korean friends. Three years after the wedding, another cliche—the doctor, after being carried through her residency, moved out and up. Ms. Osborn got to explore the virgin territory of being a gay divorcee. She’s almost over being bitter.
Short takes: Ned Rorem: Word and Music, the documentary film about the gay composer/writer, had a short revival in New York to coincide with the premiere of his opera, Our Town (NY Times, Apr. 20) ; Lance Bass, the gay former boy-band singer, has made a PSA spot for GLSEN (the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network) to honor Lawrence King, the murdered gay 15-year-old who was killed in California (Chicago Tribune, Apr. 18) ; Star Jones, who used to be a big TV star, has filed for divorce from her much-touted hubby, Al Reynolds (and her even more-touted marriage), ostensibly because of Reynolds’ ties to those gay folk on Fire Island (Chicago Sun-Times, Apr. 24) ; more on Beat (and gay) poet Allen Ginsburg in a new book, A Blue Hand: The Beats in India, by Deborah Baker (The NY Times Book Review, Apr. 13) ; the leading seminary of Conservative Judaism drops its ‘ … longstanding ban on admitting, teaching or ordaining openly gay students to be rabbis.’ (NY Times, Apr. 19).