Paul Monette

[Insertnamehere]

this is ridiculous.

Ridiculous! Of course.

Thank you, I know I had missed something in there.

EDIT: Fair enough, my reaction is not personally towards you, but to words I've heard over and again to justify animosity from a certain group of gays folks towards another. For the sake of topic, I'll leave it at that.

[meridannight]

i finished the book and it's easily one of the best i've read in my life. the subject matter itself is fascinating enough, but Monette's style is truly captivating. he's very creative and eloquent, clearly a well-educated man.

some of the excerpts from the book:

Yet that's how it felt for years and years -- that Andover ground me beneath the heel of its Bass Weejuns because it needed losers to make its golden Adonises shine ever brighter. I wandered through so lost and sad, I can't believe nobody ever asked me what was wrong. ''Nothing'', I would have said, by which I would've meant ''Everything''.

The reason these senior societies sprang up in the first place was the tacit admission that men, left to their own devices, never made friends below the surface, let alone below the belt. The macho gets in the way, the heartiness, the pride in showing no feelings.

I'm better at it now, partly because I understand how much baggage everyone else is carrying. In this Puritan skinhole of a culture, we don't teach children the uses of pleasure, and so they decide we are fools and go their own way blindly. If we learned to drive as badly as we learn to make love, the roads would be nothing but wrecks.

But that is part of the narcissism and self-hatred, the curious twisted pride that no one's managed to figure you out. Then the contempt for them, who can't see through your charm and your easy patter.

taken out of context, but still retaining meaning. this whole text was a revelation of sort.

deep, truthful insight that this book is full of to the brim. and that's not even the best part of it. the best part is Monette himself. the way he feels.

[Emiliano]

EDIT: Fair enough, my reaction is not personally towards you, but to words I've heard over and again to justify animosity from a certain group of gays folks towards another. For the sake of topic, I'll leave it at that.

Im interested about where you're coming from. Even if not in this thread, I'd be curious to hear you go more into that.

[meridannight]

[MENTION=21558]Emiliano[/MENTION] and [MENTION=23097]Insertnamehere[/MENTION], please take it elsewhere, not on this thread. this thread has been derailed and uglied up enough.

[Emiliano]

[MENTION=21558]Emiliano[/MENTION] and [MENTION=23097]Insertnamehere[/MENTION], please take it elsewhere, not on this thread. this thread has been derailed and uglied up enough.

No problem, I get it.
I did pick up Becoming a Man by the way. Once I finish my current book, I'll start reading it.

[Emiliano]

I'm about 80 pages in and am sort of impressed by all the different ways he's come up with to say masturbation. I'm honestly not feeling such a strong connection to the story though, a lot of what he describes about his private school years is sort of making my eyes glaze over. But still an interesting look into the mind of a closeted man from another era.

It certainly seems that you connected strongly with the book though, and again I'm not quite halfway through it yet, but what did you find most appealing or interesting in the first half? Are there any specific emotions or experiences that you related with? Or is it more his writing style, or the perspective he offers that you really enjoyed?

[meridannight]

I'm about 80 pages in and am sort of impressed by all the different ways he's come up with to say masturbation. I'm honestly not feeling such a strong connection to the story though, a lot of what he describes about his private school years is sort of making my eyes glaze over. But still an interesting look into the mind of a closeted man from another era.

It certainly seems that you connected strongly with the book though, and again I'm not quite halfway through it yet, but what did you find most appealing or interesting in the first half? Are there any specific emotions or experiences that you related with? Or is it more his writing style, or the perspective he offers that you really enjoyed?

i loved his genuineness and honesty. i could relate to his style, and loved it that it was forceful and intense. i haven't come across such intensity much, and it felt good. it is one of the things i love most in men, that intensity. it was also his healthy attitude that i loved; i think he had an exceptionally healthy attitude about life and himself (in retrospect, not necessarily during the time those things were happening).

i connected with his mind, i would say. his specific experiences weren't that much like what i had when i was growing up and going through the discovery of my own erotic/sexual nature. but i could relate very much to his mind. i felt he was a like mind, a kindred spirit (as much as such a thing can be said from a book alone, which i don't think can entirely be done). and it was all real, his account. it felt real.


the specific parts that i liked, i'll have to check. i haven't been home for a few days now and during the time you replied. i'll get back home tomorrow and i will look up some particular parts i liked most.


i hope you enjoy it. i didn't like it toward the end (i'll tell you why later, once you're at those parts), but overall my impressions, what i said in my first post stand.

[meridannight]

[MENTION=21558]Emiliano[/MENTION],
i looked up some of the specific parts in the book. i don't actually feel comfortable singling out certain parts under the idea that i liked them more than others. it was the book as a whole that did it for me, the things i mentioned in my previous post.

but here are some that i can say were more memorable for me:
--i liked his grandfather, the kind of man he was. (his annoyance with the mispronunciation of his French name to the point to change it so it would agree with it, was brilliant). from what Monette tells about him, he seems like my kind of guy, that man. i recognized some of myself in there.
--i could also relate to the parts where he opened up about his solitude. there was this one paragraph where he said he felt so lost and sad he couldn't believe nobody ever asked what was wrong. that could've been written by me. i know what that is like. so, i connected with him on that level.
--i loved cultural references to the classics. i was brought up on the classics myself so i am always very glad to see that background in another man.
--also his struggles and identification/misidentification with art as a way of life. i get that too.


i don't know exactly how far along you are, but if you haven't strongly liked the book halfway in, i doubt it'll get any better for you. it's pretty much the same throughout.

i found him very eloquent though. don't you think so? even if the content or the story doesn't much get through to you, there is still a beautiful poetic way of expression there in his words, well worth the whole read. that's how i feel.


but do you have any specific parts that you liked yourself? or, to the contrary, didn't like?

[Emiliano]

I agree, he has a very nice style. And even if I don't relate to his story and experiences all that much, it's still been a mostly enjoyable book to read. I've enjoyed reading about his college years more than the prep school ones. I'm almost finished, I might get it done today during my commutes, but for sure in the next couple of days.

So far ive been interested in his relationship with his brother, but that sort of dropped off after a while as he became more distanced from his family. I also was interested in his back and forth with the troubled artist roommate. I've had friendships that are like that. Not really where I was obsessing over straight men, but just the passion and inspiration of being up all night creating and talking about art and the world, only to have it almost burn out and just fade away. And I've seen a lot of people battle demons as he put it, with drugs and alcohol. And knowing at some point that it's time for me to just kind of walk away from it out of my own best interest. And also that sort of loss of an idolization. Thinking someone was amazing and then after life happens for a bit realizing I was mostly just projecting how I wanted them to be onto a person who actually wasn't really like that.

I guess the parts that I didn't really like were for a bit there he was making an old Hollywood reference nearly every page. I don't know about that stuff and it was just so common that I was sort of tired of it. And the way he gets into all these obsessions with straight guys. I totally get why though, he talks about the power that tv had over him as a kid and of course he lived in a very different place and time from me. So I see why he does and thinks like he does (or did, back before he comes out). He just speaks of a very different experience of homosexuality than I have, and of a very different gay culture than I know. But he's very honest and raw throughout like you said, and again, it is interesting in itself to read what it was like for a man so different from me, but that I'm in some ways connected to.

I have been in a weird mood even before I started this book so I'm not sure what all I'm projecting into it. Or what exactly I was expecting from it. The book before it was about Dachau, so maybe I'm still carrying over some of that into it, especially how in the start he was making a lot of ww2 references. But yeah, it's overall a good book and I'm glad you recommended it to me and that I picked it up.

But I'll let you know when I finish it because I'm curious about your thoughts on the second half as well.

[Emiliano]

I finished this a couple days ago, I forgot to come back and let you know. I'm not sure how I feel about the ending and the last parts of the book in general. I have a lot of mixed feelings about the book in general. But I'm glad I read it. He certainly led an interesting life.