The de-gaying of Susan Sontag (by Andrew Sullivan)

Andrew Sullivan ^ | 1 -5 -05 | Andrew Sullivan

[montag813]

Once again a homosexual shows us that it is all about sex.

[ChocChipCookie]

I didn't know that Susan Sontag was a lesbian, but boy, does that explain a lot.

[eureka!]

In case you missed it, my favorite Sontag obit: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1312290/posts

[x]

Sontag "de-gayed" herself, and wouldn't talk about her sexuality for a very long time. She thought it would marginalize her and turn her into a "gay" writer, rather than just a writer. When she did come to talk about her own private life, she was rather coy, leaving open the possibility of bisexuality, rather than publicly identifying herself as a lesbian. I don't know if she ever did, or what she was in her heart of hearts, but she was probably right that she would have been given less of a hearing if people could pigeonhole her as a homosexual.

What the Times should have done would depend on whether they were writing an obituary or a "Remembering Susan Sontag" piece, but if she didn't consider Leibovitz her "partner" herself, there's no reason why the newspapers should do so.

Roger Kimball, at The New Criterion, has written a good assessment of Sontag's career. He is very critical, but a bit less emotional than some of the other critics. Sontag was writing to create the maximum effect in the moment. She aimed to be a trend-setter, that is, to be about 15 minutes ahead of her era. So her work isn't going to last. Indeed, the ill-feeling produced by her writing will probably be better remembered than her ideas or her novels.

Most of what's said against her is true. But the "piling on" after her death probably won't endear the right to some apolitical souls. There's something to be said for the older, slower media cycle that leaves time for the dead to be buried, rather than one so fast that commentators don't have time to think out their responses. For those used to the older, slower way of doing things, it's a bit like people show up at the funeral to badmouth the dead.

[longtermmemmory]

Here's Daniel Okrent's defense of why the New York Times omitted the fact that Susan Sontag was a lesbian:

Why did this omission have to be defended? Who would have benefitted by its inclusion?
- -- --- ----- -0-----

Since when did reporting facts required a determination of benefit? Answer since the issue is homosexual behavior and the reporter is probably a homosexual.

[dennisw]

http://www.temple.edu/photo/photographers/leibovitz/
http://fototapeta.art.pl/fti-alp.html

For me it's more of an unpleasant shock to find out Ann Leibovitz is lesbian since I've seen her photographs for years. She was a big deal in the early Rolling Stone magazine. The longest piece by Sontag I ever read was one of her pieces in New York Review of Books or Village Voice. Even then I would skim it reading it more from a sense of obligation since I bought into her being a great intellect.

It all fits together that they are both gay, at least as they got older. Now that I look at their contemporary photos it's kind of obvious.

[dennisw]

That one is cutting. There are a few that deconstruct La Sontag more viciously.


SUSAN SONTAG AND THE EVIL OF BANALITY
by Srdja(Serge) Trifkovic

http://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/News/Trifkovic04/NewsST123004.html