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Hustle and Prose
Iconic writer John Rechy reveals the secrets behind his
new memoir My Life and the Kept Woman
 BY DAN LOUGHRY
Novelist. Playwright. Essayist. Hustler. John Rechy has
been all those things and much, much more. He has written,
deeply, about a range of subjects — male-perpetuated
myths of 'fallen women' (Our Lady of Babylon), an immigrant's
descent through Los Angeles (The Miraculous Day of Amalia
Gómez) — and has crafted his work in a breadth
of masterful styles. This includes the sexually explicit
works — Numbers, Rushes, and, most famously, City of
Night — that have defined him for generations of readers.
With fierce vulnerability and brave delicacy, his memoir
About My Life and the Kept Woman depicts his poor childhood
in El Paso's Mexican enclave; years in the numbing U.S. Army;
life as a street hustler; and—always—of the alluring
woman who intrigues, and then shadows his life, for forty
years. Here is how he first encounters the Kept Woman at
his sister's wedding:
“When my head resisted being turned away from the kept
woman, my mother's hands directed it back to the nuptials,
but not before I knew that my life had been invaded by an
awesome presence.”
FRONTIERS: What inspired the memoir?
JOHN RECHY: Inspiration came, as it does in the book, when
I saw that fantastic woman, Marisa Guzman, the Kept Woman
of Augusto de Leon. I'd never seen anything like her in El
Paso, this superb creation of defiance and beauty and glamour.
I knew I'd write of her, though not that it would take the
form of autobiography.
Was Marisa Guzman a manifestation of the escape you sought
in the movie palaces of El Paso?
Yes, and of possibilities in that drab, horrible life with
all its restrictions.
Would you have stayed in El Paso if it wasn't for the army?
I wonder about that myself. I might have unconsciously volunteered
to allow myself to be able to leave.
Long before “don't ask don't tell,” you were “in
denial” about your homosexuality while in the army.
I know what you mean, but remember it wasn't so much denial
as not understanding yet. I was careful to put into the memoir
scenes that auger future understanding—the memories
of the showers; the assault of it—but I didn't connect
it with actual sexuality.
It seems your life as a hustler was never about sexuality,
but desirability.
Yes, but I can look back and see that that was some major
subterfuge! Yet it was the requirement of the times to hide.
I put into the book— deliberately, very honestly—the
series of denials. I wanted to indicate that you had to deceive
not only everyone else, but yourself, in order to survive.
About My Life is less sexually explicit than past works yet
seems more naked in other ways.
I've made myself extremely vulnerable, left myself open to
criticism from my Chicano brothers, my gay brothers, and
my in-betweens. This really draws the curtain away. You know,
people have had fantasies about me, but they're responding
to a person they imagine and not the man I am now, or even
was.
You're a very conscious writer, but—as this is a memoir—how
much did you let yourself roam?
The inescapable fact is that the book uses narrative techniques
that I firmly believe in. To find any meaning in experience,
you're going to have to restructure it. Oprah Winfrey did
a terrible disfavor to writers with her monstrous confrontation
with James Frey. And then to have him confess to her for
absolution! He was doing what every writer has ever done.
What writer can say “This is exactly what happened?”
How do you feel about the perception that you're a gay icon?
I've never seen myself as that. I've always asked for self-exploration
of our own horizons, to identify problems: of ageism, of
illness, the battering of our psyches with sex. Before AIDS,
I was writing about a deadening that was happening to us,
where nothing was enough. I was a part of that, too, so I
could understand. But I think we may not want to face ourselves
now, have self-knowledge. That's what my book really is:
about finally being about to see yourself, like the Kept
Woman.
LIMITED RUN
Send Yourself Roses: Thoughts On My Life, Love and Leading
Roles
Actress Kathleen Turner presents and signs copies of her
memoir. The star of Body Heat and War of the Roses reveals
her professional and creative risks and the lessons she has
learned. Santa Monica Public Library. Thur., Feb. 21. 7 p.m.
www.booksoup.com.
Pictures at a Revolution
In 1967, five movies, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, The Graduate,
In The Heat of the Night, Doctor Doolittle, and Bonnie
and Clyde, received Academy Award nominations for Best
Picture. Author Mark Harris presents and signs copies of
his book, which documents the cultural impact that these
films had on Hollywood and America. Book Soup. Thur., Feb.
21. 7 p.m. www.booksoup.com.
The Best of Best American Erotica 2008: 15th Anniversary
Sex-positive feminist author Susie Bright offers a post-Valentine's
Day libido recharge as she presents some of the best erotic
writing of the past 15 years. Straight or gay, dominant
or submissive, Bright's selections run the gamut. Skylight
Books. Fri., Feb. 22. 7:30 p.m. www.skylightbooks.com.
Black Hole
Comic book artist Charles Burns signs and reads excerpts
from his full-length graphic novel. In the mid-1970s, a
strange plague transmitted by sexual contact has descended
upon suburban Seattle's teenagers. The disease is manifested
from the hideously grotesque to the subtle and concealable.
Skylight Books. Fri., Feb. 29. 7:30 p.m. www.skylightbooks.com.
HOMO MUST
Stonewall and Riot
Acclaimed graphic artist Joe Phillips, who created House
of Morecock and the comic book Rage for the series Queer
as Folk, discusses the soon-to-be-released full-feature,
gay adult superhero animation film, Stonewall and Riot.
The film centers on Stonewall and Riot, the two most prominent
heroes in Eros City. A Different Light Bookstore. Wed.,
Feb. 20. 7:30 p.m. www.adleventsweho.blogspot.com.
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