Bret easton ellis gay
Bret Easton Ellis Has All the Answers
Ready or not, here he comes. In TheShards, his first novel in 13 years, the great American bomb thrower, Bret Easton Ellis, plunges us back into the world of Wayfarers and BMWs in early-’80s Los Angeles, where a nature named “Bret” attends an elite prep school and a deranged serial killer is on the loose. (The book is appropriately dedicated, “To no one.”) In the opening lines of The Shards, the narrator equates a novel to a “dangerous game,” and surely Ellis has been playing dangerously with readers ever since he released his first glamorous nightmare masterpiece Less Than Zero in 1985, at age 21. Novels appreciate The Rules of Attraction, American Psycho, and Glamorama followed, as well as Ellis’s no-holds-barred cultural criticism in the forms of essays and his very own podcast. In case you were worried, Ellis hasn’t sweetened or softened with age. Here, he takes questions from friends and luminaries about video games, sincerity, and the death of art.
———
OTTESSA MOSHFEGH: How would your labor be different if you were straight?
BRET EASTON ELLIS: I’d like to tell not a lot—that as a stylist I was drawn to aesthetics rather
Mark O'Connell, LCSW-R, MFA
“Man up, dudes.”
This was how American Psycho author Bret Easton Ellis summarized, via Twitter, his recent op-ed for Out.com. Whether reflecting a conscious decision or something less self-aware, the tweet helpfully and revealingly distills the gay writer’s piece down to its basic intent: to split the LGBT communities in two, pitting, for example, “manly dudes” against “femmy queens,” “real” guys against stereotypes, and “us” against “them.” It’s not entirely unmistakable why Ellis must bifurcate thoughts, people and factions throughout his article, but exploring his consistent tendency to do so may give us insight into more than just the prolific author himself and can further serve as an illustration of how the most vulnerable members of our communities change into the primary recipients of social aggression, even from within our own communities.
Ellis begins his op-ed by making points on which we can all agree: that it would be nice if coming out didn’t have to be a “brave” and “daring” act in 2013; that equality would feel more real
An audience with Bret Easton Ellis
Not many authors are interviewed by Vogue and The New Yorker on the publication of their latest book, but then not many authors are the notorious Bret Easton Ellis.
Controversy sticks to Easton Ellis like blood to a blade, most recently seen in the reaction to White, his first collection of non-fiction essays.
In person, the man is far from the ranting misanthrope portrayed by many reviewers. He seems perpetually amused at the latest world’s many absurdities, punctuating his answers with bouts of laughter (often directed at himself).
Monster, misunderstood, or something else entirely? Interpret this interview and doodle your own judgement. He’d like that.
Are you surprised by the queues at your book signing for White?
I am. Totally surprised. Sometimes you believe that the press is indicative of everyone’s idea about you, and that never really was the reality about me and my career. There’s always been this disconnect between the people who like my work and the urge . And I just assumed that because the urge was so negative about the book, it would correspond with who would show up – and it didn’t happen in America, and it hasn’t happened.
Presu
The Attractions of Bret Easton Ellis
“I think Roger Avery is an incredibly stylish director — I’m really lucky to possess gotten him to spin this book into a movie. ”
You really wouldn’t expect Bret Easton Ellis to express anything other than that, seeing that he’s calling at the behest of Lion’s Gate, the little but influential film business that’s releasing The Rules of Attraction, an adaptation of the writer’s 1987 novel dealing with drugs, sexuality, and wanton deed on a college campus in the mid-Eighties.
“I don’t want to be ageist or anything, ” Ellis continues, “but Less Than Zero was directed by a much older Englishman and American Psycho was directed by an older woman. Roger’s my age, went to college the same period I did and, I think, liked this novel more maybe than the other filmmakers who translated my other books liked the material they were working with. ”
Still, you don’t acquire the feeling Ellis is just paying lip-service. He gets furious when talking about the cuts the Motion Picture Association of America’s ratings board imposed
.