magazine
A magazine is a periodical publication, generally published on a regular schedule (often weekly or monthly), containing a variety of content. They are generally financed by advertising, purchase price, prepaid subscriptions, or by a combinatio ...
published in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
,
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
, by
Charles Ortleb
Charles is a masculine given name predominantly found in English language, English and French language, French speaking countries. It is from the French form ''Charles'' of the Proto-Germanic, Proto-Germanic name (in runic alphabet) or ''*k ...
. Known both for its serious discussion of issues within the gay community and its
satire
Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming ...
of anti-gay criticism, it was one of the two most widely read gay-issues publications in the United States. ''Christopher Street'' covered politics and culture and its aim was to become a gay equivalent of ''
The New Yorker
''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
''.
The magazine featured original fiction and non-fiction work from such notable authors as
Andrew Holleran
Andrew Holleran is the pseudonym of Eric Garber (born 1944), an American novelist, essayist, and short story writer, born on the island of Aruba. Most of his adult life has been spent in New York City, Washington, D.C., and a small town in Flori ...
,
Felice Picano
Felice Picano (born February 22, 1944) 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.
Life
Felice Picano graduated ''cum laude'' fro ...
,
Gore Vidal
Eugene Luther Gore Vidal (; born Eugene Louis Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) was an American writer and public intellectual known for his epigrammatic wit, erudition, and patrician manner. Vidal was bisexual, and in his novels and ...
,
Edmund White
Edmund Valentine White III (born 1940) is an American novelist, memoirist, playwright, biographer and an essayist on literary and social topics. Since 1999 he has been a professor at Princeton University. France made him (and later ) de l'Ordr ...
, and John Preston, as well as emerging gay writers such as
Christopher Bram
Christopher Bram (born February 22, 1952) is an American author.
Bram grew up in Virginia Beach, Virginia (outside Norfolk), where he was a paperboy and an Eagle Scout. He graduated from the College of William and Mary in 1974 (B.A. in English) ...
,
Allen Barnett
Allen M. Barnett (born June 20, 1940) was a research professor of electrical engineering at the University of Delaware. He was the principal investigator of the DARPA-funded Consortium for Very High Efficiency Solar cells. Barnett was the founde ...
Scott Heim
Scott Heim (born 1966) is an American novelist from Hutchinson, Kansas, currently living in Massachusetts. Heim's first novel, ''Mysterious Skin'', was published in 1995.
Biography
Scott Heim was born in Hutchinson, Kansas, in 1966. He attende ...
,
John Alan Lee
John Alan Lee (August 24, 1933 – December 5, 2013) was a Canadian writer, academic and political activist, best known as an early advocate for LGBT rights in Canada,Patrick Merla,
Randy Shilts
Randy Shilts (August 8, 1951February 17, 1994) was an American journalist and author. After studying journalism at the University of Oregon, Shilts began working as a reporter for both '' The Advocate'' and the ''San Francisco Chronicle'', as wel ...
and
Matthew Stadler
Matthew Stadler (born 1959) is an American author who has written six novels and received several awards. Stadler has compiled four anthologies about literature, city life and public life. His essays, which have been published in magazines and mu ...
. The cartoons signed (Rick) Fiala, Lublin, (Henryk) Baum, Bertram Dusk, Dean, and March were all drawn by Rick Fiala, the founding art director of ''Christopher Street''.
First published in July 1976, ''Christopher Street'' printed 231 issues before closing its doors in December 1995.
Collections of ''Christopher Street'' material
* ''And God Bless Uncle Harry and His Roommate Jack Who We Are Not Supposed to Talk About: cartoons from Christopher Street magazine'', Avon Books, 1978 .
* ''Aphrodisiac, fiction from Christopher Street.'' New York: Coward, McCann & Geoghegan, 1980 . Reprinted unchanged, New York: Putnam, 1982.
* Charles Ortleb and Richard Fiala, ''Le gay ghetto: gay cartoons from Christopher Street'', St. Martin's Press, 1980 .
* ''The Christopher Street Reader'', ed. Michael Denneny; Charles Ortleb; Thomas Steele. New York: Coward, McCann & Geoghegan, 1983 . Issued in Britain as ''The View from Christopher Street'', Chatto & Windus, 1984 .
* ''First Love/Last Love: New Fiction from Christopher Street'', ed. Michael Denneny; Charles Ortleb; Thomas Steele. New York: Putnam, 1985 .
* Boyd McDonald, ''Cruising the Movies: A Sexual Guide to "Oldies" on TV'', Gay Presses of New York, 1985 : a collection of movie reviews, all but a few first published in ''Christopher Street''.
*
Quentin Crisp
Quentin Crisp (born Denis Charles Pratt; – ) was an English raconteur, whose work in the public eye included a memoir of his life and various media appearances. Before becoming well-known, he was an artist's model, hence the title of ...
, ''How to Go to the Movies: A Guide for the Perplexed'', St. Martin's Press, 1989 : more ''Christopher Street'' movie reviews.
*
Andrew Holleran
Andrew Holleran is the pseudonym of Eric Garber (born 1944), an American novelist, essayist, and short story writer, born on the island of Aruba. Most of his adult life has been spent in New York City, Washington, D.C., and a small town in Flori ...
. ''Ground Zero''. New York : Morrow, 1988. . Collection of essays from ''Christopher Street'' written in real time as AIDS devastated the gay commnity of New York.