Edmund White
Edmund White, born on January 13, 1940, in Cincinnati, Ohio, is a celebrated writer known for his extensive contributions to literature, particularly his exploration of gay life and identity. He emerged from a privileged upbringing, navigating the complexities of his sexuality during a time of societal stigma. White's literary journey began with his first novel, *Forgetting Elena*, in 1973, and he became a significant voice in LGBTQ literature with works such as *The Joy of Gay Sex* (1977) and the semi-autobiographical trilogy that includes *A Boy's Own Story* (1982) and *The Beautiful Room Is Empty* (1988). His writing candidly addresses themes of self-acceptance and societal prejudice, set against the backdrop of key events like the Stonewall Inn riots, which he witnessed.
Throughout his career, White has also tackled the challenging topic of AIDS, openly disclosing his own HIV diagnosis while advocating for greater understanding and compassion. His accolades include a Guggenheim Fellowship, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and recognition as the state author of New York. In addition to his prolific writing, White has taught at prestigious institutions, including Princeton University. His literary legacy continues with recent novels like *A Saint from Texas* (2020) and *A Previous Life* (2022), affirming his status as a vital figure in contemporary literature.
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Subject Terms
Edmund White
Writer
- Born: January 13, 1940
- Place of Birth: Cincinnati, Ohio
Across his long and decorated career, writer Edmund White produced a vast body of work, including novels, stories, plays, memoirs, and biographies. His books illuminate many different aspects of gay life, making him a noted voice in both the literary and LGBTQ communities.
- Born: January 13, 1940
- Birthplace: Cincinnati, Ohio
Author Profile
Born on January 13, 1940, in Cincinnati, Ohio, to a Christian Scientist family, White moved with his psychologist mother and his sister to suburban Chicago after his parents divorced when he was seven. His father was an entrepreneur who made and lost a lot of money, but White had a generally privileged upbringing. However, he struggled with his homosexuality in an era where it was not widely accepted. Early on, he turned to queer-themed books such as Thomas Mann's Death in Venice to make him feel less lonely in his identity. "As a young teenager," he wrote in the 1991 essay "Out of the Closet, Onto the Bookshelf," "I looked desperately for things to read that might excuse me or assure me I wasn't the only one." His mother encouraged him to come out at this time, but his father never accepted his sexual orientation. In general, though, he considered his childhood to be uneventful and "boring."
White went to the upscale Cranbrook boarding school in suburban Detroit for high school and then on to the University of Michigan, where he studied Chinese. After graduating college in 1962, he followed a lover to New York where he took a job as a caption writer for Time-Life books. He worked with the company in various capacities until 1970, while beginning to try his hand as a writer of his own work. He brought out his first novel, Forgetting Elena, in 1973. He then joined six other gay writers in forming a literary group, the Violet Quill, in which the members would read each other's work and offer advice.
White had a breakthrough as an openly gay writer when he signed his name as coauthor of The Joy of Gay Sex (1977), a sex guide that claimed for gay people the same right as straight people to a fulfilling sex life. The book became a runaway success and would remain his best-selling volume. He went on to release many other nonfiction works on similar themes, such as States of Desire: Travels in Gay America (1980), which shows the diversity of gay experience in fifteen major cities.
Along with The Joy of Gay Sex, White is best known for the novels A Boy’s Own Story (1982) and The Beautiful Room Is Empty (1988), the first two entries in a semi-autobiographical trilogy. They tell the story of a boy growing up in mid-twentieth century America, fighting the self-hatred and guilt imposed on him by society because he is gay. They culminate in the Stonewall Inn riots that took place in New York City in 1969. White himself was actually present at this event, which has gained historical significance as a turning point in the LGBTQ rights movement. White published the third book in the trilogy, The Farewell Symphony, in 1997.
Many of White's other works, including the novel The Married Man (2000), also draw on aspects of his own life to explore the gay experience. In 2005, he published the autobiography My Lives, organizing it according to themes in his life as opposed to chronologically, and in 2009 he published the memoir City Boy, about his life in New York City during the 1960s and 1970s. In 2014 he published a memoir about his years in Paris, Inside a Pearl: My Years in Paris. Both White’s fiction and his nonfiction tend to be sociological, tracing the influence of social conventions and prejudices upon character.
White is also known for his writing on the difficult but important subject of AIDS, including in two short-story collections, The Darker Proof (1988) and Skinned Alive (1995). White himself was diagnosed with HIV in 1985, although he was among the small percentage deemed "slow-progressors" in the virus's development. Aiming to reduce the stigma around HIV/AIDS, White was one of the few prominent people to openly discuss their own diagnosis, and he also used his fiction to show the human side of those with the disease.
A prolific writer, White published a steady output of novels, travelogues, biographies, and critical studies through the 1990s and early decades of the twenty-first century. He earned much critical acclaim and various honors over the years. He was awarded a Guggenheim fellowship in 1983 and a National Book Critics Circle Award in 1994, and was named to the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1996 and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1999. He was appointed state author of New York in 2016 and won the PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction in 2018.
In addition to his own writing, White also started teaching in the late 1970s. After stints at Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University, and Brown University, he became a professor of creative writing at Princeton University in 1998. He based himself in New York with his longtime partner Michael Carroll; the couple married in 2013. Although White suffered two small strokes in 2012, he recovered well and continued to write prolifically. His later novels include A Saint from Texas (2020) and A Previous Life (2022).
Bibliography
Barone, Joshua. “Living with Edmund White.” The New York Times, 24 July 2020, www.nytimes.com/2020/07/24/books/edmund-white-a-saint-from-texas.html. Accessed 17 Apr. 2023.
Bergman, David. Gaiety Transfigured: Gay Self-Representation in American Literature. University of Wisconsin Press, 1991.
Christensen, Kate. "Edmund White's Body Language." The New York Times, 27 Jan. 2012. www.nytimes.com/2012/01/29/books/review/jack-holmes-and-his-friend-by-edmund-white-book-review.html. Accessed 17 Apr. 2023.
"Edmund White." National Book Foundation, www.nationalbook.org/people/edmund-white/. Accessed 14 June 2024.
Parini, Jay. "French Kisses: 'Inside a Pearl,' by Edmund White." New York Times, 7 Feb. 2014, www.nytimes.com/2014/02/09/books/review/inside-a-pearl-by-edmund-white.html. Accessed 17 Apr. 2023.
Teeman, Tim. "Edmund White: Sex, Success, and Survival." Daily Beast, 12 June 2017. www.thedailybeast.com/edmund-white-sex-success-and-survival. Accessed 17 Apr. 2023.
White, Edmund. “An Interview with Edmund White.” Interview by Kay Bonetti. Missouri Review, vol. 13, no. 2, 1990, pp. 89-110. doi.org/10.1353/mis.1990.0003. Accessed 17 Apr. 2023.