“He who makes a beast of himself gets rid of the pain of being a man.” This quote by 18th-century English writer Samuel Johnson opens the Good Doctor Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas as an epigraph. There, it foreshadows a number of essential elements that make up Hunter’s classic manic eulogy … Continue reading
Tag Archives: Oscar Wilde
“Twinks4Trump”: Contrarianism, Wilde, Decadence, and the Future of Queer Politics
Happy Gay Pride, friends! Happy BIG 50 to the Stonewall Riots! I mean, Uprising. No, I mean, Rebellion! Yes, rebellion! The New York Times recently provided a series of pieces on the many conflicting narratives about Stonewall. Who threw the first brick–or stone–or rock–or coins? Surely, it wasn’t Roland Emmerich’s cornfed midwestern white boy laughably … Continue reading
Every Saint Has A Past And Every Sinner Has A Future: Worshiping At McDermott & McGough’s The Oscar Wilde Temple
Asked by prosecutor Charles Gills to define the “love that dare not speak its name” during his infamous trial for sodomy and gross indecency, Oscar Wilde responded, “It is beautiful, it is fine, it is the noblest form of affection. There is nothing unnatural about it. It is intellectual, and it repeatedly exists between an … Continue reading