I Used to be Jealous of Xavier Dolan

Wouldn’t you be? I’m an old gay writer. Nobody cares much about me anymore. But just as my ‘decline’ began, a young whippersnapper appeared. He quickly became the new god of the gay art scene. And he’s cute as a button to boot.

In case you’re wondering; yes I have seen some of Xavier’s flicks — and, I kinda like them. 

Which is another problem. This made me really jealous; the guy is not only cute, and a great actor, but he can direct!

Well now I can relax because there’s nothing to be jealous of.

Xavier Dolan has been knocked off his pedestal — a victim of political correctness, intersectionality, and the ’woke folk.’

What I interpreted all these years as a rejection of my writing had nothing to do with me. It’s just that what used to be the called ‘the love that dare not speak its name’ — and became (briefly, in my heyday) ‘the love that won’t shut up’ — is now, well, pretty much over.

I haven’t seen Dolan’s new film The Death and Life of John Donovan. But my critique of the reviews of this film has nothing to do with whether the critics are right or wrong, and everything to do with the cultural prejudices that dominate their writing. Angelo Murreda in The National Post refers to the film as “a comparably minor story…about a relationship between a gay actor unable to live frankly in public and an awkward pre-teen in search of a friend.” The Globe and Mail’s Kate Taylor is even more explicit in her dismissal of the film’s subject matter: “I am prepared to believe that a rising actor in the early 2000s in New York would be as firmly closeted as Rock Hudson in the 1950s, but I’m not prepared to believe it’s still society’s fault.” Wow.

When Kate Taylor was a theatre critic she never seemed very fond of my work. But I never dared imagine she was homophobic. It’s now clear to me that she always thought gay men were repulsive, annoying whiners. It’s just that now she can be completely comfortable about expressing her homophobic views in a culture climate that believes homophobia is over, that feminine boys are probably asexual and trans anyway — and that all us privileged fags should just shut up.

This cultural shift will not pan out well for anybody, gay or straight. There are (have you noticed?) lots of tortured young men out there, many conflicted about their sexuality and its relationship to masculinity, some of them with guns — some of them who are ‘incels’ — and some who are shooting up gay bars.

Pretending that homophobia does not exist will not make them all go away.

But hey— let’s look at the bright side.

I’m no longer jealous of Xavier Dolan.

Advice to A Young Artist, 2019

“It is as dangerous for society to attract and indulge authors as it is for grain dealers to raise rats in their granaries.”  - Anton Chekhov

Right now it is very difficult to be an artist. I feel for you.

When I started writing in 1966 it was very different. It was the era of abstract expressionism and conceptual art — fiction was the domain of the new French anti-novel, the ‘new criticism’ dominated poetry,’ and Bergman ruled film. Susan Sontag just published her ground breaking essay Against Interpretation (READ IT NOW!). Artists were suspicious of work with a clearly articulated message — or even of art with a meaning. Instead, artists were rebels, aesthetes and dreamers. They created — for passionate reasons they themselves could not fathom —  works that some did not understand. But nevertheless somehow the greatest of these works communicated — not about the latest ‘issues’ in the news — to people who were moved, upset, angered, and inspired by art’s form, style, grace, wit, craft, and, yes, well, beauty.

Today, art is a very different matter. We are told that every artist must have a clearly articulated message, and that message must be the correct one. What is correct — and what is not — are both relentlessly argued on social media. Christian publishers will give you money to write a ‘Christian’ book. Social justice publishers will give you money to write a book that articulates the principles of social justice. Everyone will want to know what you have to say, and there are lots of rewards for saying whatever is considered by the ‘powers that be’ to be ‘the right thing.’

You must not expect to get support from libraries, universities, arts councils, publishers — in fact institutions of any kind. You must stand alone, outside. Digital media is now the conscience of the world, decreeing that there are two points of view — right and left. They world knows (and rightly so) that these ruling dichotomies are deeply threatened by artistic work.

Knowing all this, will you still want to create? 

I suspect so. 

Why?  

Because you must, because you can do nothing else, because your art is your life.

So do it.

(How? On the sly, in secret, 'privately circulated to friends’ — however you can.)

You may be called ‘amateur’ because at one time professional standards were wholly aesthetic; now they are merely ideological.

But remember, ‘amateur’ means ‘lover.’

So always remember, you are not a preacher.

You are a lover.