Great Plains Studies, Center for
Date of this Version
Spring 1998
Citation
Great Plains Quarterly Vol. 18, No. 2, Spring 1998, pp. 175-76.
Abstract
Dear Will Fellows:
Thank you for collecting and editing Farm Boys. I have already found a use for it. Today, in one of my classes, a student, Ed Grimes, read a poem he had written. I have asked Ed if I can use some of it here:
Jeremiah, twenty-two years old, great looking, great personality, yet he is so damn alone, trying to bust out of the prison which is his closet of sexuality.
He sees fear, he senses despair, he sees facing family, friends and life of such blackness that he cannot comprehend all of the changes it will bring.
So many hopeless young men left in the sickening despair that is homophobic America have pulled the trigger, tied the knot, swallowed the pill, smashed into a tree, breathed the gas, or they have swum off into the, finally, welcoming current of resignation.
He must be retaught his loveliness.
Ed then explained that Jeremiah lives "out there" in rural Missouri. I told Ed I would give my review copy of Farm Boys to him so he could give it to Jeremiah. I'm talking about utility here and what more useful thing can a book do than save a man from suicide?
What will Jeremiah find in the book? First, he will find that he is not alone. The men interviewed in Farm Boys have felt what he feels-the same joy, the same despair, the same confusion, the same sudden enlightenment. They have known the same pain and most of them have survived it. He can survive it, too. These men are his role models.
Second, he will be made aware of a tradition. The book is set up in three parts with a historical overview in each: Part 1, "Coming of Age Before the Mid-1960s"; Part 2, "Coming of Age Between the Mid-1960s and Mid- 1970s"; Part 3, "Coming of Age Between the Mid-1970s and Mid-1980s." You make the point, Will, that with improved communications, transportation, and education, the lives of gay men have improved since 1900. The interviews themselves prove the point.
Comments
Copyright 1998 by the Center for Great Plains Studies, University of Nebraska-Lincoln