Love Stories of Gay Men: Representations of Masculinity in the 1960s-2010s
By Kavya Jain (2025)
In my research, I explored three prominent authors from the 1960s to 2010s who wrote love stories about gay men. The authors I researched were Carl Corley, John Preston, and Damon Suede, authors in the 1960s-70s, 1980s-90s, and 2000-10s respectively. By analyzing primary sources such as interviews, blog posts written by the authors, and book covers, I investigated how the authors represented masculinity in gay love stories. According to primary sources, Corley, Preston, and Suede portray masculinity as deeply emotional and both dominant and tender. My research also finds that the authors argue that representations of masculinity must encompass the positive experiences and identities of gay men, not just trauma and pain. While there is some overlap in representations of men, there are also some key differences that I will explore.
Corley and Preston both represent men as experiencing intense, uncontrollable emotions. Corley wrote gay pulp fiction in the 60s and 70s, and his book, A Chosen World, is marketed on the front cover as being about a homosexual who was “trapped by tormenting emotions… he couldn’t understand!” [1]. The tormenting emotions were because of his gay identity, suggesting that his intense emotional experience was in part due to his sexuality. Preston, an author in the 80s and 90s, addresses a similar torment. An advanced review of a non-fiction work of his, Hometowns: Gay Men Write about Where They Belong, expresses that the story is “bittersweet” and deals with rejection and being “American with a difference” [2]. Preston’s representations of men include love yet also the struggles that gay men face due to homophobia and rejection. While these sources address the intensity of emotion because of the societal response to homosexuality, Corley also represents the intensity of a different emotion– desire. The back cover of A Fallen Eagle states “there is a hungriness in men that cannot quite be explained” [3]. The word, “hungriness”, makes the emotion feel primal and uncontrollable. Hunger is natural, and so is the desire of men in this representation. The back cover also includes the quote, “That man is a savage still, is obvious in his passion”. The word “savage” also invokes a feeling of uncontrollability, and this description paints a picture of men who feel such intense desire that they cannot control their passion, and must act on it. The advertising for this book represents men, specifically gay men in this case, as naturally experiencing intense passion and desire. This experience of intense desire is also discussed in an interview, where Preston responds to the interviewer’s question about gay men acting in “sexually irresponsible” ways [4]. Preston says he “finds nothing unique” about the behavior of gay men, and that all men are sexually irresponsible. He thinks the masculine trait of being sexually irresponsible in this way is similar for straight and gay men. Being sexually irresponsible could also be explained by this uncontrollable desire that Corley describes, but Preston’s interview didn’t delve into this. While Suede, an author in the 2010s, does not address intense emotions in his own books, he does talk about his experience reading Gordon Merrick’s books about gay characters [5]. Suede talks about what drew him to Merrick’s work, saying that while the stories were unrealistic, the “intense feelings felt real”. There was a “heated, obsessive, frantic quality” in the characters in Merrick’s books which he loved. It is unclear if Suede also represented masculinity in this way in his work, but it does show what Suede was drawn to in other works he was a fan of. This quote, alongside Corley and Preston’s work, suggests that the authors represent masculinity as feeling intense emotions because of the struggles that come with homosexuality but also because of the overwhelming, natural feeling of desire that all men experience.
Corley and Suede, an author in the 2010s, also represent masculinity as dominance, but some sources about Suede show he attempts to create a balance of dominance and vulnerability in his male characters. Corley illustrated art of his work, and taking a closer look at the cover of My Purple Winter, he depicts both men as muscular, chiseled, and tan [6]. They are both naked, with their penises strategically covered. Their posture, with their shoulders back and head up, depicts confidence. In this cover, Corley represents masculinity as powerful, attractive, and confident. In a blog post Suede writes to introduce his book, Lickety Split, he explains why he likes reading and writing about attractive, dominant men in farms [7]. He writes that what he is drawn to in a farm romance is that the men have “dominance and protectiveness” and are hard working. Suede says he is an avid reader of romances set in farms which is what led him to write his own. The blog highlights that Suede may represent men using characteristics that he likes reading about, namely dominance. This evidence is corroborated in an interview he did, where he says he primarily wrote about “alpha” and “rugged” men [8]. In this interview, he says his first books all featured alpha characters, but that he was trying to move on from this being the only representation of men in his work. He states that alphas appeal but “being a dude is so much more than grunting and penetrating anything [that] doesn’t penetrate you first.” He changes his representation from his previous works, making the characters more than just “alpha”. Similarly, in his blog post, “An Ode to Gordon Merrick”, Suede writes, “What I craved at 12 or 13…was the intimacy between men.” [9] He further explains that he wanted the “tenderness” between men in books because this is what he wanted to experience himself. While Suede craved tenderness in his books, he primarily wrote alpha characters, suggesting that what he wanted in books himself wasn’t necessarily how he actually represented masculinity in his books. These sources show that Suede wants to represent masculinity as dominance and also vulnerability, because that is what attracts himself as a reader.
All three authors write about love stories between gay men, and through my research, it is clear that they address the importance of positive representations of gay men.. Both Suede and Preston address the lack of positive representation of gay men and the impact this had on them. In a op-ed, Suede writes about the lack of representation of gay love in romance books when he was a teenager [10]. He wanted to read a book about a gay character in which the character did not “suffer from addiction or illness or get beaten to death for dramatic effect.” He noticed a trend of tragic stories of gay characters, and wanted to create a sense of hope in his stories. He emphasizes that gay men are not sex objects or political figures, and need to be written as characters that are more than just that. This suggests he thinks it is important to represent gay masculinity in ways that are not solely tragic, and that encompass more than sex or politics. Gay masculinity should be a symbol of hope in books, according to Suede. In an interview, Preston highlights a similar short-coming of books about gay characters [11]. He states that gay characters are either seen as a “sexual victim” or “sexual athlete”, which can be damaging to the representation of gay men. This is a recurring theme in the research I’ve conducted– that gay masculinity is represented in the extremes. Tragic, painful stories, as described by Suede, or books that simplify the sexuality of gay characters to a sexual victim or athlete, as Preston describes. Suede and Preston take issue with these extremes, because they are not an accurate depiction of the gay experience and the joy that can exist, too. The impact of this simplification, according to Preston, is that there is a lack of community and care given to gay youth. In a podcast, Preston argues that pornography, which is how he refers to his own writing, is an important tool to educate gay youth [12]. He shares that he left his hometown and family to be openly gay without fear of the retaliation his younger brothers and family would experience. However, his grandma accidentally read some of his work, and asked, “How dare you think these things?”. Preston was ashamed, and didn’t write for 20 years. However, the reason he gave for coming back to writing pornography was because of the importance it held in educating gay men about sexuality. He thinks representations of gay men in books are important tools for gay men learning how to navigate relationships. These examples from sources about Preston and Suede highlight how the authors saw a need for gay representation in books, and that representations of gay masculinity are important to maintain hope and also teach younger gay men about sexuality.
Other sources show how Preston and Corley represent masculinity in positive ways. Preston represents masculinity as desirable, and Corley represents gay masculinity as the future of all masculinity. Preston published an essay collection titled My Life as Pornographer & Other Indecent Acts, which was originally a speech he delivered at Harvard [13]. In this collection, Preston explores why he thinks writing pornography is so important. One section discusses how pornography, much like other genres, arouses emotions. He argues that fiction is the best way to arouse emotion, and just how comedy generates laughter, pornography generates erections. The reason why he wrote pornography was because he thought generating desire in his readers was important. This highlights one way he represented masculinity in his books– attractive, with sex-appeal. While Suede argued that gay men should not only be represented as sex objects [14], Preston thought sex was the reason why he wrote pornography. While this doesn’t mean Preston only writes his gay characters as sex objects, it does show the importance of sex in the representation of masculinity in his work. Research about Corley suggests that not only does Corley represent gay masculinity as important, but as the future of all masculinity [15]. In correspondence with an editor, the editor describes how the book’s narrator elaborates “his hypothesis that the ‘gay’ is the harbinger of the ‘future man’” and that men are depicted as androgynous in Corley’s work. The editor’s description of Corley’s representation of gay men as the “future man” suggests that Corley describes the future masculinity to be androgynous, meaning it has both masculine and feminine features. It is important to note that the editor disagreed with Corley’s representation, stating that every group thinks they are the future of mankind, and that gay men are not special in this way. While the editor disagreed with Corley’s representation, it is a good summary of how Corley represented the future of masculinity in his work. While Preston’s representation of masculinity in pornography seemingly focuses on the sex-appeal of men, Corley’s work delves deeper into notions of masculinity itself. He represents the future of masculinity itself as being the masculinity of gay men.
My research on Corley, Preston, and Suede show how these authors represented masculinity in the 1960s-70s, 1980s-90s, and 2000-10s respectively. Corley and Preston both represented men as experiencing intense emotions because of the struggles of being homosexual, as well as the uncontrollable desire experienced by men. Corley and Suede also represent masculinity as dominance alongside vulnerability. Finally, I explored how all three authors emphasize that representations of masculinity should be inclusive of gay men. Corley’s work highlights that not only is gay masculinity just included as part of masculinity, but he predicted the future of all masculinity would be androgynous. This exploration of three authors of love stories between men from the 1960s to 2010s shows a small snippet of the industry, but provides interesting insights and raises questions. Do other similar authors represent masculinity in the same ways? How have depictions of the masculinity of gay characters changed as a result of LGBTQ+ activism? It would also be interesting to examine Corley’s hypothesis that the future of man is androgyny– do authors describe their male characters with stereotypically masculine or feminine features? A more thorough examination of authors in these years would be needed to answer these questions, and would be interesting future research.
Footnotes
[1] Carl Corley, A Chosen World (Agoura, California: Pad Library, 1966).
[2] John Preston, Hometowns: Gay Men Write about Where They Belong (New York: Dutton, 1991).
[3] Carl Corley, Fallen Eagle (San Diego, California: Publisher’s Export Co., 1967).
[4] John Preston, John Preston on Sex, Death, and Illnesses of the Soul, interview by Rich Grzesiak, 1990, https://richgrzesiak.net/john_preston.php.
[5] Damon Suede, “An Ode to Gordon Merrick,” Damon Suede, accessed April 7, 2025, http://www.damonsuede.com/articles/OdetoGordonMerrick.html.
[6] Carl Corley, My Purple Winter (San Diego, California: Publisher’s Export Co., 1966).
[7] Damon Suede, “Guest Post and Giveaway: Lickety Split by Damon Suede,” The Novel Approach Reviews (blog), 2017, https://thenovelapproachreviews.com/2017/02/15/guest-post-and-giveaway-lickety-split-by-damon-suede/#comment-34633.
[8] Damon Suede, On Grown Men, Alpha Males, & More, Babes in Boyland, 2011, http://www.damonsuede.com/articles/BabesinBoyland-interview.html.
[9] Damon Suede, “An Ode to Gordon Merrick,” Damon Suede, accessed April 7, 2025, http://www.damonsuede.com/articles/OdetoGordonMerrick.html.
[10] Damon Suede, “Op-Ed: Hold Your Head Up, Young One,” The Advocate, 2013, https://www.advocate.com/commentary/2013/10/24/op-ed-hold-your-head-young-one.
[11] John Preston, John Preston on Sex, Death, and Illnesses of the Soul, interview by Rich Grzesiak, 1990, https://richgrzesiak.net/john_preston.php.
[12] John Preston, Writer and Gay Activist John Preston, Fresh Air: NPR, 1992, https://freshairarchive.org/segments/writer-and-gay-activist-john-preston.
[13] John Preston, My Life as a Pornographer & Other Indecent Acts (Masquerade Books, 1993).
[14] Damon Suede, “Op-Ed: Hold Your Head Up, Young One,” The Advocate, 2013, https://www.advocate.com/commentary/2013/10/24/op-ed-hold-your-head-young-one.
[15] Corley, Carl. Correspondence with Publishers/Editors, 1981-1997, Carl V. Corley Papers. David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University.
Bibliography
Corley, Carl. A Chosen World. Agoura, California: Pad Library, 1966.
Corley, Carl. Correspondence with Publishers/Editors, 1981-1997, Carl V. Corley Papers. David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University.
Corley, Carl. Fallen Eagle. San Diego, California: Publisher’s Export Co., 1967.
Corley, Carl. My Purple Winter. San Diego, California: Publisher’s Export Co., 1966.
Preston, John. Hometowns: Gay Men Write about Where They Belong. New York: Dutton, 1991.
Preston, John. John Preston on Sex, Death, and Illnesses of the Soul. Interview by Rich Grzesiak, 1990. https://richgrzesiak.net/john_preston.php.
Preston, John. My Life as a Pornographer & Other Indecent Acts. Masquerade Books, 1993.
Preston, John. Writer and Gay Activist John Preston. Fresh Air: National Public Radio, 1992. https://freshairarchive.org/segments/writer-and-gay-activist-john-preston.
Suede, Damon. “An Ode to Gordon Merrick.” Damon Suede. Accessed April 7, 2025. http://www.damonsuede.com/articles/OdetoGordonMerrick.html.
Suede, Damon. “Guest Post and Giveaway: Lickety Split by Damon Suede.” The Novel Approach Reviews (blog), 2017. https://thenovelapproachreviews.com/2017/02/15/guest-post-and-giveaway-lickety-split-by-damon-suede/#comment-34633.
Suede, Damon. On Grown Men, Alpha Males, & More. Babes in Boyland, 2011. http://www.damonsuede.com/articles/BabesinBoyland-interview.html.
Suede, Damon. “Op-Ed: Hold Your Head Up, Young One.” The Advocate, 2013. https://www.advocate.com/commentary/2013/10/24/op-ed-hold-your-head-young-one.
