Description
Book SynopsisJohn D’Emilio is one of the leading historians of his generation and a pioneering figure in the field of LGBTQ history. At times his life has been seemingly at odds with his upbringing. How does a boy from an Italian immigrant family in which everyone unfailingly went to confession and Sunday Mass become a lapsed Catholic? How does a family who worshipped Senator Joseph McCarthy and supported Richard Nixon produce an antiwar activist and pacifist? How does a family in which the word
divorce was never spoken raise a son who comes to explore the hidden gay sexual underworld of New York City?
Memories of a Gay Catholic Boyhood is D’Emilio’s coming-of-age story in which he takes readers from his working-class Bronx neighborhood to an elite Jesuit high school in Manhattan to Columbia University and the political and social upheavals of the late 1960s. He shares his personal experiences of growing up in a conservative, tight-knit, multigenerational
Trade Review"Unusual among today’s memoirs, this one is upbeat and generous spirited about its author’s early life and challenges. . . . The author’s compassionate spirit suffuses the text to such a degree that one hopes for a future continuation into his years as a professional historian. A warm, humane coming-of-age memoir. . . ." * Kirkus Reviews *
“In this fascinating self-portrait and insightful portrait of his times, a prominent queer historian recalls growing up in the 1950s and ’60s—a smart, pious, conservative, Catholic boy from a working-class Italian family in the Bronx transforms himself into a radical left, openly gay Columbia University student.” -- Jonathan Ned Katz, author of * The Daring Life and Dangerous Times of Eve Adams *
"D’Emilio’s youthful reminiscences make for a classic work of literature that deserves a wide readership. One hopes this memoir is only the first in a succession." (Starred Review) -- David Azzolina * Library Journal *
"[D'Emilio's] memoir is a love letter to Manhattan. but also to the Bronx of his childhood, to the schools that educated and occasionally hindered him, to the family members who nourished him—even when they no longer understood him—so he would someday find his life's work. . . . Based on the many pleasures offered by this book, I hope he decides to write the sequel." -- Daniel A. Burr * Gay and Lesbian Review *
"D’Emilio, who has been an eminent historian of the American gay man’s experience and struggle during his lifetime, has turned his searching eye inward and now gives us a different kind of history—one that’s pegged to his own life, loves and learnings. Every page is fork-tender with emotion, and to be honest, in my mind’s eye, I imagined him going back to a huge file of every sweet or difficult or thoughtful observation he’d ever excised from one of his academic books and sewing them together with hindsight for this volume." -- S. Bear Bergman * Xtra! *
"As D’Emilio applies his skills as an acclaimed social and cultural historian to his own youth,
Memories of a Gay Catholic Boyhood offers us a caring and thoughtful window into a time of enormous change in American society and the Catholic Church. His account is warm and gracious; he is quick to acknowledge his own limitations while acknowledging the crucial role of his friends and family in shaping and loving the gay Catholic man he became." -- Brian Linnane * America *
Table of ContentsPreface ix
Part I. An Italian Boy from the Bronx
1. An Italian Family 3
2. Big Grandma's House 11
3. School: Becoming a Big Boy 17
4. Baby Jim 25
5. Change, and More Change 32
6. A Family of Friends 40
7. God Help Me! 49
8. A Beginning and an End 57
Part II. A Jesuit Education
9. A Whole New World 65
10. Striving to Win 76
11. My Sexual Desires 84
12. Another Ending 94
13. Working in the City 105
Part III. Everything Changes
14. God Is Dead 119
15. War and Peace 128
16. This Is Me 140
17. I Come Out, Sort Of 148
18. Her Name Is Margaret Mead 160
19. And Then I Studied 169
20. Now What Do I Do? 182
21. A Door Opens 194
Postscript 205
Acknowledgments 207
