Whatever Happened to LGBT Bookstores?

On June 8, 1974,the Lambda Rising Bookstore opened its doors in Washington, D.C., with a stock of three hundred titles and average sales of about $25 a day.


By 1987, it had opened a second store, established a thriving mail-order business, offers more than twenty thousand titles, and has annual sales of $1.5 million.

“We really didn't expect it to make any money,” said owner Deacon Maccubbin in retrospect.

Maccubin opened up a second store in Maryland in 1984, but it closed in the spring of 2008, as part of the trend toward LGBT bookstore (in fact, practically all brick-and-mortar bookstores) closures in the early 21st century.

Lambda did try to save one famous LGBT bookstore: The Oscar Wilde Bookshop, the United States' first gay and lesbian bookstore. Craig Rodwell in 1967 at 15 Mercer Street in Greenwich Village, later moving to the corner of Christopher and Gay Streets in Manhattan. Lambda Rising got the store going on again financially, but then sold it to the long-time manager.
 

 

Other famous LGBT bookstores that have closed include A Different Light in Los Angeles and San Francisco and Giovanni's Room in Philadelphia.

Specifically, Maccubbin announced in 2009 that his stores would close in 2010. He said:

61b5310b3bed3The phrase 'mission accomplished' has gotten a bad rap in recent years, but in this case, it certainly applies. When we set out to establish Lambda Rising in 1974, it was intended as a demonstration of the demand for gay and lesbian literature. We thought ... we could encourage the writing and publishing of LGBT books, and sooner or later other bookstores would put those books on their own shelves and there would be less need for a specifically gay and lesbian bookstore. Today, 35 years later, nearly every general bookstore carries LGBT books.61b5310b3bed4

 

What “general bookstores?” In Chicago, I've witnessed the disappearance of Kroch's and Brentanos, Crown Books, Barnes & Nobles, Barbara's Bookstore (where I bought my first gay book, 61b5310b3bed3The Sexual Outlaw61b5310b3bed4 by John Rechy) and Borders. Unabridged Books, a local (now it's trendy to be local) icon, in the Boystown area still thrives, but it is not exclusively LGBT, but does carry quite a bit of stock in that area.
 

Are brick-and-mortar bookstores, or gasp, even books, now a thing of the past, like rotary phones, local savings and loans, and milkmen?

Some might argue that the medium of print has evolved into diverse, flexible, electronic formats such as Kindle and will continue to evolve. But I think there's a deeper message here, and to understand it, we need to go back even further, before the days of gay liberation.

I was reading on the precarious faculty blog site (which calls itself an online reading room) that workers' reading and education tradition include Mechanics' Institutes (1800) and Reading Rooms in union halls. Dorothy Day's February 1940 Day by Day column in 61b5310b3bed3The Catholic Worker61b5310b3bed4 specifically mentions the reading rooms in every union she visited. Samuel Gompers' cigar rollers even voted to have a member on the clock read to them as they worked!


Imagine! Someone reading to you as an adult, not a child! And at work!

 

Now, in the monasteries and convents up to the days before Vatican II, as part of the religious discipline, someone would be assigned to read while the monks and nuns ate meals in the refectory. (I can't fathom something comparable happening in today's virtual offices!)

The experience implied that language was something that was savored patiently, like a gourmet meal or a good sex scene with a partner willing to go beyond slam, bang, thank you ma'am. Whether you experienced it reading out loud or silently, the act was both individual and communal.

In the past, going to a bookstore meant you were both browsing alone but also doing it physically, in a public place where you could, without incurring suspicion, hang out for hours. Going to a LGBT bookstore implied you were also part of a community of shared values, and you not only showed your affinity my physically hanging out there, but also by purchasing a physical source of knowledge and values and taking it into your home environment. Even if you had to hide the book or magazine, it became something sacred because it was taboo, and thus a tangible, living connection with the deepest part of your identity.

Social media is fast and convenient and works wonders to connect others with shared values in crisis situations, but what bothers me about it is that the word element gets lost: the word as both language and also something that a live person embodies in an “I-Thou” dialogue. Kind of like Judaism's idea of the Torah as the eternal voice of God or the Christian theology of the Word made flesh. Something that needs more than a tweet or a non-verbal instagram to express.

 

Joan Didion predicted something this dynamic would happen in her study of the 1960s counterculture, 61b5310b3bed3Slouching Towards Bethlehem61b5310b3bed4, where she decried that the reliance on images and quick fixes (slogans like" All You Need Is Love") to complex problems, caused a loss of critical thinking: “The ability to think for one's self depends upon one's mastery of the language.” 

In those 1960s, feeling groovy meant you needed to “slow down, you're moving too fast, gotta make the morning last.” In the 21st century, where and when can you even slow down? Definitely not in a tweet. And sadly, no longer in a bookstore.


 

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Does Bigger Mean Better?: Thoughts About A Book for "Size Queens"

Does Bigger Mean Better?: Thoughts About A Book for "Size Queens"

In 1985, a book came out called How to Enlarge Your Penis. Yes, instructions on how to get that all powerful king of dicks that many men have always wanted. According to the book, by someone with a degree in history (what does history have to do with creating a big dick?), various types of vacuum pumps are apparently a particularly effective way to enlarge the cock.

 

Now, in ancient Greek and Arabic, there were manuals on the subject (I’m going to take from an Arabic manual) that proscribed that when an Arab boy reaches the age of six, his father initiates him into the practice of “JELQ”; This is where the boy slowly strokes his cock form bottom to top every day for an half an hour to enlarge it. Now this is a very good and understanding father.

Though the information in this book is quite fascinating in scope, it seems like the real appeal is for size queens. For example, the book includes a picture by Tom of Finland, whose drawings with exaggerated cocks play on the age-old fascination that a big dick is power, an aphrodisiac that makes all who come in contact with a big beautiful cock swoon. So to illustrate the point, the majority of the photos in this book are of famous porn stars with 11-inch dicks or longer: Cassidy, Dakota, Ray Fuller, and the legendary John Holmes.


Nothing is new under the sun or under the covers, for that matter. This obsession with a big cock and its potency is apparently something men never grow out of. That desire sublimates itself even today in the constant ads for Viagra and similar products. But as Dr. Ruth has advised, in a multitude of ways, bigger is not necessarily better.

But can big mean better, or even best, in certain contexts? In the case of the porn stars above, the big cock works in their favor as an immediately identifiable indicator of sexual power, prowess and sexual gratification. Isn't that why many gay men watch porn? To share in that power, and then enjoy good sex where the whole time your dick feels like it is 13 inches (even it it's not) because you feel good about yourself and your sexuality. So as I see it in the end (pun intended), sorry Dr. Ruth, bigger is better.

 

 

 

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Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Lee Ryder

Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Lee Ryder

We at Bijou carry back issues of Manshots magazines, which was, I think, in its heyday (the late eighties and early nineties), offered a sophisticated approach to gay porn; its video reviews were generally cogent and intelligent, even scholarly. It treated gay porn in all its variety of genres like something that deserved thoughtful analysis, especially the movies now legendary directors like Steve Scott, Toby Ross, and Tom DeSimone made (movies Bijou carries, by the way).

And Manshots also offered some telling biographies of and interviews with most of the great gay porn stars of the past; again, treating their lives (and of course their activities on screen) as something as interesting and entertaining as any feature on a celebrity in a mainstream magazine like People.

And if there was a gay porn star, or “retrostud” who deserved celebrity treatment, it was Lee Ryder. But like many of the gay porn stars of that period, as noted in the all­too­common “Fade Out” feature at the back of so many back issues of Manshots, he died of AIDS-­related complications (in 1991).

Lee Ryder was born in 1959 as Darras Robert Pyron. He was California born and bred, raised in Laguna, and he graduated from Esperanza High School in Anaheim.

After Mark Reynolds discovered him and featured him in All American Boys, he literally made a splash in Falcon Studio's Huge in 1982.

He starred in thirteen features between 1982 and 1986, including Bijou titles Screenplay, A Few Good Men, Giants 1, and 2 X 10.

Now, of course, if one views these films, it's clear that Lee Ryder's cock is pretty much legendary. According to one Jeff Starkey, who reviewed the movie Screenplay in tandem with Ryder's appearances at the Bijou Theater to greet fans and sign autographs back in 1984:

"Ryder's cock is long, thick, and shapely and is criss­crossed by just the right number of lovely veins. Beneath it hang a perfectly balanced pair of what appear to be 5­pound balls. When his cock appears in public, it is usually hard as a baseball bat, with its swollen head looking purple and petulant."

Purple and petulant? Wow. Perhaps those adjectives could apply to the cock, but not the person.

In an interview with Stallion magazine, known for his sexually aggressive but also unforced, natural screen presence, seems rather low­key, both veering between a quiet confidence in himself, but also showing a somewhat self­-deprecating attitude. Definitely not the “divo” attitude of so many celebrities: “Everyone wants to look at me, I am the 
Adonis with the giant cock and all should worship me."

 

In fact, in the interview, he actually seems rather pragmatic: he does it for the money, and for his business (he actually was a successful floral designer), but ... he actually doesn't see himself as a sex symbol. He just enjoys being himself, and letting a chink of vulnerability come out, being wanted.

(We also find out in the interview he had a relationship with an older guy from ages 15 to 18, who tragically committed suicide soon after they broke up.)

To add to the complexity of his character, despite his appearance at the Bijou and other venues as a gay porn celebrity, he actually admits he would rather not be recognized (he even goes to Europe to escape the attention)... and he notices, even when he does, the guys stay away, or “they stare – I guess I do show a big crotch – or they look at my eyes.”

To be honest, at least for me, the eyes can be just as erotic as, especially in Ryder's case, a dick of death. And Ryder he admits in the interview that he loves his eyes. And rightly so!

 

His eyes make love to the camera, like those of that famous movie star Joan Crawford (completely the opposite in her approach to celebrity). The eyes themselves create a unique effect in the viewer; they seem to draw you in with a promise of something intense; you think he is looking directly at you via the camera, which could satisfy your desire, but you at the same time feel like you will always want more. Perhaps it's their narrow shape but also richly colored pupils. I don't know, but I can't stop looking at his picture on the cover on Stallion magazine as I write this piece.

And I promise you, you won't be able to take your eyes off of Lee Ryder in our remastering of Huge (now Huge 1) as he beats his meat while perched on the toilet ­ ­ making it bigger, hotter and harder. He, Rick Jensen and Matt Stoker roll around on the cold concrete floor, licking each other's hairy armpits and sitting on each other's faces.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

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What's All This I Hear About Manspreading?

What's All This I Hear About Manspreading?


Emily Litella of Saturday Night Live fame might have got this term wrong and called it something like “tanspread” or “manshead or even “sandwich spread;” I am waiting for this term to perhaps get into the Oxford English dictionary in a few years.

So what is it? Is it a noun, a verb? Animal, vegetable, or mineral? Bigger than a bread box? It actually could be all of these.

Here's a pic which shows, not tells, what it is, and it mostly takes place on the subway or other forms of public transportation, perhaps making it a more urban image:

 
Essentially, the posture takes up too much space on a seat, and those who complain about it tend to be women. Some women tend to see it as showing a basic lack of consideration among males (I totally agree), and some even see it as an assertion of male privilege and its accompanying sexual dominance (well, that depends … )


Even the conservative National Review, despite its biases and nasty overgeneralizations about feminism, satirized (I would hope this is the case) some more extreme reactions to this posture. The article is actually more upset that “big government” would intervene even to the point of arresting someone(?!).

 

Yet, how dare a municipality put up a sign reminding people (in this case, mostly men) to just be more considerate of others on public transportation. And not just manspreading, but loud headphones and backpacks and other luggage and staring into phones and thus not watching where one is going while entering and exiting ...

The fact is, both sexes use specific body language to assert dominance; in the case of guys, such dominance usually involves taking up space, marking territory, as it were.

Manspread is one of those postures, as is the hands on hips or arms akimbo one. The latter also indicates readiness (sports players often stand this way waiting for action in a game) as well as dominance, and some studies have revealed that African-American women will also use this pose to show disagreement or even disgust.

Have I noticed this pose? Yes, of course, because who at gay men isn't looking for a seductive bulge? A gay man thus might interpret this pose differently, as a sexual come-on, however unconscious. But does a gay man interpret the accompanying power dynamic differently?


I could see this particularly pose as actually more submissive than dominant. The cock is open for play. And for those BDSM-inclined guys, open for cock and ball torture. In a pansexual BDSM scene, a dominatrix might want this pose so she could squeeze the guy's cock and balls. I even coined a term called “slavespread;” a sub bottom slave would sit this way, hands behind his back, cock and balls exposed.

I don't want to suggest that everyone should thus enjoy manspreading. There's a time and place to get horny, be it a dominant, submissive or mutual interaction. Move your legs. Let someone else sit next to you. Well, in the case of a gay man, that action might end up becoming an even more intimate proposition.

b2ap3_thumbnail_slavespread.jpg

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Forty Years Ago: Fred Halsted and Jack Wrangler Debuts

Forty Years Ago: Fred Halsted and Jack Wrangler Debuts

In the spring of 1975, states were repealing sodomy laws, though on April 12 the Arizona House passed an emergency measure to ban same-sex marriages, and the Colorado Attorney General ruled such marriages were illegal too.


Despite these setbacks the gay liberation counterculture was in full swing, despite so many setbacks, and the gay porn industry, at that time a major outlet for expressing openly (and often artistically) gay men's sexuality, was flourishing in its film to movie theater format.

 

For example, on April 30, Fred Halsted's film Sextool came out. Its definitely experimental approach - which involved surrealistic imagery, BDSM sex, and disjunctive editing - turned off rather than on many reviewers, but it did get a write up in the mainstream press. Variety actually claimed Halsted was “the Ken Russell of S & M homoerotica.” Bijou's review is here.

On May 19, Jack Stillman made his debut as Jack Wrangler when he performed a striptease on cowboy gear at the Paris Theater in Los Angeles. He was dressed like a cowboy. He took his surname from those cowboy jeans that really show off a cute ass, of course.

 

Later that year, he starred in his first gay porn film, Ranch Dudes, a 15-minute loop where he jacks off his big member in a corral. He must have really been into that cowboy look early in his career. We have remastered an edit of this loop, calling it Cowboy, in our Magnum Griffin 14 compilation.

 

Here at Bijouworld.com and Bijougayporn.com (where both of these titles can be found) we are dedicated to the preservation and dissemination of key artistic mediums that shaped and continue to shape gay sexuality.

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