| Reflections in a Golden Eye | |
|---|---|
 First edition cover without paper & cellophane dust jacket |
|
| Author | Carson McCullers |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Southern Gothic |
| Publisher | Houghton Mifflin |
| Publication date | 1941 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback) |
| Pages | 182 pp |
| ISBN | ISBN 0618084754 ISBN 978-0618084753 |
| OCLC Number | 44518055 |
| Dewey Decimal | 813/.52 21 |
| LC Classification | PS3525.A1772 R4 2000 |
Reflections in a Golden Eye is a 1941 novel by American author Carson McCullers.
It first appeared in Harper's Bazaar in 1940, serialized in the October-November issues. The book was published by Houghton Mifflin on February 14, 1941, to mostly poor reviews. The book was dedicated to the Swiss journalist and travel writer Annemarie Schwarzenbach, to whom McCullers had been attracted, but been rejected by – although they remained friends.
Contents |
Plot summary
The novel takes place at an Army base in the U.S. state of Georgia. Private Ellgee Williams is a solitary man full of secrets and desires. He has been in service for two years and is assigned to stable duty. After doing yard work at the home of Capt. Penderton, he sees his wife nude and becomes obsessed with her.
Capt. Weldon Penderton and his wife Lenora, a feeble-minded Army brat, have a fiery relationship and she takes in many lovers. Lenora's current lover is Major Morris Langdon, who lives with his depressed wife Alison, and her flamboyant Filipino houseboy Anacleto, near the Pendertons.
Capt. Penderton, who is a coward and a homosexual, realizes that he is physically attracted to Pvt. Williams, unaware of the private's attraction to Leonora.
Film adaptation
A 1967 film adaptation of Reflections in a Golden Eye bearing the same name was directed by John Huston. It stars Marlon Brando, Elizabeth Taylor, Julie Harris, Robert Forster and Brian Keith.
Critical analysis
Reflections in a Golden Eye is considered by Anthony Slide, a modern scholar, to be one of only four familiar gay novels of the first half of the twentieth century. The other three novels are Djuna Barnes' Nightwood, Truman Capote's Other Voices, Other Rooms, and Gore Vidal's The City and the Pillar.[1]
According to author Michael Bronski, McCullers tackles the topics of "homosexuality, sadism, voyeurism, and fetishism [while exploring] the boundaries of eroticism, outsider status and the fragility of normal in Reflections in a Golden Eye"[2]
History
McCullers wrote the piece in 1939. Originally titled 'Army Post' she said the story had germinated when she was an adolescent and had first stepped upon the alien territory of Fort Benning. Its more direct inspiration was a chance remark her husband Reeves (an ex-soldier) made to her about a voyeur who had been arrested at Fort Bragg (North Carolina), - a young soldier who had been caught peeping inside the married officers' quarters. She wrote it in Fayetteville, North Carolina. After only two months of arduous writing she finished the book and put it away in a dresser. "I am so immersed in my characters that their motives are my own. When I write about a thief, I become one; when I write about Captain Penderton, I become a homosexual man. I become the characters I write about and I bless the Latin poet Terence who said 'Nothing human is alien to me.' "
After its publication in 1941 the novel caused some embarrassment in Columbus, Georgia and at Fort Benning when people speculated about the source of McCullers' weird tale. [3]
Footnotes
- ^ Slide, Anthony. Lost Gay Novels: A Reference Guide to Fifty Works from the First Half of the Twentieth Century, (Binghamton, NY: Harrington Park Press), page 2.
- ^ Bronski, Michael, ed. Pulp Friction: Uncovering the Golden Age of Gay Male Pulps. New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 2003, page 349.
- ^ The Lonely Hunter, a Biography of Carson McCullers by Virginia Spencer Carr p.91
References
- Austen, Roger (1977). Playing the Game: The Homosexual Novel in America (1st ed. ed.). Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company. ISBN 978-067252287X.
- Bronski, Michael (2003). Pulp Friction: Uncovering the Golden Age of Gay Male Pulps (1st ed. ed.). New York, NY: St. Martin's Griffin. ISBN 978-0312252676.
- Slide, Anthony (2003). Lost Gay Novels: A Reference Guide to Fifty Works from the First Half of the Twentieth Century (1st ed. ed.). Binghamton, NY: Harrington Park Press. ISBN 978-156023413X.
- Stryker, Susan (2001). Queer Pulp: Perverted Passions from the Golden Age of the Paperback (1st ed. ed.). San Francisco, CA: Chronicle Books. ISBN 978-0811830209.
External links
- Reflections in a Golden Eye page
- Online text of Reflections in a Golden Eye
- Book review from www.GoodShortNovels.com
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