Author | Dan Savage |
---|---|
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Subject | Politics, Religion |
Publisher | Dutton Adult |
Publication date | 2002 |
Media type | |
Pages | 320 |
ISBN | 0-525-94675-6 |
OCLC | 49421653 |
Preceded by | The Kid: What Happened After My Boyfriend and I Decided to Go Get Pregnant (1999). |
Followed by | The Commitment: Love, Sex, Marriage, and My Family (2005). |
Skipping Towards Gomorrah: The Seven Deadly Sins and the Pursuit of Happiness in America is a non-fiction book by Dan Savage, first published in 2002 by Dutton. The book examines the concept of happiness in American culture, as obtained by indulging in each of the Seven Deadly Sins.
Skipping Towards Gomorrah was selected for inclusion in The Best American Sex Writing 2004, [1] and won a Lambda Literary Award in 2003. [2] [3] [4] The book received a favorable reception from reviews in Publishers Weekly , [5] Library Journal , [6] and Kirkus Reviews . [7] A review in Flagpole Magazine was critical of the book's organization, and observed that the writing wandered a bit, [8] while a review in Gay Today commented, "Those who agree with Savage's views will like his book while those who disagree will hate it; in either case there will be no converts." [9]
The book's title is a reference to Robert Bork's 1996 book, Slouching Towards Gomorrah (itself a reference to Yeats's poem The Second Coming ), in which Bork decried what he saw as modern moral corruption caused by liberalism, especially social liberalism. [9] Skipping Towards Gomorrah examines the concept of happiness in American culture, as obtained by indulging in each of the Seven Deadly Sins. [10] In each chapter, Savage explores a different subculture in an attempt to understand how its participants gain happiness, and contrasts this with religious conservatism. [11] Regarding his experience of gambling, Savage notes, "You know the only thing worse than losing big the first time you go into a casino? Winning big." [12] Savage writes, "The truly revolutionary promise of our nation's founding document is the freedom to pursue happiness-with-a-capital-H". [13] The author asserts he is pointing out hypocritical behavior in the book, "Young people have finely tuned bullshit detectors, and nothing annoys people more than adult hypocrisy". [14]
The book was first published by Dutton in 2002 in hardcover format. [15] [16] A subsequent edition was published by Plume, in 2003 in paperback format. [17] [18] Savage appeared on The O'Reilly Factor as part of the marketing for the book, and supported sex education. [19]
Skipping Towards Gomorrah was selected for inclusion in The Best American Sex Writing 2004, [1] and won a 2003 Lambda Literary Award in the humor category. [2] [3] [4] A review of the book in Publishers Weekly was positive and the review concluded, "On the whole, however, Savage hits the mark and gives advocates of personal and sexual liberty the hippest, sassiest voice they've had in a long time." [5] A review in Library Journal noted, "His real strength is in blending pungent social commentary with the personal narrative. At least one of these pieces will undoubtedly land in an anthology for future students of the essay." [6] The review concluded, "The explicit nature of this book will make it a difficult purchase for many libraries in the age of Ashcroft, but the justifying argument should be made that any library owning Bork's book needs this one as an antidote." [6] Kirkus Reviews wrote, "Common sense is Savage’s strong suit, and he makes more of it than a preening moralist ever could." [7] Kelly Darrah of The Gonzaga Bulletin noted, "'Skipping' does a powerful job of taking a raw look at the embarrassing facets of our society that we often will ourselves not to see. Savage forces us to reexamine what we've been taught about morality and what constitutes an 'ethical' decision." [20]
A review by Flagpole Magazine writer Jyl Inov concluded, "This book wanders. It talks more about some sins than others and often takes a long time to get to a particular point. But in the end, it is wildly amusing and makes a lot of sense. Skipping Towards Gomorrah is not going to make converts of conservatives, but if they are willing to read, it just might make them think. As for everybody else, it is reaffirming and potentially motivating." [8] In his book Reordered Love, Reordered Lives: Learning the Deep Meaning of Happiness, author David K. Naugle commented, "This book is an irreverent attack on the 'virtuecrats' who hypocritically impose their moral values on others." [13] Writing in a review for Gay Today, Jesse Monteagudo observed, "Those who agree with Savage's views will like his book while those who disagree will hate it; in either case there will be no converts. Still, in a literary genre dominated by the Borks and Bennetts it is good to hear a dissenting voice. Reading Skipping Towards Gomorrah reminds us that there is still some sanity left in this world." [9] Rebecca Flint of Entertainment Weekly wrote, "Skipping follows the writer as he tackles each of the seven deadlies, hanging out with everyone from gamblers to adulterers to the filthy rich. Lacing his anecdotes with persuasive arguments for the freedom to pursue life, liberty, and happiness in all its sinful forms, he takes readers on a journey that's as insightful as it is hilarious." [21]
The seven deadly sins, also known as the capital vices, or cardinal sins, is a grouping and classification of vices within Christian teachings, although they are not mentioned in the Bible. Behaviours or habits are classified under this category if they directly give rise to other immoralities. According to the standard list, they are pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony, and sloth, which are contrary to the seven heavenly virtues.
Robert Heron Bork was an American judge, government official, and legal scholar who served as the Solicitor General of the United States from 1973 to 1977. A professor at Yale Law School by occupation, he later served as a judge on the influential U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit from 1982 to 1988. In 1987, President Ronald Reagan nominated Bork to the U.S. Supreme Court, but the U.S. Senate rejected his nomination.
Daniel Keenan Savage is an American author, media pundit, journalist, and LGBT community activist. He writes Savage Love, an internationally syndicated relationship and sex advice column. In 2010, Savage and his husband, Terry Miller, began the It Gets Better Project to help prevent suicide among LGBT youth. He has also worked as a theater director, sometimes credited as Keenan Hollahan.
Slouching Towards Gomorrah: Modern Liberalism and American Decline is a 1996 non-fiction book by Robert H. Bork, a former United States Court of Appeals judge. Bork's thesis in the book is that U.S. and more generally Western culture is in a state of decline and that the cause of this decline is modern liberalism and the rise of the New Left. Specifically, he attacks modern liberalism for what he describes as its dual emphases on radical egalitarianism and radical individualism. The title of the book is a play on the last couplet of W. B. Yeats's poem "The Second Coming": "And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, / Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?" Bork contends that the "rough beast of decadence … now sends us slouching towards our new home, not Bethlehem but Gomorrah." More directly, the title borrows from Joan Didion's Slouching Towards Bethlehem.
King & King is a children's picture book co-authored and co-illustrated by Stern Nijland and Linda De Haan. King & King tells the story of a young prince whose mother is forcing him to find his princess. However, after meeting many princesses, the prince falls in love with another prince. King & King was originally written in Dutch and has since been published in ten languages. The book's illustrations have received both positive and negative reviews, as has the storyline. The book has been analyzed for both its usefulness in the classroom and its challenges to social norms.
Felice Picano is an American writer, publisher, and critic who has encouraged the development of gay literature in the United States. His work is documented in many sources.
Michael Thomas Ford is an American author of primarily gay-themed literature. He is best known for his "My Queer Life" series of humorous essay collections and for his award-winning novels Last Summer, Looking for It, Full Circle, Changing Tides and What We Remember.
Troll and trolling are slang terms used almost exclusively among gay men to characterize gay, bisexual and questioning or bi-curious men who cruise or "wander about looking" for sex or potential sex partners or experiences "in a notably wanton manner and with lessened standards of what one will accept in a partner." The term can be used positively or negatively depending on the speaker, usage and intent and can describe the person or the activity. Although often referring to "an unattractive older gay man" and although troll as a slur "is primarily a visual, not a behavioral" judgment, the phrases can be used for anyone who is trolling regardless of the putative troll's age or perceived attractiveness.
Sodom and Gomorrah were two cities mentioned in the Book of Genesis and throughout the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, and in the deuterocanonical books, as well as in the Quran and the Hadith.
Aminatta Forna, OBE is a Scottish and Sierra Leonean writer. She is the author of a memoir, The Devil That Danced on the Water, and four novels: Ancestor Stones (2006), The Memory of Love (2010), The Hired Man (2013) and Happiness (2018). Her novel The Memory of Love was awarded the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for "Best Book" in 2011, and was also shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction. Forna is Professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University and was, until recently, Sterling Brown Distinguished Visiting Professor at Williams College in Massachusetts. She is currently Lannan Visiting Chair of Poetics at Georgetown University in Washington, DC.
Savage Love: Straight Answers from America's Most Popular Sex Columnist is a non-fiction book by sex columnist Dan Savage. It was first published in 1998 by Plume.
The Kid: What Happened After My Boyfriend and I Decided to Go Get Pregnant is a non-fiction book by Dan Savage. It was first published by Dutton in 1999. The book recounts the author's experiences during the process of adopting a child with his partner, Terry. Savage details for the reader his emotional states at various times during the adoption period and how it affected his life.
The Commitment: Love, Sex, Marriage, and My Family is a non-fiction book by Dan Savage. It was first published by Dutton in 2005. The book delves into the author's experiences with his partner Terry Miller and their adopted son as they decide whether or not to get married. Throughout the course of the book, Savage incorporates an analysis of the debate over same-sex marriage within society.
American author Dan Savage has written six books, op-ed pieces in The New York Times, and an advice column on sexual issues in The Stranger. A graduate of the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, Savage began contributing a column, Savage Love, to The Stranger from its inception in 1991. By 1998 his column had a readership of four million. He was Associate Editor at the newspaper from 1991 to 2001, when he became its editor-in-chief, later becoming its editorial director in 2007.
The Kid is a musical with a book by Michael Zam, music composed by Andy Monroe and lyrics by Jack Lechner. The comic story concerns an open adoption process by a same-sex couple. It is based on the 1999 non-fiction book by Dan Savage, The Kid: What Happened After My Boyfriend and I Decided to Go Get Pregnant. The protagonist, Dan, is a sex advice columnist who decides to adopt a child with his partner Terry. Throughout the musical the couple encounter difficulties including making the decision to adopt, finding a birth mother, and overcoming apprehension about the adoption process.
Cindy Patton is an American sociologist and historian specializing in the history of the AIDS epidemic. A former faculty member at Temple University and Emory University, she currently teaches at Simon Fraser University, where she held the Canada Research Chair in Community, Culture, and Health from 2003 to 2014. Her work has appeared in Criticism, the Feminist Review, and the International Review of Qualitative Research, and she co-edited a special edition of Cultural Studies on French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu.
Leslie Dick is an American artist, writer, editor, and educator, based in Los Angeles. Her work explores feminist themes, especially in relation to queer theory and Lacanian discourse. Dick has published two novels, a collection of short stories, and several critical essays. She is a member of the editorial board of X-TRA Contemporary Art Quarterly, a Los Angeles-based, internationally distributed journal of art. She has been faculty at the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) since 1992, and is currently co-director of the CalArts Program in Art. Since 2012 she has also held a position as a critic in the sculpture program at the Yale School of Art.
Not Gay: Sex Between Straight White Men is a 2015 book by Jane Ward, in which the author details the phenomenon of straight men seeking out sex with other straight men despite not identifying as gay, bisexual, or bi-curious.
Anna-Marie McLemore is a Mexican-American author of young adult fiction magical realism, best known for their Stonewall Honor-winning novel When the Moon Was Ours, Wild Beauty, and The Weight of Feathers.