''The Western Shore'' is a 1925 novel written by
Clarkson Crane. It depicts life at the
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
in a series of 20 "episodes" featuring a variety of characters.
Lawrence Clark Powell
Lawrence Clark Powell (September 3, 1906–March 14, 2001) was a librarian, literary critic, bibliographer and author of more than 100 books. Powell "made a significant contribution to the literature of the library profession, but he also writ ...
described it as one of the first and best novels about university life at Berkeley.
The novel was not commercially successful and received mixed reviews.
It is now mostly remembered for being an example of an
early gay novel, for its inclusion of a gay professor as a major character as well as frank discussions of homosexuality among other characters.
Background
Crane himself had studied at UC Berkeley, graduating in 1916.
After graduation, he served in the army during World War I, and then pursued a career as a writer, publishing stories in a number of magazines. He traveled to Paris in 1924 where he lived on a small stipend from an aunt while composing ''The Western Shore'', his first novel.
Reception
The ''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' gave ''The Western Shore'' a tepid review, describing it as "realistic, brilliant and sound, without being great or important in any respect."
A review in the ''Saturday Review of Literature'' complained that Crane "fails to realize the tragedy or the pathos" of his characters.
Other critics, including
Van Wyck Brooks
Van Wyck Brooks (February 16, 1886 in Plainfield, New Jersey – May 2, 1963 in Bridgewater, Connecticut) was an American literary critic, biographer, and historian.
Biography
Brooks graduated from Harvard University in 1908. As a student ...
,
Paul Rosenfeld, and
Carey McWilliams gave more positive assessments.
As gay novel
''The Western Shore'' has been recognized as among the earliest novels to feature prominent gay themes. Most notably, the character of Philip Burton, a gay English professor. Other characters have been read as ambiguously gay, including the freshman student Milton Granger.
Unlike many other gay novels of the early 20th century, it was printed by a mainstream publisher, and without use of a pseudonym. Contemporary reviewers did not remark on the novel's gay content, nor is it mentioned in the introduction to the 1985 second edition.
See also
* ''
Lost Gay Novels
''Lost Gay Novels'' is a 2003 reference guide written by Anthony Slide that provides commentary on 50 works of gay literature published between 1900 and 1950 that Slide found to be not well-known by late 20th and early 21st-century audiences.
...
''
References
Novels with gay themes
University of California, Berkeley
1920s LGBT novels
Novels set in the San Francisco Bay Area
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