| Transcript |
12
CONNECTIONS
Man to Man
Reviewed by Lars Eighner
Since Dr. Charles Silverstein co-
authored The Joy of Gay Sex, expectations of his latest offering are bound
to be high. He meets them, Man to Man is
an original, inventive, even seminal, work.
Dr. Silverstein has completely reexamined
the development types, and meaning of
gay love, while largely freeing himself of the
entrenched stances of both the ho-
mophobe and homophile camps. There is
an abundance of new light cast on the
subject. In short, this is a must
The subtitle "Gay Couples in America"
may be a bit misleading. This is not another
gay "marriage" manual nor a survey-and-
tabulate book. Some of the "couples"
described here are little more than one-
night-stands; some are more like
roommates than lovers. Much of the book
is devoted to the development of loving
within the individual. Man to Man is long on
the "why's and how comes" of gay
coupling, but a bit shorter on the "how to's"
than I expect many readers would prefer.
Part of this, no doubt is the general
unwillingness of our community, including
Dr. Silverstein himself, to rigidly define a
gay couple." Perhaps that is a definition
that should never be made. But if it is, work
like Dr. Silverstein's must be considered,
expanded, and debated. Man to Man
reveals how truly complex the issues
involved are, even though many of us have
had pat political answers to most of these
questions for years.
For example, Dr. Silverstein considers
the Distant Father. This hoary bugaboo has
been handed down to us from straight
psychiatry, which persists in the attempt to
explain homosexual development as a
result of an alienation of father and son.
This has never explained why some sons
with demonstrably poor relations with their
father fail to become homosexuals, nor why
some homosexuals have very good
relations with their fathers.
Gay activists have always rejected the
Distant Father theory, but have failed to
account for the fact that strained relations
with the father is a very common aspect of
the history of the gay man. Both sides have
become deeply entrenched in their
positions and nothing really new has been
added to this debate for years.
But suppose, as Dr. Silverstein does, that
these causes and effects are reversed. If a
boy is gay, doesn't it seem reasonable that a
distant relationship with his father will
result? Would not even well-meaning,
accepting straight men have difficulty
relating to gay sons? If we accept some
version of the Oedipal theory, where a
straight boy puts distance between himself
and his mother, it doesn't seem so
outlandish to suppose a gay boy
contributesto the distance between himself
and his father for similar reasons and by
similar mechanisms.
Even the dogmas of Gay Liberation are
not safe from Dr. Silverstein's acute
observations. The catechism goes: "gay is a
preference; we choose to be gay.' Dr.
Silverstein's heresy is all the more
dangerous because it is true: we do not
choose to be gay: we discover we are gay
and choose to accept if The catechism
goes: 'gay men do not have sex with
teenage boys; that occurs only with
deranged heterosexuals.' Now we all know
Dr. Charles Silverstein
that is a crock, if only because many of us
had relations with adults when we were
teenagers. Dr. Silverstein just flat out says
gay men and gay boys do have sex with
each other and maybe that is not such an
awful thing. For folks still nervous about
Anita Bryant and the Save Our Children
hoopla, that is a very shocking and
frightening observation.
Dr. Silverstein's most surprising
observations, of course, are not at all alien
— they are new twists on old gambits. We
are perfectly familiar with the facts and
surprised we never thought to put them
together that way.
Sector 27
Tom Robinson
by Debra Rae Cohen
Tom Robinson used to make commitment look so easy. He was gay. proud
and good-looking. His lyrics were raised-fist
emphatic, his vocals full of hail-fellow-well-
met heartiness. It was easy to sing along
with "Glad to Be Gay," easy to stomp to his
group's straight-ahead rock & roll — i.e.,
easy to approve ofthe Tom Robinson Band
without ever really becoming engaged by
them.
Apparently. Robinson felt the same way.
Sector 27 is more complicated —
musically, lyrically and conceptually —
than either of the TRB albums, and it's a
more powerful political document because
of it
Intrigued by the strain of spacey British
progressivism that runs from the Police to
Joy Division, Robinson has made a fresh
start, assembling a highly talented group
that challenges him musically rather than
simply supporting his words.
In Stevie B especially, he's found an
accomplished, intuitive performer whose
lyrical guitar work - twisting atonal bursts,
ringing notes cast into the void a la the
Police's Andy Summers - gives the
spacious, pulsing melodies most of their
color and character. The rest of the band is
strong enough to force Robinson to
concentrate on singing, if only to keep
pace. This music strains his vocal
resources more than did the TRB's, but
that's all for the best Tom Robinson s air of
a man pressed and exhilarated by tension
fits right in with the new LP's main themes.
Sector 27's songs (mostly cowritten by
Robinson and bassist Jo Burt) paint a
portrait of an artist caught between moral
imperatives and the knowledge of his own
weakness. Instead of their old sloganeering,
the singers lyrics are full of resonant
ambiguity. The "invitation from the other
side" that Robinson must consider ("What
have we got to lose if we try it on/None of
them bastards notice when we're gone")
might be the temptation of treason, suicide
or simple escape, while the responsibilities
he must face ("'Not Ready") may be those
of sexual or political commitment,
rhetorical or physical confrontation.
Probably all of the above.
Several of Sector 27 s compositions are
concerned with the problems - logistical,
familial, internal - of gay life, yet this by no
means limits them: such detail makes the
whole record ring truer. Whether fighting
off painful fragments of memory in "Mary
Lynne" or clutching at the promise, worn by
repetition, that he'll seize control of his life
("One Fine Day"), Tom Robinson isn't
demonstrating perfect politics but how
difficult it is to be a political human being.
And that makes Sector 27 not only a fine
album but a brave one.
Rolling Stone
Man to Man requires the reader to do a
lot of rethinking and new thinking. That is
not particularly comfortable or comforting
to everyone. Clearly, a much more popular
and facile book could have come out of Dr.
Silverstein's very candid and incisive
interviews. Instead, Man to Man will remain
a cornerstone of the gay library when the
current spate of pandering pop-psychology
books has been recycled into shopping
bags.
MAN TO MAN. by Dr. Charles
Silverstein. William Morrow and
Company, inc.. 105 Madison Avenue.
, New York NY 10016. 347 pages.
$12.95.
J
iscoveri)
records
VISIT US
TO SATISFY
YOUR
MUSICAL NEEDS
*
HEADGEAR &
ACCESSORIES
RIVERTOWNE
MALI...443-2232
WESTGATE
MALL 892 13*9
10% OFF Purchase
of Non Sale Items With
This Ad thru April 30.1981
|
