Edmund White
Edmund White was born on January 19, 1940 in Cincinnati, Ohio. His parents
divorced when White was seven years old. He moved with his mother and sister
to Evanston. He has written of searching for books in the Evanston Public
Library about homosexuality and found only Thomas Mann's Death in Venice
and a biography of Nijinski. Neither book painted an attractive picture
of life as a homosexual and did not ease his desperation as he tried to
piece together his identity.
White was schooled at Cranbrook Academy and then studied at the University
of Michigan (his major was Chinese). He moved to New York City and embarked
on a five year relationship with another man. From 1962 - 1970, White worked
for Time-Life Books. After a year in Rome, White came back to the U.S. and
worked as an editor at The Saturday Review and Horizon. He
and six other gay writers in New York formed the Violet Quill in the mid-1970's./
This group included Andrew Holleran, Robert Ferro, Felice Picano, George
Whitmore, Christopher Cox, and Michael Grumley. The Violet Quill met in
the apartments of its members where they read and offered critiques of each
other's work. White has published several critically and commercially successful
books: Forgetting Elena (1972) and Nocturnes for the King of Naples (1978)
as well as two largely autobiographical novels -- A Boy's Own Story (1982)
and The Beautiful Room is Empty (1988).
White moved to France from 1983 - 1990. Cox, Whitmore, Ferro and Grumley
and many more of White's closest friends had all died from AIDS during the
time White lived in France. White himself is HIV-positive.
White is also a cultural critic. He co-wrote The Joy of Gay Sex: An Intimate
Guide for Gay Men to the Pleasures of a Gay Life with Dr. Charles Silverstein.
His 1980 book States of Desire: Travels in Gay America was a travelogue
which looked at gay life just before the devastation of the AIDS crisis.
His 1991 anthology, Gay Short Fiction, was heavily criticized for
its failure to include works by any men of color.
His most recent work is a monumental biography of Jean Genet, the French
novelist and playwright. White wrote of the dilemma facing gay writers:
"Some... think that it's unconscionable to deal with anything [besides
AIDS]; others believe that since gay culture is in imminent danger of being
reduced to a single issue, one that once again equates homosexuality with
a dire medical condition, the true duty of gay writers is to remind readers
of the wealth of gay accomplishments. Only in that way, they argue, will
a gay heritage be passed down to a post-plague generation."
