A Quote by Thom Gunn
It was difficult being a teacher and out of the closet in the '50s. By the time I retired, the English department was proud of having a gay poet of a certain minor fame. It was a very satisfactory change!
Related Quotes
If I was gay, there’d be no closet. You’d never see the closet I came out of. Why? I would have burned it for kindling by the time I was twelve! Because I know, with all certainty in my mind, there’s nothing wrong with being gay and you know it! And there’s nothing wrong with being into chicks if you’re a girl. And there’s nothing wrong with being into all of it…. How awesome would it be to be bisexual? To just walk into a room and go ‘MMMM, ALRIGHT!!!!’
If I was gay, there would be no closet. You would never see the closet I came out of. Why? Because I'd have burned it for kindling by the time I was twelve... If I was gay, at this stage of the game?age 37, aging alternative icon?I'd be taking out ads.
Having an interview in English is difficult for me, but acting in English is much harder. Because when I'm acting in English, if someone points out bad pronunciation or accent, I cannot focus on my emotions anymore, so it was very hard.
When I was 12 I worked with someone - it was actually an English teacher at my school, John Woodward. He was the only teacher in the school to have a top-of-the-range Porsche and all the trappings of success, so it was very interesting for me to find out how he did it. He was probably the wealthiest English teacher in the community.
I was raised in a household where being gay was like, the most normal thing. My brother is gay, all of my best friends are gay. When my brother came out of the closet, it wasn't a big deal for my family.
When I see young men and old women come out of the closet and face being called faggots and dykes and pariahs and betrayers of the family dream, then I am honored to be gay because I belong to a people who are proud.
I'm into books - I love literature, so I toyed with the idea of being an English teacher. I had a fantastic English teacher at school. I think great English teachers make the world go round.
I'm into books – I love literature, so I toyed with the idea of being an English teacher. I had a fantastic English teacher at school. I think great English teachers make the world go round.
Being someone who had had a very difficult childhood, a very difficult adolescence - it had to do with not quite poverty, but close. It had to do with being brought up in a family where no one spoke English, no one could read or write English. It had to do with death and disease and lots of other things. I was a little prone to depression.
Then maybe it's time to change that." Della sat back in her chair. "Change what?" Kylie asked. "Come out of the closet. You know, like...'I'm gay and here to stay.' You'd need a different slogan, but maybe, 'I'm a lizard and if you don't like it, I'll eat out your gizzard.'" Della chuckled. "Okay, it needs some work, but you get what I mean.
I became a poet in Pittsburgh. When I lived in the South, I was a basketball player and primarily a jock. An English teacher essentially suggested that I send the poems that I'd been writing - really just for him - to a few programs, so that when I wound up in Pittsburgh, it's where I figured out that I could actually be a poet.
The difference between being in the closet and out of the closet as a gay man is such a huge shift. I feel so connected still to that 22-year-old, but the idea that I was not open with that part of my life - which I am now so open about - is sort of surreal.
After I retired, it was quite a long time before I went back to my department. I thought I was well out of it.
I think I succeeded as a writer because I did not come out of an English department. I used to write in the chemistry department. And I wrote some good stuff. If I had been in the English department, the prof would have looked at my short stories, congratulated me on my talent, and then showed me how Joyce or Hemingway handled the same elements of the short story. The prof would have placed me in competition with the greatest writers of all time, and that would have ended my writing career.
I'm a supporter of gay rights. And not a closet supporter either. From the time I was a kid, I have never been able to understand attacks upon the gay community. There are so many qualities that make up a human being... by the time I get through with all the things that I really admire about people, what they do with their private parts is probably so low on the list that it is irrelevant.
Gay marriage has jumped out of the closet on to the front page. Everyone from the president of the U.S. to retired four-star general Colin Powell is embracing the issue, now supported by most Americans. Still, a few people, like former First Lady Laura Bush appear to be conflicted.
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