I’ll be frank: Born to Be Gay and The Bronze and the Wine are two of my least favorite of Victor’s gay pulps, but I’m going to try to do my best by them anyhow. I don’t have a ton to say in defense of content or quality besides providing the context that they’re also two of his earliest novels. Both were published in 1966—June and September, respectively. Born was, in fact, Victor’s first Greenleaf novel after The Why Not and The Man from C.A.M.P., both of which were notable for departing from more formulaic modes of gay storytelling under sleaze paperback publishers. Born is… not quite that.
Born to Be Gay follows Terry, a gay teenager navigating the torments of being a small-town gay kid in a pulp novel. Enduring daily threats and violence from a group of bullies all battling their own repressed same sex desires, Terry finds himself turning to his alluring French teacher Bruce Tucker for respite and support. You can imagine what it was that his teacher actually wanted from him, though their relationship represents a different kind of abuse than the dangers Terry faces with his school bullies (we shall be returning to our French teacher in the following post!). Amidst all of that, Terry finds himself in a budding romance with Jack, the school’s new transfer student… and semi-complicit bystander to Terry’s bullies.
Young men striking out on their own for the first time is a decently common trope in Victor’s gay pulps, but high school–aged/under-18 lead characters are quite rare. In 30+ books, I can think of only three besides Terry: the nameless “Psyche” of Man Into Boy (1968), 17-year-old Spiro from Brandon’s Boy (1968), and 14-year-old David of Victor’s anonymously published and truly uncategorizable piece of fake 15th century erotica, Friar Peck and His Tale (1969). Terry, however, is the only one of those four protagonists we see attend high school. [An additional two novels, The Bronze and the Wine (1966) and Gaydreams (1968), feature secondary protagonists in high school.]
This means that, obscure as Born may be in his bibliography, Terry also went on to become something of a celebrity in Victor’s early pulps. As Maggie points out in her comments on The Gay Trap, you’ll come across a handful of Born scenes serving as word count padding to the first editions of other early novels of his, passed off as flashback material to when protagonists were Terry’s age.
In that light, Terry is actually quite interesting for the fact that he went on to become a kind of shorthand for gay adolescence in Victor’s pulps. I’ve always wondered whether or not Greenleaf ever pasted him into any non-Victor works, but I’ve yet to see it.
Both Born to Be Gay and The Bronze and the Wine are among the small handful of Victor’s novels scholar Randall Ivey focuses on in his 2013 chapter of The Misplaced Heritage, “Guerrilla Literature: The Many Worlds of Victor J. Banis.” In the case of Born to Be Gay, I think Ivey does a particularly good job of breaking down some of the novel’s ideas about gay self-knowledge & internalized homophobia, so I don’t want to encroach too much on the territory of his analysis.
Differences of opinion are inevitable, but his work is certainly the most comprehensive scholarly look at Victor’s works beyond CAMP/The Why Not in print (so far!). His analysis of Born to Be Gay can be found on pages 201–203 of The Misplaced Heritage.
In an effort to put Born’s most interesting foot forward, you’ll find an excerpt @ the end of this post covering a few of the novel’s central themes, starting with teacher Bruce’s harsh rejection of Terry’s feelings and concluding with Terry’s first taste of real romance as he shares his first kiss with Jack.
This excerpt also highlights what sets Born apart from the other novels we’ve discussed so far: where So Sweet, So Soft, So Queer focuses solely on a romance and journey towards embracing gay identity, the central relationships in AC-DC Lover are all about power imbalances, manipulation, and denials of queerness. Born, in contrast, gives us both. In this snippet, we see that these elements are incorporated not only within the same novel but sequentially in the very same chapter. The intention in their juxtaposition feels clear, and it helps inform the way we read each element.
The excerpt begins with Tommy confronting Bruce by asking if he’s “ever [thought] about real love” in the context of their relationship, a line of questioning that is not received well.
“I mean,” Bruce went on. “Two fellows can’t love one another, unless they’re queer, and I’m not.”
He had not, Terry noticed, said “we’re not.” Bruce no doubt considered him as queer. But it was puzzling to him how he could be queer, and Bruce was not. (Born to Be Gay, Chapter 8)
Key here is not only Bruce’s rejection of the label but his insistence on a stark difference between Terry’s status and his own, one that might ring a bell to anyone familiar with the central plot of AC-DC Lover, in which pro-manipulator Lenny Adams enacts his convoluted scheme to seduce a married man, convince him he’s gay, and then dropkick him out of the picture by denying having feelings for him:
“That’s different,” Nick insisted. “I can’t help that, or how I feel about you. But I don’t want to be queer, like those people we met last night.”
“You are queer!” Lenny said mercilessly. “Wake up. You weren’t doing anything last night that you haven’t done with me. What difference does it make whether it’s me or any man off the streets?”
“I love you,” Nick sobbed helplessly.
Lenny smiled and allowed the silence to linger for a moment. “I don’t believe you,” he said finally. (AC-DC Lover, Chapter 14)
Though Lenny’s initial arguments rely on making Nick feel he’s “queer” based on his relationship with Lenny, he quickly changes his tune once his “conversion” tactics have proven successful:
“You said you wanted me to leave her, you said this was the life for me. Don’t you see, I’m yours now, you can do whatever you want with me.”
Lenny released his grip and turned his back on Nick. He would have to see Gloria as soon as possible, convince her that there was nothing queer about him. He could make her believe that he had only submitted to Nick’s demands out of sympathy.
“Why are you angry with me?” Nick sobbed from behind him.
“Get out of here,” Lenny snarled without turning. Do you think I’d want a weak, sniveling faggot like you hanging around me? You make me sick!” (AC-DC Lover, Chapter 15)
Like Bruce Tucker, it’s critical to Lenny that he not be seen as gay. And, like Born to Be Gay, Victor deliberately frames this as something these men tell other people and themselves, but is by no means validated by the narrative itself. However, unlike AC-DC Lover, the privileged perspective in Born to Be Gay is the belittled and emasculated party in the equation.
In other words, Born to Be Gay doesn’t leave it up to subtext to call out the Lennys of the world on their posturing. Terry is mad, he wants “real love,” and he finds it in the very next scene, as Jack expressing his jealousy over Terry’s sexual relationship with Bruce culminates in a kiss that suggests Terry has finally found someone whose interest in him goes deeper than sex.
Born may not be Victor’s finest pulp work, but its place in the development of his writing is well worth documenting!
The first edition text of Born to Be Gay is available through Hommi Publishing.
“You know,” he said slowly, not looking at Bruce. “You’ve never really told me how you feel.”
“About what?”
“About me,” Terry said.
Bruce chuckled and ruffled Terry’s hair again. “I thought you knew—I like you, I think you’re a good kid. Why?”
“Is that all?” Like was a pretty mild word for the sort of relationship they had been having. “Well, I enjoy making love with you.” Bruce seemed genuinely ignorant of Terry’s meaning. “Don’t you ever think about real love?” Terry asked, frustrated.
Bruce scowled. “You mean loving you? That would be kind of impossible, wouldn’t it?”
Terry stared at him wordlessly. It did not seem impossible to him at all. It was exactly what he had expected when things had started between them.
“I mean,” Bruce went on. “Two fellows can’t love one another, unless they’re queer, and I’m not.”
He had not, Terry noticed, said “we’re not.” Bruce no doubt considered him as queer. But it was puzzling to him how he could be queer, and Bruce was not.
“I guess you’re right,” Terry said finally, although he did not agree at all. His question had been answered, and there was no need to pursue the subject further.
It was still fairly early when Terry left and started for home again. As he started up the steps to his front door, he heard a footstep behind him and turned to see Jack approaching.
“Well, hi,” he greeted his friend. “What brings you by?”
“I stopped earlier to see you,” Jack explained. He did not seem particularly cheerful. “When your dad told me you were out, I waited around out here to see you.”
“If I’d known, I’d have been here sooner,” Terry said, puzzled by Jack’s distant manner. His friend was plainly annoyed about something. “I had to go out for a while.”
“With Bruce?” Jack asked. There was a nasty edge to his voice.
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I did see him,” Terry answered curtly, offended by the tone. “And I might say, you seem awfully concerned about Mr. Tucker the last day or so.”
“Are you sleeping with him?” Jack asked sharply.
The blunt question caught Terry off guard, and he was grateful for the darkness that concealed his blush of embarrassment.
“What if I am?” he snapped. “I don’t see what business that should be of yours, or why it should matter to you at all.” It was not the right thing to say, he knew. He should be denying the suggestion forcefully. But Jack’s words had stung him, and he wanted to slap back in any way possible.
They glared at one another in silence for a long moment, and already Terry was beginning to regret the quarrel. Although being near Jack was an agony of frustration, he was at the same time too fond of Jack to want to give up his friendship. But he was sure that Jack would not want to be his friend if he realized that Terry’s desires were homosexual.
“Maybe it matters a great deal,” Jack said in a low voice that was little more than a whisper. He took a step closer, grabbing Terry by the shoulders in a firm grip. Almost before Terry knew what was happening, Jack had pulled their bodies together, bent his face down. Terry’s mouth was crushed beneath Jack’s, filled with the sweetness of the other’s lips.
It was over in a second. Terry stood breathless, his legs turning to jelly beneath him, as Jack released him and stepped abruptly back. His eyes stared deeply in Terry’s, seeking anxiously for some response. Terry was too dazed, however, to respond. He was speechless and amazed.
Without another word, Jack turned and ran, dashing quickly away into the night. He was gone before Terry realized what was happening.
Terry half moved to follow him, but instinct stopped him. He knew that Jack would be embarrassed by his actions, perhaps even angry. Even if Terry followed him, they would probably only quarrel; and the moment had been too perfect to spoil.
With a dazed smile, Terry started again for his front door. A short time before, he had been disappointed to realize that Bruce did not love him.
Now that hardly seemed to matter at all.
