A beautiful, beguiling journey to the ultimate queer utopia, a site of riotous hedonism, wild creativity and immense loss. Fire Island is a fascinating, throbbing history that asks the most urgent of contemporary questions: what does paradise look like, and who does it exclude?”— Olivia Laing "Jack Parlett’s Fire Island is that rare book: a compelling social history of a time and place that, through carefully assembled detail and astute analysis brilliantly illuminates American culture as well as its topic. Its expansive cast of characters—Frank O’Hara, W.H. Auden, James Baldwin, Lorraine Hansberry, Truman Capote, Carson McCullers Tennessee Williams, Andy Warhol, Robert Mapplethorpe, Patricia Highsmith—demonstrate that Fire Island was a crucible of brilliance and creativity as well sexual and personal freedom. Interlacing insightful observations with flashes of personal memoir Parlett beautifully conjures Fire Island as myth, metaphor, and microcosm of queer culture that profoundly changed American culture."—Michael Bronski, author of A Queer History of the United States "The zingy tale of one magnetic place — as well as a sprawling rumination on the intertwined urges to get away and get together. Clued-up but insatiably thirsty, poignant, packed with literary intrigue, Fire Island is a beaming beach read."—Jeremy Atherton Lin, author of Gay Bar Vibrant… uniquely insightful and colorful cultural history… An illuminating, well-written history of a unique place.” —Kirkus Reviews “Poetic and moving…beautifully written … Readers of all stripes will appreciate this fast-paced general interest title.”—Library Journal "A fine account of an important place in gay cultural history."—Booklist "Delightfully chronicled... the history of a queer landmark, its beginnings, its influence, and its seemingly constant evolution."—The Advocate "A must-read. [Parlett's] prose illuminates and educates as well as lovingly shimmers across chapters... a memorable tribute to an unforgettable queer vacation destination."—Bay Area Reporter "A riveting social history of Fire Island... Supremely engaging and highly informative."—Buzzfeed “[An] engrossing history… This is essential reading for the ferry from Sayville or wherever you happen to be.”–Town and Country “[A] concise, meticulously researched, century-spanning chronicle of queer life on Fire Island captures, with a plain-spoken yet lyric touch, the locale’s power to stun and shame, to give pleasure and symbolize evanescence… Parlett is sharp-minded about gentrification, class, racism and the “structural privilege” built into Fire Island’s style, a hegemonic strand… this book enacts a glancing yet trenchant meditation on community, “ecological precarity” and the fugitive links between place and sexuality… the well-timed pulsations [of Parlett’s prose] bring beach light onto the page.” –The New York Times Book Review
“Parlett’s task of compacting about 100 years of cultural history into a slim volume would seem nearly impossible. That is, if he weren’t such a deft storyteller. His book breezes by with beach-read ease but is packed with enough facts, theories, and anecdotes to inspire weeks’ worth of dinner conversations…. Wonderful…detailed, inclusive, and compassionate.”—Jezebel
"[Fire Island] takes a 30,000-foot view, helmed by one of the island’s greatest gifts: literature. Through an investigation of the queer writers who took up residence in Cherry Grove and the Pines (the island’s queer communities), Jack Parlett assembles a literary history that embraces complexity."—Esquire
"With its stunning beaches, legendary parties and rich cultural history, Fire Island is celebrated in Parlett’s deeply researched book."—New York Daily News
"[A] richly textured history ... Parlett captures the giffy excesses, but his real aim is to show how a community sought to define, protect, liberate, and celebrate themselves."—The New Yorker
03/28/2022
Literary theorist Parlett (The Poetics of Cruising) delivers an immersive history of Fire Island and the evolution of LGBTQ culture in 20th-century America. Documenting the island’s Native American origins; the emergence of Cherry Grove and its neighboring community, Fire Island Pines, as refuges for those seeking to evade “the scrutiny of mainland morality”; and their development as increasingly risqué and sexually permissive vacation destinations in the latter half of the 20th century, Parlett excels at portraying literary odd couples who helped shape the culture of Fire Island. These include “gay patron saints” Walt Whitman and Oscar Wilde (though Parlett admits there is “no real evidence” Wilde visited the island), writers Frank O’Hara and James Baldwin, and novelists Carson McCullers and Patricia Highsmith, who were part of Fire Island’s “lesbian literati” in the 1950s and ’60s. Parlett also does an admirable job illuminating how the Stonewall Riots, the emergence of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the 1980s, and other events affected the island’s gay community, though his attempts to weave in autobiographical reflections are somewhat less effective. Still, this is a rich and rewarding study of Fire Island’s vital role in LGBTQ history and culture. (June)
04/01/2022
Parlett's (literary theory, Oxford Univ.; The Poetics of Cruising) literary history of Fire Island also uses memoir and social history to document gay and lesbian life and arts in the beach community on New York's Long Island. The literary side of Fire Island goes back to Walt Whitman, with an overwhelming cast of more recent luminaries (W. H. Auden, James Baldwin, Patricia Highsmith, Larry Kramer, Frank O'Hara). For some writers and artists, Fire Island was a place of respite and creativity; others just used it a quick getaway, and queer people discovered it to be a place of freedom. Long before Stonewall, Fire Island became a refuge from the threats to queer New Yorkers; its house parties, discos, and beach cruising made for a uniquely liberating experience. Parlett also notes the AIDS crisis's effect on Fire Island's culture. Among the most poetic and moving parts of this beautifully written book are Parlett's own memories of New York City, Fire Island, and his growth as a gay man. VERDICT Readers of all stripes will appreciate this fast-paced general interest title.—David Azzolina
Narrator Joe Jameson smoothly blends the British author’s polished documentary-style remove, accessible literary scholarship, and candid memoir to create especially engaging narrative nonfiction. The rich cultural history and unique identities of Fire Island’s gay communities, Cherry Grove and the Pines, unfold through Jameson’s clear, well-paced delivery. Famous literary visitors, including Patricia Highsmith, W.H. Auden, James Baldwin, and AIDS activists Vito Russo and Larry Kramer, illuminate the intersections of their daily lives with the arts and social justice movements, on and off the island. These vibrant communities have served as a refuge and vacation destination for generations of predominantly white, cisgender gay men, and a now growing number of travelers from across the LGBTQIA+ community. This production is a listening treat for queer history enthusiasts. J.R.T. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine
Narrator Joe Jameson smoothly blends the British author’s polished documentary-style remove, accessible literary scholarship, and candid memoir to create especially engaging narrative nonfiction. The rich cultural history and unique identities of Fire Island’s gay communities, Cherry Grove and the Pines, unfold through Jameson’s clear, well-paced delivery. Famous literary visitors, including Patricia Highsmith, W.H. Auden, James Baldwin, and AIDS activists Vito Russo and Larry Kramer, illuminate the intersections of their daily lives with the arts and social justice movements, on and off the island. These vibrant communities have served as a refuge and vacation destination for generations of predominantly white, cisgender gay men, and a now growing number of travelers from across the LGBTQIA+ community. This production is a listening treat for queer history enthusiasts. J.R.T. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine
2022-02-25
A vibrant social history of the iconic bastion of queer culture and leisure.
Inspired by the work of poet Frank O’Hara, a frequent visitor to Fire Island who was tragically killed in a freakish accident there in 1966, Parlett first ventured to the island in 2017 while furthering his doctoral research on American poetry and cruising. His experiences during this visit, as a curious researcher who was also actively engaged in the gay party scene, serve as the launching point for this uniquely insightful and colorful cultural history. Parlett traces the extraordinary literary heritage of the island, including its earliest foundation, laid by Walt Whitman and Oscar Wilde; midcentury luminaries (W.H. Auden, Tennessee Williams, Carson McCullers, Patricia Highsmith) and their booze-fueled escapades; and later, the more serious, politically charged influence of James Baldwin, who drew much-needed attention to the narrow Whiteness of the community. The hedonistic, sex-and-drug–laden tenor of the 1970s and ’80s, portrayed in novels by Edmund White, Andrew Holleran, and others, was ravaged by the onslaught of the AIDS epidemic, which had an indelible, long-lasting impact on the island’s literary and artistic culture. “Along with the many artists and writers lost to AIDS,” writes Parlett, “came the loss of an engaged and informed audience; the readership that kept gay publishing afloat, and the wider sense of a community consuming and critiquing the work of its own luminaries and emerging voices.” Throughout the book, the author smoothly interweaves an enlightened perspective of the island’s influence and importance with candid appraisals of its shortcomings, especially related to cultural homogenization and the overwhelming Whiteness that has continued into the 21st century. “Fire Island feels like a case study of utopian imperfections,” writes Parlett, “of the way norms become entrenched and inequalities perpetuated in a place defined by the fact that it is not, simply, for everyone.”
An illuminating, well-written history of a unique place.
