Monthly Archives: June 2024
“Craft”ing Mysteries
I can’t remember when I read the first of his books. It could have been in college, but mostly likely it was when I was in grad school, and I discovered that the local public library had a dozen or so gay mystery novels. I’d have never guessed that a public library in Mississippi would have any gay novels, especially not mysteries. I can only assume that someone in town had bought and read them and then donated them to the library.
It could have also been when I subscribed to the now defunct book of the month club, InsightOut Books, which introduced me to authors like Greg Herren and many other gay authors. I devoured all the gay books the library had and as many as I could afford from the book club. Contrary to present-day gay novels dominated by male/male romances and female authors, these books from the late 1990s and early 2000s, were almost always written by gay men. As a newly out man, this was a fascinating world to discover.
Like I said, I don’t know when I read the first of his books, but once I read the first in Michael Craft’s Mark Manning series, I was hooked. The series began with Flight Dreams in 1997. In the book, Mark Manning, and investigative journalist and the accidental detective in the novels, begins his gay awakening, which begins with a series of dreams after meeting and falling in love for the first time with the man of his dreams, architect Neil Waite. There was a mystery in there too, but I think the love story made these books special to me. The series continued with six more books. Eye Contact and Body Language were next, and the series concluded with Bitch Slap in 2004.
Craft was always a bit of a campy writer who injected a fair amount of humor into his books. This was typical of gay mysteries of the time with titles like Fred Hunter’s National Nancys and Capital Queers (terrible names but fun reads) and Mark Richard Zubro’s Tom and Scott series which features as main characters, a gay schoolteacher and his lover, a professional baseball player. Grad school stopped a lot of my reading for fun because I had a ton of history books to read for classes, but I usually had a stack of books to read throughout the summer months when I was not taking classes. Eventually research and writing my dissertation, my migraines, and teaching took up most of my time.
After Michael Craft concluded his Mark Manning Mysteries and his Claire Gray Mysteries (a somewhat spinoff of the Mark Manning mysteries and his first novel Rehearsing) in 2005, he seemed to have quit writing. A few months ago, I was telling Susan about these books, and she discovered he had begun publishing a new series in 2018 called the Mister Puss Mysteries which featured a talking cat. It’s the first of these, FlabberGassed, that I started reading last night. It’s different from his other mysteries, though it takes place in the fictional town of Dumont, Wisconsin, where the Mark Manning Mysteries concluded.
I wondered if I’d like the new series. In high school I’d read the The Cat Who… Series by Lillian Jackson Braun and the Mrs. Murphy Series by Rita Mae Brown, which both featured cats. (At the time, I did not realize that Rita May Brown was the iconic lesbian author who wrote Rubyfruit Jungle, which when published in 1973 was remarkable for its explicit portrayal of lesbianism). A bit of trivia, the television movie “Murder She Purred” starring the actress and talk show host Ricki Lake was based on Rita Mae Brown’s Mrs. Murphy Series. Though I had read these cat-based mysteries some 30 years or so ago (and how did I not realize I was gay?), I hesitated to read Craft’s Mister Puss Series, but I gave it a try last night, and while I was not far into it when I went to bed, I was hooked. Yes, a talking cat is strange, but the level of camp is so much fun and reminiscent of the first gay mysteries that I’d read for the first time over 20 years ago. I’m looking g forward to reading more, which I’m about to do before I get ready for work this morning.
In the Forest
In the Forest
By Oscar Wilde
Out of the mid-wood’s twilight
Into the meadow’s dawn,
Ivory limbed and brown-eyed,
Flashes my Faun!
He skips through the copses singing,
And his shadow dances along,
And I know not which I should follow,
Shadow or song!
O Hunter, snare me his shadow!
O Nightingale, catch me his strain!
Else moonstruck with music and madness
I track him in vain!
About The Poem
“In the Forest” appears in the “Uncollected Poems” (1876–1893) section of the volume Poems, with The Ballad of Reading Gaol, published in 1909 by Methuen & Company. During the 1890s, Wilde faced three criminal and civil trials due to his relationship with the poet Lord Alfred Douglas. In March 1946, Poetry: A Magazine of Verse published the article “Oscar Wilde’s Poetry as Art History” by American poet Edouard Roditi, who wrote: “The evolution of Wilde’s descriptive style in his poetry, from the museum-piece ornateness of his earlier works to the simpler and more delicate art of his more mature poems, was accompanied, moreover, by an analogous evolution of his poetry’s intellectual content, from the discussion of general problems of politics, ethics or esthetics to a greater attention to personal impressions or to the elucidation of particular problems of the poet’s life, such as his temptations and moral conflicts. […] Wilde proved his ability to compose, had he but dared, a body of poems, on themes of sin, suffering and remorse, which might have been the Fleurs du Mal of English literature, with much of Baudelaire’s concise quality as opposed to Swinburne’s vagueness.”
About the Poet
Oscar Wilde, born in Dublin, Ireland, on October 16, 1854, was a playwright and poet. His first book of poetry, Ravenna (T. Shrimpton and Son, 1878) won the Newdigate Prize. Wilde won more acclaim for his plays, particularly An Ideal Husband (L. Smithers, 1899) and The Importance of Being Earnest (E. Matthews and John Lane, 1899). He died in Paris on November 30, 1900.
A New Day
It’s a new work week, and sort of a new era at the museum. My new director has her first day today. While she’ll probably spend most of her time with onboarding procedures and paperwork, she should be in the museum this afternoon. I initially had trepidations about this new era. I usually do not deal well with the anticipation of change, but once it happens, I generally go with the flow. With a new boss, I was worried about someone coming in and being a micromanager.
However, a few weeks ago, I had a long meeting with her, and we discussed the museum’s educational activities and our public programs. At that time, she reiterated that she was there to help not micromanage or change anything. My former director had already told her that I was very good at my job, and she was lucky to have me. I don’t expect a lot of upheaval, but I do expect a more competent director.
My previous director was a nice guy, sometimes too nice, and a good friend, but he was never cut out to be a museum administrator. I’ve always felt like his wife pushed him to pursue the position, and he was just not ready. That led to some issues, and there were times when he would hide his head in the sand instead of effectively dealing with issues that arose. I am hoping that our new director is a stronger person and a better advocate for her employees, and I hope she’ll take on problems that come up and handle them competently.
Of course, only time will tell how she will perform as director, but what I’ve seen so far, I am optimistic. I am not always the best judge of character, nor the best at recognizing red flags. I was in the hiring committee for our new director, so I hope we made the right choice. In the last two hiring committees I was on, I think we made mistakes and missed the red flags. So, I worry that I may have missed any red flags; however, I hope I learned from my previous experiences. In the song “Feelin’ Good,” Nina Simone sang:
It’s a new dawn
It’s a new day
It’s a new life for me, ooh
And I’m feeling good
I guess we’ll see how it goes, but as of now, I’m feeling good.
Pride
Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall. Better it is to be of an humble spirit with the lowly, than to divide the spoil with the proud.
—Proverbs 16:18-19 (KJV)
Should we celebrate LGBTQ+ Pride when it is considered one of the Seven Deadly Sins? The answer is yes because LGBTQ+ Pride is not a sinful pride as described in scripture. It is a celebration of who we are, and the person God created us to be. Pride in the Bible is the antonym of humility. The Britannica Dictionary offers four definitions for Pride:
- a feeling that you respect yourself and deserve to be respected by other people, i.e., self-respect
- a feeling that you are more important or better than other people
- a feeling of happiness that you get when you or someone you know does something good, difficult, etc.
- a person or thing that makes you feel proud
It is the second definition that the Bible says God abhors and is a sin. LGBTQ+ Pride is an example of the first and third definitions. LGBTQ+ Pride is about self-respect, not superiority. The Bible offers two basic types of pride: legitimate pride and sinful pride.
The word “pride” is mentioned in the Bible multiple times, but the exact count varies depending on the translation. The New King James Version mentions the word “pride” 51 times, but there are many more instances of pride that do not use the word itself. None of those instances encourage pride. Pride, in a biblical context, refers to an excessive sense of self-worth, arrogance, and superiority often leading to rebellion against God. In the Bible, pride is frequently associated with disobedience, rebellion, and an elevation of self above God and others. It is regarded as a sin that hinders humility and disrupts one’s relationship with God.
To give a biblical example, in Revelation 18, an angel announces the judgment of Babylon and describes what provokes God’s wrath on the world. Revelation 18:7 says: “In the measure that she glorified herself and lived luxuriously, in the same measure give her torment and sorrow; for she says in her heart, ‘I sit as queen, and am no widow, and will not see sorrow.’” Here we see pride is what Revelation describes as the antichrist. (The Epistle of James speaks of many antichrists, not just one as some Christians believe. An antichrist is someone who is the opposite of Christ though they will often claim to be Christ-like.) Pride is an attitude that we can trust in wealth and independence and have no need for God in our lives. As Believers, we are called to rely on the Lord for all that we need.
Matthew Poole, an English Puritan who lived from 1624–1679, summarized in his commentaries the situation this way, “Pride goeth before destruction; it is commonly a forerunner and cause of men’s ruin because it highly provokes both God and men.” There is a tension between the will of man and the will of God. For things to go well for us, we must be willing to surrender our lives to God and follow the example set forth by Christ. We are called to trust God with our hearts and believe God when He promises that He will take care of us. Proverbs 3:5-6 tells us, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.”
In contrast to sinful pride, LGBTQ+ pride is not meant to celebrate arrogance or superiority. LGBTQ+ pride is the promotion of the self-affirmation, dignity, equality, and increased visibility of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer people as a social group. Pride, as opposed to shame and social stigma, is the predominant outlook that bolsters most LGBTQ+ rights movements. Pride is a celebration of who we are and the rights we have fought to be acknowledged and protected. It is about equality, not superiority. We have parades, parties, and rainbows everywhere to celebrate Pride, and it may look like a sinful pride from the outside looking in, but it is actually a humble pride. We do not seek superiority over others; we seek equality and recognition.
In his annual proclamation for Pride month, President Biden wrote, “To the entire LGBTQI+ community — and especially transgender children — please know that your President and my entire Administration have your back. We see you for who you are: made in the image of God and deserving of dignity, respect, and support.” I can’t reiterate enough that we are made in the image of God and deserving of dignity, respect, and support. This is what Pride should be for LGBTQ+ Christians.
P.S. I could have done a whole post about Donald Trump and the sins of pride. He is one of the most sinful examples of pride in the public eye today, but with his conviction on Thursday and his and other Republicans subsequent reactions, I can only be reminded of Proverbs 16:18, “Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.”
Moment of Zen: Waterfalls
I love the sound of rushing water whether it’s a mountain stream or a waterfall. The sound is infinitely soothing. With that said, today also marks the beginning of Pride Month, and the above picture seems to be the perfect one to kick off the month.
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The Closet Professor 