The Beautiful Room Is Empty (The Edmund Trilogy, #2) in Queereaders

Aug 17, 2009 Jesse rated it liked it

Shelves: queer-lit, 1980-s

Edmund White's writing style is more or less a series of incredibly vivid vignettes linked together through simple chronology. And while the individual events, memories and musings are often beautiful in and of themselves, it has a curiously monotone effect after a while, almost like banging the same chords on a piano over and over--not even the most gorgeous notes can sustain their impact if piled on top of each other with nothing between to showcase their individual merit. That said, White's n ...more

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Mar 13, 2008 Stephen rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: literature, gay, z-read-in-2010, tally-1001-books-list

The title is not a line from a scene in the book. Perhaps it's a warning?

I'm no great fan of autobiography but this is one of the best tooled autobiographies. I've ever read. My problem with the book is that it seems to meander through comonplace events that have been told in more engaging ways elsewhere. No matter how nice the cup, poor coffee is still poor coffee. The writing here is excellent and at times brilliant but the story itself is unengaging.

While it deals with one man's journey from ...more

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Jun 17, 2013 Jamie rated it liked it

Shelves: read-in-2013, lgbt

I think I give White the benefit of the doubt because (a) "City Boy" is so great; and (b) he's a queermo, like me. But in point of fact, neither of his novels that I've read were really that fabulous. Maybe this is a lil' whiff of my latent snobbery coming out, but I found this and "A Boy's Own Story" to be glorified erotica, rather than a measured exploration of queer subjectivity in the mid-century cultural and political American context. And I can't figure if I'm a snob or if White toots his I think I give White the benefit of the doubt because (a) "City Boy" is so great; and (b) he's a queermo, like me. But in point of fact, neither of his novels that I've read were really that fabulous. Maybe this is a lil' whiff of my latent snobbery coming out, but I found this and "A Boy's Own Story" to be glorified erotica, rather than a measured exploration of queer subjectivity in the mid-century cultural and political American context. And I can't figure if I'm a snob or if White toots his own supposedly "high art" horn too loudly. "City Boy" is great as an historical piece of titillating gossip, and it feels important because it traces the development of a gay history that, I think v importantly, White repudiates as originally political. His sense of gay revolution is that it was, from the outset, about sexual radicalism - a turning away from heterosexual norms, rather than a rhetorical diatribe or investment in civil legalese. And it's exciting to read because White knew everyone and fucked most of them, and he has great stories about familiar figures. But the two novels redirect that energy into flat characters and endless series of similar sexual encounters. When the protagonists find "love" (structured as psychologically more important and healthy counters to the anonymous sex they've been shamefully having until that moment), one wonders: who are these people and what would ever generate actual emotional resonance between them? This one in particular sets Maria up as the enigmatic center of the novel, but she never really lives up to that dream - she seems banal rather than quirky, undeveloped rather than mysterious. She's a Holly Golightly or a Sally Bowles without any of the fun or the actual nuance.

All this said, as a pulpy read, it has its moments. I do find it troubling that White's personal history of gayness seems so much more astute and radicalized than his novelistic renderings of it, but the sex can be pretty hot and of course, I'm a sucker for any portrayal of past gay lingo, the faggot underground, and so forth. I just wish that by the end of the novel, I actually gave half a shit about the characters I'd joined for 200 pages. ...more

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