Gay Novel Quotes & Sayings

Maybe there is no better novel in the world than Denton Welch's In Youth Is Pleasure. Just holding it in my hands, so precious, so beyond gay, so deliciously subversive, is enough to make illiteracy a worse social crime than hunger. — John Waters

Chocolate makes everything better, in the end," he announced, and Thayer fully agreed.
Thayer gave him a smile of gratitude and watched Castel lift his spoon from the saucer. He dipped it, gracefully, into his coffee and gave it a light stir.
"Too many people rush to stir such delicate flavours. Take too long and they will clog together to become a lump of bitterness in your coffee. But take your time and be gentle with them," Castel explained, quietly, "and they will create a symphony of flavours, to melt in your mouth," he said, leaning down, just until his nose was over his cup, to take a long inhale. He smiled and straightened, extracting the spoon to place it back on his saucer. "Now try it."
Thayer took a sip and almost felt his toes curl at the luxurious taste.

~ Cinnamon Kiss — Elaine White

I am writing about people who are alive in the city of New York during mid-20th-century America. And these people are like a character in a play or they are figures in a short story or a novel. — Gay Talese

Who knows what tomorrow brings
In a world where everyone lies ...
Tupac — Raquel Taylor

It's like I'm suddenly a hormonally charged teenager or living in a bad romance novel: I suddenly can't stop myself from noticing every man around me. Which means that Darcy, Samantha, and Michael are probably right. Plus, there was that disturbing dream about Voldemort this morning. I need to lose my gay-husband virginity before I lose my mind entirely. I need to find someone to sleep with me. And the fact that I don't have the faintest idea how to make that happen is just further proof that it needs to.
- SINGLE-MINDED — Lisa Daily

So he was queer, E.M. Forster. It wasn't his middle name (that would be 'Morgan'), but it was his orientation, his romping pleasure, his half-secret, his romantic passion. In the long-suppressed novel Maurice the title character blurts out his truth, 'I'm an unspeakable of the Oscar Wilde sort.' It must have felt that way when Forster came of sexual age in the last years of the 19th century: seriously risky and dangerously blurt-able. The public cry had caught Wilde, exposed and arrested him, broken him in prison. He was one face of anxiety to Forster; his mother was another. As long as she lived (and they lived together until she died, when he was 66), he couldn't let her know. — Michael Levenson

Tam let out a ragged breath, as he fought to reign his emotions back, while the realisation sank in.
He was nothing. To Konnor. To Giovanni. To everyone.
He was invisible. — Elaine White

I've always been impelled to say the truth. When I was 14, in 1954, I already wrote a gay novel, though I'd never read one. I felt that life handed me a great subject, gay life, that had scarcely been examined, and I was impelled to record it in all its strange detail. — Edmund White

Jaxton smiled and caught his hand, holding it tight in both of his. "Are you burnt out? Is it all too much?" he asked, getting straight to the root of the matter, in one go.
"Yes," he sighed, hating that it was true.
"Then you'll stay home."
"You know I can't. It's impossible," Roman complained about the unfairness of it all.
He was due to return to the studio in two days times, to finalise the tracks he'd recorded yesterday. Then he had to sit down with Jalen next week, to pick out a new piece of his artwork for the next album cover. And two weeks after that, he had three interviews with three different music channels, to film.
"Try telling that to Ben." Jaxton winked at him, then ducked down to kiss him.

~ From the Heart — Elaine White

He shook his head and thought about it for a second. "Maybe I'm not straight? Can I still be straight when I'm sitting here looking into your eyes?" he asked. Maybe it was the alcohol talking or maybe he wasn't as straight as he thought he was.
"Yes. Absolutely." Cormag nodded and watched him closely.
"Even when I think they're so pretty? They are, you know. So many different shades of brown ... and a little green. Just a touch; not a lot. So pretty." He sighed happily, watching those dark eyes staring back at him in surprise. He lay his head on his arms, smiling at the way Cormag flushed in embarrassment and turned his full attention onto his bottle of beer.
"Wow, you are super drunk. — Elaine White

I have written this book quicker than any other," she notes in her diary, "[and] it is all a joke; & yet gay & quick reading I think; a writers holiday. I feel more and more sure that I will never write a novel again — Virginia Woolf

This was a great idea; he needed to go into tonight knowing that this was the last time he would ever be with Barry. He needed to savour it and enjoy it, to lock it tight in his memories, so that he would never forget how it felt to be with him.
This would be his final goodbye.

~ A Case of the Ex — Elaine White

In the case of my book, I don't think it's really the coming-out gay novel that everyone really needed, even though it was received as such. The boy is too creepy, he betrays his teacher, the only adult man with whom he's enjoyed a sexual experience, etc. — Edmund White

Cormag caught his hand and pulled him back until they were facing each other. "I think you're amazing," he said, blurting the words out.
Lachlan smiled, completely shocked and thrilled by how captivating he found him.
He had never thought this could happen to him, that he would be attracted to another boy.
He thought he knew himself so well.
"I think you're smart, sexy, funny as hell. You have hidden depths, Lachlan. You only need the right person to coax you out of your protective shell," he claimed.
"Are you the right person?" Lachlan wondered, as he took a half step forward.
Cormag took a deep breath and brushed at a strand of hair that was sticking out at a funny angle from behind the top of his ear. He tugged at his short hair every time he talked about his recent break up. He was such a dork. — Elaine White

Fitzgerald has charm. It's a silly word, but it's an exact word for me. I like 'The Great Gatsby' and it's sad, gay nostalgia. — Truman Capote

I imagined a time when being gay is as unquestioned and un-judged as is having blue eyes. Some might call it fantasy or science fiction. I'd like to think it's the future. — Missouri Vaun

In a novel, I think you have a contract with the reader to make the character representative - of a moment in history, a social class ... for instance, I wanted to make the boy in 'A Boy's Own Story' more like other gay men of my generation in their youth and not like me. — Edmund White

Karla Jay's intimate account of life in the early years of feminism and gay liberation is as irresistible as a novel, but as credible, humorous, and unexpected as real life. — Gloria Steinem

It had been a shitty night, so it was fitting that it should end with rain.
He closed his eyes and lay where he was, ready for it to stop. The rain, the cold, the pain, the aches, the blood choking the back of his throat, the metallic taste on his tongue. He wanted an off switch to his life; to get it over with. There wasn't much point fighting; he didn't have anything to fight for. He had his family and Levi, but something in his heart said that wasn't enough anymore.
He didn't want to be alone. — Elaine White

A couple hours went by, and the storm began to turn back to the sea. The dark clouds rolled away, leaving white, fluffy ones in their place. We were safe, and the rock in the distance was still there. We stepped out of the car and walked over to the rock, noticing the families of seals were back again. The seals were strong and ready to make it through any storm that would fall their way. My parents' love was still there; that is what love means. I envy that love, and I hoped to find it someday ... and I did. — Joseph McGinnis

You let this become a mess," he cursed, as though he'd walked up to Tam and asked him to be drop dead gorgeous and vulnerable, just so that he would have his first guy crush.
"I didn't let anything happen. I just ... felt it. I think he feels it too," he argued, trying to talk sense into him. Why was this a bad thing? Konnor didn't have anything to do with Tam anymore, so why did it matter?
"Oh God. You're in serious shit now," Mack bemoaned, rolling his eyes and rubbing his forehead. — Elaine White

Cunningham himself said in an interview in Poz that he couldn't help noticing that as soon as he wrote a novel without a blowjob, they gave him the Pulitzer Prize. — Christopher Bram

The usual pronouncement that Truman Capote is a 'birdbrain.' Gore [Vidal] has finished a novel called Two Sisters in which he admits that he and Jack Kerouac went to bed together - or was that in an article? (Gore told me about so many articles he's written and talks he has given that my memory spins.) Anyhow, Gore now regrets that he didn't describe the act itself; how they got very drunk and Kerouac said, 'Why don't we take a shower?' and then tried to go down on him but did it very badly, and then they belly rubbed. Next day, Kerouac claimed he remembered nothing; but later, in a bar, yelled out, 'I've blown Gore Vidal! — Christopher Isherwood

The longest piece of literature I've read lately was a tattoo on this biker I picked up last night. It said, If you're this close, you've gotta suck it. — Eric Arvin

The novel space is a pure space. I'm nobody once I go into that room. I'm not gay, I'm not bald, I'm not Irish. I'm not anybody. I'm nobody. I'm the guy telling the story, and the only person that matters is the person reading that story, the target. It's to get that person to feel what I'm trying to dramatize. — Colm Toibin

Get your sticky fingers away from my cookies," Ben ordered, without turning his head, to see Jaxton trying to steal one from the cooking tray.
"You weren't saying that last night," Jaxton retaliated, coming up to Ben's side, to give him a nudge. They were both smiling, while looking down at the counter, where Ben was making his delicious rosemary cookies. "In fact, I seem to remember you grabbing my sticky fingers and putting them in your mouth," he teased, speaking quietly, so that Lyon wouldn't hear them at the other side of the room.
Ben turned to Jaxton and abandoned his baking, to catch his face in flour covered hands and plant a deep kiss on his lips.
Jaxton opened his mouth, in acceptance of his kiss.

~ From the Heart — Elaine White

He was getting undressed and it snapped something inside of him that had been drawing taut, ready to break for months.
"I'm hungry, Bruno," he said, in a soft voice, as he removed the shirt from his broad shoulders, revealing a perfect sight of smooth dark skin. "I can't wait for dinner," he continued, with a smile.
When he put his hands to the fastening of his trousers, Bruno let out a sigh and put the take out menus on the counter. He couldn't look at him, because he knew Lyon was trying to seduce him on purpose. He didn't want to talk or hear him out or spend time with him that didn't end with an orgasm.
"I can't do this anymore," Bruno confessed, quietly. — Elaine White

I was determined that in fiction anyway two men should fall in love and remain in it for the ever and ever that fiction allows. — E. M. Forster

Shock? More like shellshock at this point. Blondie knew I was gay, yet he was a Company Exec or else he wouldn't be here. I was his butt boy in the worst possible way.
When I squinted at him, he gave nothing up. Neither did I. I had shit on this newly minted man too.
Double fucking jeopardy, jackass. — Rie Warren

He cupped her face and held her still, as he looked into her brown eyes; she was all flash and no bang. She talked big, but when it came down to it, she was a simple girl. — Elaine White

Grayson Dashwood.
Those two words had just ruined what was turning into a good morning. — Elaine White

I saw it all suddenly while I was reading Howards End . . . Forster's the only one who understands what the modern novel ought to be . . . Our frightful mistake was that we believed in tragedy: the point is, tragedy's quite impossible nowadays . . . We ought to aim at being essentially comic writers . . . The whole of Forster's technique is based on the tea-table: instead of trying to screw all his scenes up to the highest possible pitch, he tones them down until they sound like mothers'-meeting gossip . . . In fact, there's actually less emphasis laid on the big scenes than on the unimportant ones: that's what's so utterly terrific. It's the completely new kind of accentuation - like a person talking a different language . . . . — Christopher Isherwood

A straight writer can write a gay novel and not worry about it, and a gay novelist can write about straight people. — Edmund White

The resulting scrambling to get the next big shiver and shake novel produced some really terrible books. As a further result, the wave had begun to withdraw by the mid 70s, and more traditional bestsellers began to re-appear: stories of sex, big business, sex, spies, gay sex, doctors in trouble, kinky sex, historical romances, sexy celebrities, war stories, and sex. — Stephen King

Tam let his hand drop to his neck and slowly circled his fingers around it. It was a free, gentle touch and Casen knew that if he asked him not to, he would remove his hand and nothing would change. He couldn't get the words out; it wasn't the touch he had a problem with, it was the far away look in Tam's eyes that said he wasn't in the room anymore. The look that suggested he was lying on the ground, as the rain fell in buckets and a stranger knelt over him, trying to keep him awake.
Casen blinked and looked away, as the urge to cry for that lost look threatened. — Elaine White

He faced Doug. His eyes were wet. "I am not one of your tricks, Douglas."
"Of course, you're not."
"That's what I feel like tonight, seeing you in there with all those bodies. One of a thousand nights. One of a thousand fucks. And fuck you for making me feel this way. And fuck you again for making me say fuck in this beautiful place. — Eric Arvin

I always wondered why I didn't try to seduce you, since you're so good-looking, more appealing than any woman. — Debra Strattford

I have thought of you much, and have shared with you in thought much that has been elevating, stirring, and gay, so much so that it has been like living with my dear friends. If only you know how novel and strange that seems to an old hermit like me? How often it has made me laugh at myself! — Friedrich Nietzsche