Ron Jackson Suresha is an American
author
An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states:
"''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...
and
anthologist of books centering on
gay and
bisexual
Bisexuality is a romantic or sexual attraction or behavior toward both males and females, or to more than one gender. It may also be defined to include romantic or sexual attraction to people regardless of their sex or gender identity, whi ...
men's
subcultures, particularly the
Bear community.
Biography
Suresha was born in
Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at th ...
,
Michigan
Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...
, and attended grade school in the northwest suburb of Oak Park.
Suresha and his husband (styled "husbear"), Rocco Russo, were
legally married in
Provincetown, Massachusetts, in October 2004, and received a
Connecticut civil union one year later. They lived until 2011 in
New London, Connecticut
New London is a seaport city and a port of entry on the northeast coast of the United States, located at the mouth of the Thames River in New London County, Connecticut. It was one of the world's three busiest whaling ports for several decades ...
and now live in
New Milford, Connecticut
New Milford is a town in Litchfield County, Connecticut, United States. The town is in western Connecticut, north of Danbury, on the banks of the Housatonic River, and it shares its border with the northeastern shore of Candlewood Lake. It is t ...
, where Suresha serves as a
Justice of the Peace
A justice of the peace (JP) is a judicial officer of a lower or ''puisne'' court, elected or appointed by means of a commission ( letters patent) to keep the peace. In past centuries the term commissioner of the peace was often used with the sa ...
. He has been an ordained minister of the
Universal Life Church since 1975.
Suresha's nonfiction anthology, ''Bears on Bears: Interviews & Discussions'' (2002), includes 25 dialogues with 57
bear-identified men and bear-lovers from around the world, such as comedian
Bruce Vilanch, porn model Jack Radcliffe, and ''
Survivor
Survivor(s) may refer to:
Actual survivors
*
*Last survivors of historical events
Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional entities
* Survivors, characters in the 1997 ''KKnD'' video-game series
* ''The Survivors'', or the ''New Survivors Found ...
'' star
Richard Hatch. In the introduction, Suresha asserts that ''Bears on Bears'' is "the first interview book ... compiled primarily from online interactions" using
online chat technology.
A bisexual-identified man and bi rights advocate, Suresha edited, with Peter Chvany, the nonfiction book ''Bi Men : Coming Out Every Which Way'' (2006). Suresha's two bisexual men's anthologies were named finalists in the 2006
Lambda Literary Award for Bisexual Literature
The Lambda Literary Award for Bisexual Literature is an annual literary award, presented by the Lambda Literary Foundation, that awards books with bisexual content. The award can be separated into three categories: bisexual fiction, bisexual nonf ...
.
In 2008, Suresha edited for ''
Journal of Bisexuality
The ''Journal of Bisexuality'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal published quarterly by the Taylor & Francis Group under the Routledge imprint. It is the official journal of the American Institute of Bisexuality. It covers a wide range of topics ...
'' a special issue commemorating the sexagennial (60th) anniversary of the publication of ''
Sexual Behavior in the Human Male'', commonly known as the
Kinsey Report, as ''Bisexual Perspectives on the Life and Work of Alfred C. Kinsey,'' which was named a finalist in the 2008
Lambda Literary Awards
Lambda Literary Awards, also known as the "Lammys", are awarded yearly by Lambda Literary to recognize the crucial role LGBTQ writers play in shaping the world. The Lammys celebrate the very best in LGBTQ literature.The awards were instituted i ...
in Bisexual Literature.
That year, Suresha cofounded Bear Bones Books, an imprint of
LGBT
' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity.
The LGBT term is a ...
publisher
Lethe Press, which released a revised edition of his ''Bears on Bears'', including five additional interviews. The imprint also reissued several men's fiction anthologies he edited under the pseudonym R. Jackson. In 2017, Suresha made Bear Bones Books an independent media outlet, reissuing several of his and other's books.
Suresha published in 2011 a folklore collection of humorous tales about the character
Nasreddin, ''
The Uncommon Sense of the Immortal Mullah Nasruddin'' which was named a
Storytelling
Storytelling is the social and cultural activity of sharing stories, sometimes with improvisation, theatrics or embellishment. Every culture has its own stories or narratives, which are shared as a means of entertainment, education, cultural pre ...
World Honor Title in 2012 in the adult collections category, and which received a 2013 Anne Izard Storytellers' Choice Award.
With Scott McGillivray, Suresha compiled and wrote a 2012 photobook, ''Fur: The Love of Hair'', for German publisher
Bruno Gmünder Verlag
Bruno's GmbH is a German retailer of products targeted toward gay men; it was originally founded in 1981 as Bruno Gmünder Verlag, a book publishing house. Bruno Gmünder Verlag was dissolved in 2017, with the retail division becoming Bruno's ...
, which received a Rainbow Book Award.
In 2014, Suresha edited an anthology of poetry written by and for men of the bear community, ''Hibernation and Other Poems by Bear Bards'', which was named a Rainbow Book Award winner in both the LGBTQ Poetry and Bisexuality categories. In 2014 he published a second collection of Nasreddin stories, ''Extraordinary Adventures of Mullah Nasruddin'', named a Lambda Literary Award Finalist.
Suresha identified as a
gay man "since puberty" until his forties. After
cancer
Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...
and several other midlife crises, Suresha came out as bisexual. Suresha says that this second coming out was "much more provocative and positive than my first arduous teenage process of self-discovery as gay, but just as much a rollercoaster."
In September 2019, in coordination with an exhibit at the New Milford (Conn.) Historical Society & Museum, Suresha presented an evening lecture on
Florence Maybrick
Florence Elizabeth Chandler Maybrick (3 September 1862 – 23 October 1941) was an American woman convicted in the United Kingdom of murdering her husband, cotton merchant James Maybrick.
Early life
Florence Maybrick was born Florence Elizabet ...
, the American woman wrongly accused of poisoning her British husband, entitled ''The Mystery of the Dress: The Cat Woman of Gaylordsville.'' Suresha two years later brought proposals before the Town Council of New Milford and the Town of Kent Selectmen, marking the 80th anniversary of Maybrick's October 1941 death in New Milford and burial in South Kent and noting her exoneration; both proposals were accepted, and on October 23, 2021, both towns observed ''Florence Chandler Maybrick Day.''
See also
*
Bisexual Community
The bisexual community, also known as the bi+, m-spec, bisexual/pansexual, or bi/pan/fluid community, includes members of the LGBT community who identify as bisexual, pansexual, omnisexual, polysexual and sexually fluid. As opposed to hetero- ...
*
Bisexual Resource Center
The Bisexual Resource Center (BRC) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit educational organization headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, that has served the bisexual community since 1985. Originally known as The East Coast Bisexual Network, it incorporated ...
*
Bear community
*
Nasreddin Hoca
Nasreddin () or Nasreddin Hodja (other variants include: Mullah Nasreddin Hooja, Nasruddin Hodja, Mullah Nasruddin, Mullah Nasriddin, Khoja Nasriddin) (1208-1285) is a character in the folklore of the Muslim world from Arabia to Central Asia ...
References
External links
Ron Suresha(website / blog)
Bear Bones BooksMullah Nasruddin
{{DEFAULTSORT:Suresha, Ron
Bisexual men
Bisexual rights activists
Bisexual writers
Jewish American writers
American LGBT rights activists
American LGBT writers
LGBT people from Michigan
American non-fiction writers
Living people
Bear (gay culture)
Year of birth missing (living people)
21st-century American Jews