Posted on 01/05/2005 9:23:50 AM PST by dennisw
DE-GAYING SONTAG: Here's Daniel Okrent's defense of why the New York Times omitted the fact that Susan Sontag was a lesbian:
Spurred by challenges and queries from several readers, I looked into the charge that The Times had willfully suppressed information about Susan Sontag's relationship with Annie Leibovitz. (The famous rock and roll and Vogue magazine photographer who has also photographed in GWBush's White House) My inquiry indicates that the subject was in fact discussed before publication of the Sontag obituary, but that The Times could find no authoritative source who could confirm any details of a relationship. According to obituaries editor Chuck Strum, "It might have been helpful if The Times could have found a way to acknowledge the existence of a widespread impression that Susan Sontag and Annie Leibovitz were more than just casual friends. But absent any clarifying statements from either party over the years, and no such corroboration from people close to her, we felt it was impossible to write anything conclusive about their relationship and remain fair to both of them." Ms. Leibovitz would not discuss the subject with The Times, and Ms. Sontag's son, David Rieff, declined to confirm any details about the relationship. Some might say that such safely accurate phrases as "Ms. Sontag had a long relationship with Annie Leibovitz" would have sufficed, but I think anything like that would not only bear the unpleasant aroma of euphemism, but would also seem leering or coy. Additionally, irrespective of the details of this particular situation, it's fair to ask whether intimate information about the private lives of people who wish to keep those lives private is fair game for newspapers. I would personally hope not.The closet remains intact. Privacy? Sontag informed the world about her cancers and even an abortion. And her relationships with several women were not state secrets. Recall also that Sontag's career took off with her rightly celebrated essay on camp, an essay that she would had a hard time writing without intimate familiarity with gay life and culture. The golden rule here is to ask what the NYT would have done if Sontag had lived with a man for a couple of decades on and off, and had written essays on various aspects of sex, love and heterosexuality. Do you think they would have never mentioned her actual love life? Or if she had had serious relationships with a variety of male artists and thinkers, some of whom had influenced her work. Would this be regarded as an invasion of her privacy? The question answers itself. (More discussion here.)
Once again a homosexual shows us that it is all about sex.
I didn't know that Susan Sontag was a lesbian, but boy, does that explain a lot.
In case you missed it, my favorite Sontag obit: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1312290/posts
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.
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?
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Since when did reporting facts required a determination of benefit? Answer since the issue is homosexual behavior and the reporter is probably a homosexual.
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.
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
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