American Studies edition by Mark Merlis Literature Fiction eBooks
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Los Angeles Times Book Prize Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction, 1996
Ferro-Grumley Award for distinction in gay writing, 1996
American Studies edition by Mark Merlis Literature Fiction eBooks
How is it that Mark Merlis has been around for such a long time and I'm just now discovering him? This is a great book - the story of two gay men, one a student of the other. By using flashbacks to a much earlier time, Merlis weaves a haunting story of both: the narrator, a 62 YO man resting in the hospital after having been mugged by a trick in his own apartment; the other, a college professor who, as a Communist Party member during the McCarthy era, and as a closeted gay, meets his Waterloo at his academic institution.Although "American Studies" includes virtually no overt sex scenes, every page is permeated with the sexual implications of being gay. Merlis does a superb job of characterizing the desire, fears, rationales, fantasies, and botched advances of both his major characters. A particularly amusing and interesting aspect is how Reeves, the patient, interacts with his hospital roommate, a young, straight, clueless hunk who is stuck in bed for days with a ruined thumb that is never quite explained. Reeve lusts after the hunk's buns, which are frequently available for his viewing pleasure because of the rear-view hospital gown.
The writing is subtle, nuanced, and sparkling. Every page expands the reader's view of how these two men have responded to being gay in a gay-unfriendly world. The mood fluctuates from being light and amusing to sombre and tragic. The book is both simple and complex - simple in the sense that it's basically the story of a few days in the life of a gay man in the hospital, but complex in that, through flashbacks, it reveals the life experiences, thoughts, and actions of both the main characters - all done in a sensitive, sophisticated manner.
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American Studies edition by Mark Merlis Literature Fiction eBooks Reviews
American Studies, very sadly out of print at the moment (but surely not for long), is one of the great gay novels of the 20th century. Narrated by a gay man in hospital after being beaten by a trick, the novel tells the story of F.O. Matthiessen, a great American literary critic who committed suicide in 1950 after being outed and ostracized at Harvard, where he taught for more than twenty years. Most importantly, though, Merlis writes like an angel, every sentence beautifully made, charming, amusing, and moving. It is as perfect as a novel can be.
I was very pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this book. The writing was deeply thoughtful and painfully realistic. I found myself wholly immersed in a time when being gay was not easy and in fact could prove to be ruinous.
I highly recommend this book and intend to read his other works!
Author Mark Merlis is a writer of rare talents. The structure of his novel allows the reader to follow two stories, one from the McCarthy era and one from 1989. He makes it clear that gay identity has a temporal quality. I recommend this book highly.
American Studies is a great story, funny, incisive and even suspenseful but its larger themes of the great "traitor" hunts of the fifties and the lives that were destroyed by them is one which is seldom told these days. It is just post WWII. A beloved university professor at Yale is investigated for his prior associations with the communist party. The school wants him out and, unable to find a good argument in the flimsy (but true) evidence of former allegiances it focuses on his closeted life as a gay man who, ironically, has never really been with another man sexually. As a mentor and special friend to a continuous line of "Wheaties" boys, he has never been in bed with one until the very last one who is used as a tattle tale by the University. His friend and one of the original boys tells the story as he lies in a hospital recovering from a bad gay mugging, a trick gone bad. That still happens, incidentally. So. The scene is set to describe what passed as gay life in the Fifties but also the incredible bombardment of accusation and hostility that people of the left experienced in that period. A "two-fer" of discrimination and cruel and inhuman behavior by the "establishment". I lived through this period as a gay man. It involved the generation before me and though I barely escaped this life it had special personal meaning. It may sound like this is a gay novel and, to some extent it is. But it is a very human novel showing what redemption there is even in the worst of times as well as the courage which many men had in working their way through it. The voice throughout is that of the recently mugged perpetual grad student as he lies in bed contemplating the past. Some of the present leaks in as he deals with the reality of his own unmasking as a result of the public bashing. It is a wonderful voice. Funny, knowing, wry and, at the same time, as honest as he can be for the first time in his life about his own and his older friend's story. He is telling us. We are the witnesses. Merlis is an expert at getting out the funny bits in the midst of serious business and as a writer of gay stories his talent for what could be called "queenspeak" that sort of ironic banter we heard all the time in the gay bars of those days. I don't know if it helps to be gay to read this but it shouldn't hurt at all if you are not. It is about the American tendency to punish what is different whether that difference is political or personal.
I've recently discovered Mark Merlis. As a classical scholar, I think AN ARROW'S FLIGHT is unsurpassed as a novel on a mythological theme. Merlis has a rich imagination and the ability to communicate on multiple levels. AMERICAN STUDIES is deep, funny, poignant, an honest look at a moment in history. The final scene is amazingly touching as a reader (along with the main character) experiences catharsis - fleeting though it be - and feels buoyed up enough to face life, whatever it might bring.
Until his death, I had never heard of Mark Merlis, but I wish I had. I have now read a number of his books, and he was a very good writer, in my opinion. Having lived in DC at one time, I could relate to a lot of the story and even figured out some of the places where the story took place. He does an excellent job with character development, and the story line is imaginative. I really enjoyed this book.
Very intelligent and complete description of the repression lived by two generations during the first half of the 20th century. The ambiguities, the internalized homophobia and other problems. The storybis credible, enrapturing and moving.
How is it that Mark Merlis has been around for such a long time and I'm just now discovering him? This is a great book - the story of two gay men, one a student of the other. By using flashbacks to a much earlier time, Merlis weaves a haunting story of both the narrator, a 62 YO man resting in the hospital after having been mugged by a trick in his own apartment; the other, a college professor who, as a Communist Party member during the McCarthy era, and as a closeted gay, meets his Waterloo at his academic institution.
Although "American Studies" includes virtually no overt sex scenes, every page is permeated with the sexual implications of being gay. Merlis does a superb job of characterizing the desire, fears, rationales, fantasies, and botched advances of both his major characters. A particularly amusing and interesting aspect is how Reeves, the patient, interacts with his hospital roommate, a young, straight, clueless hunk who is stuck in bed for days with a ruined thumb that is never quite explained. Reeve lusts after the hunk's buns, which are frequently available for his viewing pleasure because of the rear-view hospital gown.
The writing is subtle, nuanced, and sparkling. Every page expands the reader's view of how these two men have responded to being gay in a gay-unfriendly world. The mood fluctuates from being light and amusing to sombre and tragic. The book is both simple and complex - simple in the sense that it's basically the story of a few days in the life of a gay man in the hospital, but complex in that, through flashbacks, it reveals the life experiences, thoughts, and actions of both the main characters - all done in a sensitive, sophisticated manner.
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