In September, the Light Changes

Rating:
Summary: Good, but not Holleran's best
Review: Andrew Holleran has written some of the most beautiful prose I've ever read about his experiences as a gay man, and I had the opportunity to meet him at a book signing once and found him to be congenial and friendly. That's why I wish I could be more enthusiastic about this book, a collection of his short stories. Holleran seems to have a fascination with rather affected characters, like Sutherland in Dancer From The Dance; that type of character appears in almost every one of these stories, and they quickly become not only tiresome but interchangeable. You feel you're reading the same story over and over. Holleran is more effective, I think, when writing about his interior experiences, as he shows here in the title story, and his introduction of one bitchy character after another eventually seems intrusive.

Much better writing can be found in Holleran's underrated Nights in Aruba, and in some passages from The Beauty of Men (notably those about growing older). I'd recommend those books but perhaps not this one.

Rating:
Summary: This Is Why I Read Books
Review: Andrew Holleran is an example of why I read books. _The Beauty of Men_ will always be with me, I suspect, somewhere in the back of my mind, as the measure of what writers are "supposed" to do with their art. This collection of short stories I loved almost as much. Mr. H can, technically, set up sentences that are complicated and still lucid. Artistically, he can designate a character with an amazing minimum of details; it's like he knows just the right characteristics to show you to make his characters stand out. None of his characters are perfect, and most are struggling with growing older and being lonely, but I cared about all of them. Joshua, in "Blorts," for example, was hilarious. Morgan, in "Petunias," was self-absorbed and afraid, but struggling to rise above it all and even though the story is tragic, it still ends on a mystifyingly hopeful sentence. Mr. Holleran might not churn out novels every year, but when he does put one out, I'm always deeply affected by it. I wonder, though, why no author's picture on book jackets?

Rating:
Summary: Energetic, Vibrant prose!
Review: Andrew Holleran's collection of short stories is nothing short of marvellous. Written during a period that spans over twenty years, Holleran offers his readers funny, original stories about gay life. While sometimes tragic, the stories are told in energetic, vibrant prose and are ultimately very uplifting. It's all here: aging, AIDS, cheating, sexual perversity, etc. You will NOT be disappopinted.

Rating:
Summary: Light and Dark
Review: I am just as impressed with this book on my second reading as on my first, years earlier: the beauty of the prose, the sharply drawn characters and the sense of reality that the writing imparts. On my second perusal, however, I noticed more strongly, the loneliness and restrained sadness that suffuses nearly all the stories. Andrew re-creates on paper, a homosexual world wherein sex is abundant, love a rarity and romance non-existent. This book might have sunk into pessimism and gloom but Andrew lifts it up to rarified layers with his sheer talent for description. Whether it's a graduate house or a lifeless station platform, a small town or a big city, the precision and economy of his style is extraordinary.

(...)

Rating:
Summary: Times We'll Never Forget!!
Review: I have been a great admirer of Andrew Holleran for many years, and have always enjoyed his stories he wrote for Christopher Street magazine. Every month I waited with anticipation for the next issue for his latest writing. He always writes from the heart and these 16 stories prove it. Andrew's writing is so polished and easy to read, you feel you are listening to him tell these stories in person. Some of these stories are pleasant to read, and others are very sad because they deal with loss(AIDS), loneliness, getting older, and still having desires, especially to be young again, and the yearning for youth.

I found myself finishing one story and then continuing right on into the next chapter without stopping, they are so interesting. Maybe its because these stories relate to my generation and the times I lived through in the 70's and early 80's. I feel this book will interest anybody, there is so much beauty and history in his writing. Andrew Holleran, I believe, has not been given enough recognition or credit for his brilliant writing. I truly enjoyed this book.

Rating:
Summary: A leisurely literary cruise
Review: I often return to books for repeated readings when my first impressions are lasting. Short story collections by such authors as Andrew Holleran renew the vigor of initial impact, the joys of lingering. IN SEPTEMBER THE LIGHT CHANGES is a treasure of smaller stories that prove once again that Holleran is one of our best writers today. Without depending on one locale, familiar and constant faces, recurring themes to keep us aligned, Holleran strings together tales like the best of Song Cycles by Schubert and Schumann (and Ned Rorem, more poignantly!) and allows us to absorb his luxuriant prose through very complete novellas about love, age, lust, and friends. His hour is magical...and never more evident than in his final In Septmeber the Light Changes. Smart, elegant, and yet very much from the heart.

Rating:
Summary: Running short
Review: I'm alittle torn on this one:

Ok, first off I have to say that I loved the book because Andrew Holleran's writing shines marvelously in short story form. Seriously I think I enjoyed his WRITING more in this than in any of his novels.

Also, "The Penthouse" (one of the stories) was DIVINE! I give "The Penthouse" like 100 stars! I read it twice!

HOWEVER, I cannot give this book more than 3 stars because...with only a few exceptions...all the stories are the same. They are all about gay men in New York in the 70's. All of them. Even ones that are technically set later on or in a different place INEVITABLY end up about gay men in New York in the 70's. And I'm sorry there's too many stories to justify the lack of diversity in subject. When place names, events, and pretty much characters themselves are repeating from story to story it gets old.

I really wish this book was shorter and included a cross-section of the stories in there. Heck, if it was just "The Penthouse" I would of been supremely happy. Even Andrew Holleran's fabulous writing can't save the stale subjects he ruminates on endlessly.

However if you love Holleran as I do, and are in the mood to search for the diamond in the rough (did I mention "The Penthouse" yet?) then I recommend!

Rating:
Summary: Too Much of a Good Thing?
Review: There are some lovely stories here, and while each and every story has something to recommend it I felt that as a whole the stories were too similar to each other. I would have preferred to have had a shorter, less repetitive collection.

P.S. I heard the author reading two of these stories before the book was published. They're really nice in the form. If there's an audio version available, you might want to check this out.

Rating:
Summary: A Chekhov for the Gay Seventies and Beyond
Review: This is a brilliant collection of stories, one of the strongest I've read ever. Each story is a marvel, the prose, the emotions, the characters. Holleran has a brilliant sense of place and he is very specific about the period of time that he writes about. Aids is barely mentioned in these stories, although the disease does appear towards the end of the collection. The saddest thing for me as a reader is that Holleran is still being marginalized as a writer. Certainly is area of knowledge and interest is the gay demi-monde of New York/Fire Island circa 1970 +...but which great short fiction writer throughout history did not have his favourite epoch that he wrote about over and over again. Is HOlleran any different then an Updike or a John Cheever or even the master himself Anton Chekhov? This is a collection of great short fiction that speaks to all readers who adore brilliant prose. This book has become one of my favourites of all time.

Rating:
Summary: Touching
Review: Well, different readers will surely see the same book differently, that¡¯s for sure¡­ Most other reviewers here brightly praise Holleran¡¯s style and also substance. (¡°Acute social vision,¡± Witty, shrewd¡±¡­) I seem to see more darkly.

I see a major (and troubling) element others don¡¯t discuss¡ªheck, don¡¯t even notice? I see pervasive pessimism about life-chances, one¡¯s relationship to his own biography. I also see pathology about interactions, one¡¯s relationship to others¡ªin this case, to other gay men¡­

These twin ¡°incompletenesses¡± seem¡ªto me only, perhaps¡ªpervasive, and also problematic. Most of these characters seem doubly ¡°drifty.¡± They eddy through their lives, decades largely without change, growth, achievement. And they edge away from others, from true mature relationships in what I feel is classic ¡°defensive detachment.¡± (Are these triste tales, dangerous ammunition for anti-gay elements who want to misperceive all homosexuality as psychopathological, dirty laundry indeed?)

But am I mis-judging complexity here? 1. Are these dark elements ¡°what life is really like,¡± straight and gay¡ªand it¡¯s better to know it? 2. Or is this the undiscussed underside of much gay male life, suppressed by Political Correctness? 3. Or is author Holleran selectively mis-perceiving gay male life thus through his own smudged lens¡ªand I the reader am also overemphasizing this downside and wrongly chiding Holleran for this unanalyzed, uncritical portrait of pathologies?)

A few examples from the stories may illustrate (not justify) my alarmed ¡°minority report¡± here:

(1) Biographical change, growth, achievement? --But in ¡°Penthouse,¡± the character says something like a party is over¡ªbut he didn¡¯t know where to go next. --Worse, in ¡°Hamburger Man,¡± a character says so many of these (homosexual) men have wasted their lives. ¡°Not the drugs, or the houses in Acapulco, or the small talk¡ªthe waste! Of energy and talent, love and ambition!¡± --In another, ¡°You will go on living from crisis to crisis, and eventually self-destruct!¡± And Freud is quoted noting ¡°people who waste their lives pursuing things that cannot possibly provide happiness.¡± --In ¡°Sentimental Education,¡± ¡°his life was simply a bland tale of frienship, affairs, money borrowed and loaned, all of it leading nowhere except to the inevitable disillusionment of age.¡± Flaubert is quoted, noting that in a life, nothing happens except a lot of little unworthy stuff upon which that life is wasted.

Perhaps this is gritty realism: is much life like this? Or is it accentuated in the gay male subculture which Holleran sketches. Homosexuality as pathological? (Or at least, simply what happens when men the roamers and rovers interact with other men not the domesticating women?)

--In ¡°Housesitter,¡± a character laments stasis. ¡°We¡¯ll never regard each other as anything but fantasies, we¡¯ll never integrate sex with the rest of our lives, we¡¯re just going to keep on going to gyms and dance clubs, taking drugs, dancing, and cruising the Rambles.¡± All the same just more dull.

(2) Are initial male-male interactions easy or difficult? --In ¡°Key West,¡± we see two middle-aged men on a date after their aged parents had died: ¡°as fragile as flowers, as set in their ways as cement.¡± I applaud Holleran for his accurate snapshot, however depressing¡­.

(--In ¡°Delancey Place,¡± the tone gets worse. Well-adjusted people don¡¯t do well in the bars, to get cruised you have to be in a really rotten mood, people don¡¯t look for nice guys with a friendly open face, but instead, those complicated, dangerous, neurotic.)

(3) What about good male-male friendships? --In ¡°Amsterdam,¡± a ten-year friendship collapses, largely due to one character¡¯s gross misperceptions of the other, for whatever motivations. ¡°Instead of comforting, joking laughing, commiserating and encouraging, we were going our separate ways."

(4) Are long-lasting mature male-male relationships possible or probable? --In ¡°Blorts,¡± Joshua has a good education, job, friends, physique, but no lover. Suitors appear, but ¡°Joshua always found something wrong with him; primarily, I suspect, the fact that he liked Joshua.¡±

(5) Is change and growth possible after realizations? No, all the stories do not end on lives wasted and other people not attached to. Two or three end with some ¡°possibility of grace.¡± However, most of these people seem not open to change and growth, even after insight. --In ¡°Sentimental Education,¡± a character has an epiphany. ¡°He who had once believed that sex was the means by which he engaged Life now wondered if it had not been the way he avoided it.¡± An open door? But the story ends with the character appreciating Flaubert¡¯s comment: ¡°What can compare with the joy of waking up beside someone you had never seen before and know you will never see again?¡±

--And in ¡°Key West,¡± the lonely character¡¯s old friend Lee was ¡°still good, still kind, still compassionate,¡± which is now more important than his good looks of years ago. An open path? But the story ends with the character looking at Lee asleep in the next room and then ¡°Next year, he thought, Caracas.¡± In short, more discontented detached drifting?

Glum glimpses indeed, these stories. Do they raise key issues for responding to literature? As stated above, is this The Truth about human lives? About many gay male lives? About Holleran¡¯s skewed view of same? Or are these stories sunny and I completely misread¡ªor does the current gay-lib and P.C. tone of the times, acceptance of diversity and the like, majorly block any discussion, let alone perception, of real problems here?

I read these stories with clinical interest. Things are indeed bad, as this, yes; but things are not always this bad and in any case can be aimed for better. I prefer gritty realism and truth to optimistic romance, but I thank the fates that I have (so far) escaped the level-to-downward life-career, and the drifty detachment from others, which most of these dour stories depict.