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City of Night Paperback – November 12, 2013
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When John Rechy’s explosive first novel appeared in 1963, it marked a radical departure in fiction, and gave voice to a subculture that had never before been revealed with such acuity. It earned comparisons to Genet and Kerouac, even as Rechy was personally attacked by scandalized reviewers. Nevertheless, the book became an international bestseller, and fifty years later, it has become a classic. Bold and inventive in style, Rechy is unflinching in his portrayal of one hustling youngman” and his search for self-knowledge within the neon-lit world of hustlers, drag queens, and the denizens of their world, as he moves from El Paso to Times Square, from Pershing Square to the French Quarter. Now including never-seen original marked galley pages and an interview with the author, Rechy’s portrait of the edges of America has lost none of its power to move and exhilarate.
- Print length400 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherGrove Press
- Publication dateNovember 12, 2013
- Dimensions5.5 x 1.25 x 8.25 inches
- ISBN-100802121535
- ISBN-13978-0802121530
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4 stars and above
Editorial Reviews
Review
Praise for City of Night:
One of the few major American writers whose life is almost as interesting, and meaningful, as his work.”Michael Cunningham
A ground-breaking book . . . observing a whole new array of characters . . . many for the first time in American literature. . . . A classic American novel.”Edmund White, The New York Review of Books
Probably no novel published in this decade is so complete, so well held together, and so important as City of Night.”Larry McMurtry
One of the major books to be published since World War II.”The Washington Post
City of Night is one of the most remarkable novels to appear in years. . . . It illuminates, it stirs the heart, it is unforgettable.”Herbert Gold
This is one of the best first novels in recent years. . . . It is not presented and it is not conceived, it is written.”Frank O’Hara, Kulchur
City of Night is a remarkable book. . . . Mr. Rechy writes in an authentic jive-like slang: the nightmare existence is explored with a clarity not often clouded by sentimentality and self-pity. The book therefore has the unmistakable ring of candor and truth.”Peter Buitenhuis, The New York Times Book Review
John Rechy shows great comic and tragic talent. He is a truly gifted novelist.”Christopher Isherwood
A stunning piece of writing.”David Bowie
When John Rechy’s first novel, City of Night, appeared in 1963, there had never been anything quite like it. . .Its urgent, syntax-scrambled style [was] a wonderful shock to the reading eye, like that of Hubert Selby’s Last Exit to Brooklyn and William Burroughs’ Naked Lunch. City of Night was distinctly a Beat novel, rangy and full of bold riffs as a Charlie Parker album. Rechy displayed a throwaway brilliance.”Gary Indiana, The Los Angeles Times Book Review
An American classic, with its loner hero, its juke joints and neon signs, its restless shifting from city to city . . . a hybrid of On the Road and Catcher in the Rye.”Independent on Sunday (London)
The novel has not aged a bit. . . . one reads [it] eagerly. . . . We understand better its exceptional authenticity, its premonitory vision, its subtle literary innovations. The characters . . . have the tragic complexity of Vautrin, Charlus, or Morel, and the aggressive solitude of the marginal people of Jean Genet. . . . Its poetry is not ostentatious nor imposed. . . . The protagonists are individuals of flesh and blood.”Hugo Marsan, Le Monde (France)
Rechy is more than a good reporter, for he has touched his materials with the imagination and the craft of a writer.”Granville Hicks, The Saturday Review of Literature
It is the honesty about his narcissism, his depression, and his sexual promiscuity that lifts Rechy’s writing to art. Like so many books, City got attention because of the sex, but it’s really about the soul.”Daniel Curzon, The Los Angeles Times
About the Author
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
City of Night
By John RechyGrove Atlantic, Inc.
Copyright © 1963 John RechyAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-8021-2153-0
Contents
Letter to Grove Press from James Baldwin, 1963,Introduction to the 1984 edition of City of Night,
City of Night,
Afterword to the 50th anniversary edition of,
City of Night,
Portfolio of annotated galley pages from the original 1963 edition of City of Night,
"John Rechy": VICE magazine interview by Steve Lafreniere,
CHAPTER 1
CITY OF NIGHT
LATER I WOULD THINK OF AMERICA as one vast City of Night stretching gaudily from Times Square to Hollywood Boulevard — jukebox-winking, rock-n-roll-moaning: America at night fusing its darkcities into the unmistakable shape of loneliness.
Remember Pershing Square and the apathetic palmtrees. Central Park and the frantic shadows. Movie theaters in the angry morning-hours. And wounded Chicago streets. ... Horrormovie courtyards in the French Quarter — tawdry Mardi Gras floats with clowns tossing out glass beads, passing dumbly like life itself. ... Remember rock-n-roll sex-music blasting from jukeboxes leering obscenely, blinking many-colored along the streets of America strung like a cheap necklace from 42nd Street to Market Street, San Francisco....
One-night sex and cigarette smoke and rooms squashed in by loneliness....
And I would remember lives lived out darkly in that vast City of Night, from all-night movies to Beverly Hills mansions.
But it should begin in El Paso, that journey through the cities of night. Should begin in El Paso, in Texas. And it begins in the Wind. ... In a Southwest windstorm with the gray clouds like steel doors locking you in the world from Heaven.
I cant remember now how long that windstorm lasted — it might have been days — but perhaps it was only hours — because it was in that timeless time of my boyhood, ages six through eight.
My dog Winnie was dying. I would bring her water and food and place them near her, stand watching intently — but she doesnt move. The saliva kept coming from the edges of her mouth. She had always been fat, and she had a crazy crooked grin — but she was usually sick: Once her eyes turned over, so that they were almost completely white and she couldnt see — just lay down, and didnt try to get up for a day. Then she was well, briefly, smiling again, wobbling lopsidedly.
Now she was lying out there dying.
At first the day was beautiful, with the sky blue as it gets only in memories of Texas childhood. Nowhere else in the world, I will think later, is there a sky as clear, as blue, as Deep as that. I will remember other skies: like inverted cups, this shade of blue or gray or black, with limits, like painted rooms. But in the Southwest, the sky was millions and millions of miles deep of blue — clear, magic, electric blue. (I would stare at it sometimes, inexplicably racked with excitement, thinking: If I get a stick miles long and stand on a mountain, I'll puncture Heaven — which I thought of then as an island somewhere in the vast sky — and then Heaven will come tumbling down to earth. ...) Then, that day, standing watching Winnie, I see the gray clouds massing and rolling in the horizon, sweeping suddenly terrifyingly across the sky as if to battle, giant mushrooms exploding, blending into that steely blanket. Now youre locked down here so Lonesome suddenly youre cold. The wind sweeps up the dust, tumbleweeds claw their way across the dirt....
I moved Winnie against the wall of the house, to shelter her from the needlepointed dust. The clouds have shut out the sky completely, the wind is howling violently, and it is Awesomely dark. My mother keeps calling me to come in. ... From the porch, I look back at my dog. The water in the bowl beside her has turned into mud. ... Inside now, I rushed to the window. And the wind is shrieking into the house — the curtains thrashing at the furniture like giant lost birds, flapping against the walls, and my two brothers and two sisters are running about the beat-up house closing the windows, removing the sticks we propped them open with. I hear my father banging on the frames with a hammer, patching the broken panes with cardboard.
Inside, the house was suddenly serene, safe from the wind; but staring out the window in cold terror, I see boxes and weeds crashing against the walls outside, almost tumbling over my sick dog. I long for something miraculous to draw across the sky to stop the wind. ... I squeezed against the pane as close as I could get to Winnie: If I keep looking at her, she cant possibly die! A tumbleweed rolled over her.
I ran out. I stood over Winnie, shielding my eyes from the slashing wind, knelt over her to see if her stomach was still moving, breathing. And her eyes open looking at me. I listen to her heart (as I used to listen to my mother's heart when she was sick so often and I would think she had died, leaving me Alone — because my father for me then existed only as someone who was around somehow; taking furious shape later, fiercely).
Winnie is dead.
It seemed the windstorm lasted for days, weeks. But it must have been over, as usual, the next day, when Im standing next to my mother in the kitchen. (Strangely, I loved to sit and look at her as she fixed the food — or did the laundry: She washed our clothes outside in an aluminum tub, and I would watch her hanging up the clean sheets flapping in the wind. Later I would empty the water for her, and I stared intrigued as it made unpredictable patterns on the dirt. ...) I said: "If Winnie dies —" (She had of course already died, but I didnt want to say it; her body was still outside, and I kept going to see if miraculously she is breathing again.)" — if she dies, I wont be sad because she'll go to Heaven and I'll see her there." My mother said: "Dogs dont go to Heaven, they havent got souls." She didnt say that brutally. There is nothing brutal about my mother: only a crushing tenderness, as powerful as the hatred I would discover later in my father. "What will happen to Winnie, then?" I asked. "Shes dead, thats all," my mother answers, "the body just disappears, becomes dirt." I stand by the window, thinking: It isn't fair....
Then my brother, the younger of the two — I am the youngest in the family — had to bury Winnie.
I was very religious then. I went to Mass regularly, to Confession. I prayed nightly. And I prayed now for my dead dog: God would make an exception. He would let her into Heaven.
I stand watching my brother dig that hole in the backyard. He put the dead dog in and covered it. I made a cross and brought flowers. Knelt. Made the sign of the cross: "Let her into Heaven...."
In the days that followed — I dont know exactly how much later — we could smell the body rotting. ... The day was a ferocious Texas summerday with the threat of rain: thunder — but no rain. The sky lit up through the cracked clouds, and lightning snapped at the world like a whip. My older brother said we hadnt buried Winnie deep enough.
So he dug up the body, and I stand by him as he shovels the dirt in our backyard (littered with papers and bottles covering the weeds which occasionally we pulled, trying several times to grow grass — but it never grew). Finally the body appeared. I turned away quickly. I had seen the decaying face of death. My mother was right. Soon Winnie will blend into the dirt. There was no soul, the body would rot, and there would be Nothing left of Winnie.
That is the incident of my early childhood that I remember most often. And that is why I say it begins in the wind. Because somewhere in that plain of childhood time must have been planted the seeds of the restlessness.
Before the death of Winnie, there are other memories of loss.
We were going to plant flowers in the front yard of the house we lived in before we moved to the house where Winnie died. I was digging a ledge along the sidewalk, and my mother was at the store getting the seeds. A man came and asked for my father, but my father isnt home. "Youre going to have to move very soon," he tells me. I had heard the house was being sold, and we couldnt buy it, but it hadnt meant much to me. I continue shoveling the dirt. After my mother came and spoke to the man, she told me to stop making the holes. Almost snatching the seeds from her — and understanding now — I began burying them frantically as if that way we will have to stay to see them grow.
And so we moved. We moved from that clean house with the white walls and into the house where Winnie will die.
I stand looking at the house in child panic. It was the other half of a duplex, the wooden porch decayed, almost on the verge of toppling down; it slanted like a slide. A dried-up vine, dead from lack of water, still clung to the base of the porch like a skeleton, and the bricks were disintegrating in places into thin streaks of orangy powder. The sun was brazenly bright; it elongates each splinter on the wood, each broken twig on the skeleton vine. ... I rushed inside. Huge brown cockroaches scurried into the crevices. One fell from the wall, spreading its wings — almost two inches wide — as if to lunge at me — and it splashes like a miniature plane on the floor — splut! The paper was peeling off the walls over at least four more layers, all different graycolors. (We would put up the sixth, or begin to — and then stop, leaving the house even more patched as that layer peeled too: an unfinished jigsaw puzzle which would fascinate me at night: its ragged patterns making angryfaces, angry animalshapes — but I could quickly alter them into less angry figures by ripping off the jagged edges. ...) Where the ceiling had leaked, there are spidery brown outlines.
I flick the cockroaches off the walls, stamping angrily on them.
The house smells of Rot. I went to the bathroom. The tub was full of dirty water, and it had stagnated. It was brown, bubbly. In wild dreadful panic, I thrust my hand into the rancid water, found the stopper, pulled it out holding my breath, and looked at my arm, which is covered with the filthy brown crud.
Winters in El Paso for me later would never again seem as bitter cold as they were then. Then I thought of El Paso as the coldest place in the world. We had an old iron stove with a round belly which heated up the whole house; and when we opened the small door to feed it more coal or wood, the glowing pieces inside created a miniature of Hell: the cinders crushed against the edges, smoking. ... The metal flues that carried the smoke from the stove to the chimney collapsed occasionally and filled the house with soot. This happened especially during the windy days, and the wind would whoosh grimespecked down the chimney. At night my mother piled coats on us to keep us warm.
Later, I would be sent out to ask one of our neighbors for a dime — "until my father comes home from work." Being the youngest and most soulful looking in the family, then, I was the one who went. ...
Around that time my father plunged into my life with a vengeance.
To expiate some guilt now for what I'll tell you about him later, I'll say that that strange, moody, angry man — my father — had once experienced a flashy grandeur in music. At the age of eight he had played a piano concert before the President of Mexico. Years later, still a youngman, he directed a symphony orchestra. Unaccountably, since I never really knew that man, he sank quickly lower and lower, and when I came along, when he was almost 50 years old, he found himself Trapped in the memories of that grandeur and in the reality of a series of jobs teaching music to sadly untalented children; selling pianos, sheet music — and soon even that bastard relationship to the world of music he loved was gone, and he became a caretaker for public parks. Then he worked in a hospital cleaning out trash. (I remember him, already a defeated old man, getting up before dawn to face the unmusical reality of soiled bloody dressings.) He would cling to stacks and stacks of symphonic music which he had played, orchestrated — still working on them at night, drumming his fingers on the table feverishly: stacks of music now piled in the narrow hallway in that house, completely unwanted by anyone but himself, gathering dust which annoyed us, so that we wanted to put them outside in the leaky aluminum garage: but he clung to those precious dust-piling manuscripts — and to newspaper clippings of his once-glory — clung to them like a dream, now a nightmare. ... And somehow I became the reluctant inheritor of his hatred for the world that had coldly knocked him down without even glancing back.
Once, yes, there had been a warmth toward that strange red-faced man — and there were still the sudden flashes of tenderness which I will tell you about later: that man who alternately claimed French, English, Scottish descent — depending on his imaginative moods — that strange man who had traveled from Mexico to California spreading his seed — that turbulent man, married and divorced, who then married my Mother, a beautiful Mexican woman who loves me fiercely and never once understood about the terror between me and my father.
Even now in my mother's living room there is a glasscase which has been with us as long as I can remember. It is full of glass objects: figurines of angels, Virgins of Guadalupe, dolls; tissuethin imitation flowers, swans; and a small glass, reverently covered with a rotting piece of silk, tied tightly with a fadedpink ribbon, containing some mysterious memento of one of my father's dead children. ... When I think of that glasscase, I think of my Mother ... a ghost image that will haunt me — Always.
When I was about eight years old, my father taught me this: He would say to me: "Give me a thousand," and I knew this meant I should hop on his lap and then he would fondle me — intimately — and he'd give me a penny, sometimes a nickel. At times when his friends — old gray men — came to our house, they would ask for "a thousand." And I would jump on their laps too. And I would get nickel after nickel, going around the table.
And later, a gift from my father would become a token of a truce from the soon-to-blaze hatred between us.
I loathed Christmas.
Each year, my father put up a Nacimiento — an elaborate Christmas scene, with houses, the wisemen on their way to the manger, angels on angelhair clouds. (On Christmas Eve, after my mother said a rosary while we knelt before the Nacimiento, we placed the Christchild in the crib.) Weeks before Christmas my father began constructing it, and each day, when I came home from school, he would have me stand by him while he worked building the boxlike structure, the miniature houses, the artificial lake; hanging the angels from the elaborate simulated sky, replete with moon, clouds, stars. Sometimes hours passed before he would ask me to help him, but I had to remain there, not talking. Sometimes my mother would have to stand there too, sometimes my younger sister. When anything went wrong — if anything fell — he was in a rage, hurling hammers, cursing.
My father's violence erupted unpredictably over anything. In an instant he overturns the table — food and plates thrust to the floor. He would smash bottles, menacing us with the sharpfanged edges. He had an old sword which he kept hidden threateningly about the house.
And even so there were those moments of tenderness — even more brutal because they didnt last: times in which, when he got paid, he would fill the house with presents — flowers for my mother (incongruous in that patched-up house, until they withered and blended with the drabness), toys for us. Even during the poorest Christmas we went through when we were kids — and after the fearful times of putting up the Nacimiento — he would make sure we all had presents — not clothes, which we needed but didnt want, but toys, which we wanted but didnt need. And Sundays he would take us to Juarez to dinner, leaving an exorbitant tip for the suddenly attentive waiter. ... But in the ocean of his hatred, those times of kindness were mere islands. He burned with an anger at life, which had chewed him up callously: an anger which blazed more fiercely as he sank further beneath the surface of his once almost-realized dream of musical glory.
One of the last touches on the Nacimiento was two pieces of craggy wood, which looked very heavy, like rocks (very much like the piece of petrified wood which my father kept on his desk, to warn us that once it had been the hand of a child who had struck his father, and God had turned the child's hand into stone). The pieces of rocklike wood were located on either side of the manger, like hills. On top of one, my father placed a small statue of a red-tailed, horned Devil, drinking out of a bottle.
(Continues...)Excerpted from City of Night by John Rechy. Copyright © 1963 John Rechy. Excerpted by permission of Grove Atlantic, Inc..
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Product details
- Publisher : Grove Press; Anniversary edition (November 12, 2013)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 400 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0802121535
- ISBN-13 : 978-0802121530
- Item Weight : 1.25 pounds
- Dimensions : 5.5 x 1.25 x 8.25 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #67,815 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #116 in LGBTQ+ Literary Fiction (Books)
- #174 in City Life Fiction (Books)
- #5,352 in Literary Fiction (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
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Customers enjoy the book and find it well-written with vivid descriptions and authentic dialogue. They describe it as a classic that captures the early 1960s era. The characters are described as remarkable and human, making them endearing. Many consider the book insightful and a significant contribution to gay literature. However, some feel the story becomes dull and tiresome at times. Opinions differ on the emotional content, with some finding it insightful and moving, while others criticize the monologues and metaphorical language.
AI-generated from the text of customer reviews
Customers praise the writing quality of the book. They find the vivid descriptions and authentic dialogue bring the story to life. The book is written in a 1950s stream-of-consciousness style. Readers enjoy the tone and style, finding it thoughtful and not just a blow-by-blow description.
"...Flamboyant queens, butch hustlers, desperate scores, gruff bartenders, and reckless partiers populate the book’s many locales—New York City, Los..." Read more
"...Rechy's vivid descriptions and authentic dialogue bring to life a series of unforgettable characters and seedy locations, from New York to New..." Read more
"This book is one of a kind! Mr. Rechy is a very good writer. I have to read some of it every day...." Read more
"...I like the book as a whole. John Rechy was able to describe in complete exactitude all of the characters of the gay community that I could identify..." Read more
Customers appreciate the book's readability. They find it enjoyable, insightful, and a classic worth adding to their libraries. While some readers found the book started off okay, others felt it got subversive and powerful at certain points.
"...“City of Night” is required—and worthwhile—reading for anyone interested in queer American literature." Read more
"Exciting read...." Read more
"This book is one of a kind! Mr. Rechy is a very good writer. I have to read some of it every day...." Read more
"...Way ahead of its time and still worth a read." Read more
Customers enjoy the book's era. They describe it as a classic document from the early 1960s and a throwback to life on the streets of New York.
"...I have to read some of it every day. It is a total throwback to the early 1960's and life on the streets of New York and California as a hustler..." Read more
"This book is a document from the early 60s, required reading for anyone interested in the history of gay literature...." Read more
"...the faint of heart, this is a very well written book and interesting look into a time and life style few of us know anything about" Read more
"Dated. An interesting look at a world that used to be but probably looks a lot different today." Read more
Customers like the character development. They say the characters are remarkable and human, and they end up caring about them.
"...perceptive ear for authentic dialogue to sketch distinct, almost allegorical characters...." Read more
"...descriptions and authentic dialogue bring to life a series of unforgettable characters and seedy locations, from New York to New Orleans...." Read more
"...The characters are believable of the time (and even now) and the hustling locations are beautifully described in each city, New York, Los Angeles,..." Read more
"...I felt I was a part of the scene as I was introduced to some amazing characters. It is a book you should read. It is a book you will not forget...." Read more
Customers find the book insightful and a classic of gay literature. They say it's written by an influential figure in the community.
"In this classic of gay literature (first published in 1963), Rechy—who worked as a hustler himself for years prior to its publication as well as..." Read more
"...Overall, it's a significant and insightful contribution to queer literature." Read more
"...I realized that Mr. Rechy was THE voice of the gay community, and a very talented and skilled man...." Read more
"It's gay, it's Americana, and it's altogether wonderful..." Read more
Customers have mixed opinions about the book's insight. Some find it insightful and moving, with raw honesty and emotional depth that keep them engaged. The writing style is described as stream of consciousness, uncompromising, and poetic. However, others feel the monologues lack grittiness and become too philosophical. Overall, the book is described as earnest, bleak, sentimental, and tough going.
"...for years prior to its publication as well as after—captures the spectrum of experience (I resist calling it emotion) that constituted queer life in..." Read more
"...The style is so poetic and chock full of metaphors as to really obscure meaning a lot of the time...." Read more
"...can be disorienting at times, the raw honesty and emotional depth keep you engaged...." Read more
"...This good, as it allows the reader to focus on the main issue - the narrator's internal struggle - as well as the fine writing...." Read more
Customers have different views on the emotional content. Some find it heartbreaking, poignant, and sad in parts. They appreciate the exploration of loneliness and the search for identity. Others consider it depressing and grim, though some parts are funny.
"...Though the book lacks a traditional plot, its exploration of loneliness and the search for identity makes it a poignant read...." Read more
"...Have read nothing like it. It is not a happy read though parts are very funny, but it is a cold look at desire in all the wrong places." Read more
"Most real life biography I read in a long time. Gritty, emotional and sad in some ways yet shows that it can still end well." Read more
"...And boy it's grim! I certainly felt for the main character. This is just not a style of writing that I particularly enjoy...." Read more
Customers find the book boring and tiresome. They say there's not much to hold their attention, and it becomes mundane and difficult to follow.
"...For the story itself, I felt that much of it became mundane and difficult to follow because it lacked an ostensible storyline...." Read more
"...In 2023, it becomes tiresome. The shock sex and prostitution aren’t really that interesting today, so there’s not a lot to hold your attention...." Read more
"...it got stuck on a character rambling on, and on, and on and just got so boring I couldn't spend another minute of my life on it and deleted it..." Read more
"Long Winded and Boring but has some insight..." Read more
Top reviews from the United States
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- Reviewed in the United States on May 24, 2020In this classic of gay literature (first published in 1963), Rechy—who worked as a hustler himself for years prior to its publication as well as after—captures the spectrum of experience (I resist calling it emotion) that constituted queer life in the decades before Stonewall.
The book is more of a peripatetic collection of vignettes and verbal tableaux than an actual novel. Rechy’s story lacks a conventional plot structure, and the characters are developed only to the extent that their brief appearance in the narrative will allow. Although no character (other than the narrator) sticks around very long, many are nevertheless quite memorable. Drawing on his own experience, Rechy uses exquisite detail and a perceptive ear for authentic dialogue to sketch distinct, almost allegorical characters. Flamboyant queens, butch hustlers, desperate scores, gruff bartenders, and reckless partiers populate the book’s many locales—New York City, Los Angeles, Hollywood, San Francisco, Chicago, and New Orleans.
Despite their differing appearances and motives, every character—and most notably Rechy’s unnamed hustler narrator—experiences a profound sadness borne of loneliness, which is the theme that unites every scene in the book to every other. Every human connection between characters is predicated on physical contact (often sexual)—and every connection evaporates at the first sign of intimacy or emotion. Desire—or, more precisely, the desire to be desired—always conquers love in Rechy’s world.
Nearly 500 pages in length (this edition includes Rechy’s Introduction, an Afterword, and an interview with the author), “City of Night” is required—and worthwhile—reading for anyone interested in queer American literature.
- Reviewed in the United States on October 31, 2023Exciting read. At times the style was a little disorienting and could jolt you in and out of rhythm, but its exciting to see someone take those kinds of liberties, and the subject itself is enough to keep you hooked.
- Reviewed in the United States on June 23, 2024City of Night by John Rechy offers an unflinching look at the life of a gay hustler navigating America's urban landscapes in the 1960s. Rechy's vivid descriptions and authentic dialogue bring to life a series of unforgettable characters and seedy locations, from New York to New Orleans. Though the book lacks a traditional plot, its exploration of loneliness and the search for identity makes it a poignant read. While the writing style can be disorienting at times, the raw honesty and emotional depth keep you engaged. Overall, it's a significant and insightful contribution to queer literature.
- Reviewed in the United States on July 12, 2024This book is one of a kind! Mr. Rechy is a very good writer. I have to read some of it every day. It is a total throwback to the early 1960's and life on the streets of New York and California as a hustler would have known it back then. Lovin' it!
- Reviewed in the United States on December 30, 2012First and foremost, I have to use this opportunity to express how poorly written this E-book is. Missing punctuation, misspelled words, words completely omitted, numbers in place of letters -- so egregious and unmistakable that it sometimes disturbed the flow of the story.
For the story itself, I felt that much of it became mundane and difficult to follow because it lacked an ostensible storyline. The character seems to simply describe each city, each bar, each mercurial character therein, as he so indifferently exposes himself to them. There are no meaningful connections aside from his mother and childhood memories, and when he finally discovers the few that were sparsely pinched inbetween all of these extraordinarily "ignoble" events, he quickly ends it in impulsive aggression. Perhaps it is a reflection of how it actually was to live in that kind of lifestyle where people come and go and connections were easily lost and found again, but it would have been a pleasure to see a connection with someone for the longterm -- especially since he so desperately wanted it.
I like the book as a whole. John Rechy was able to describe in complete exactitude all of the characters of the gay community that I could identify in modern time; from the terribly apathetic, to the pseudo-intellectuals, to the veillards with long acquired bizarre and fantastic vices. It was a pleasure to find a connection with those whose hayday was half a century ago! I found myself also oddly identifying with this mysterious principal character. He reminded me that there is a lot of knowledge one can obtain by simply being a passive spectator in this incredible opera that we call "Life."
- Reviewed in the United States on July 19, 2017This is a lyrical work. it doesn't drain your life with excessive literary prose, but it is also not just a blow-by-blow description, leaving no wondrous phrases or moments to remember, a perfect, delicate balance. The characters are believable of the time (and even now) and the hustling locations are beautifully described in each city, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, New Orleans. No, they are not happy places in this era, maybe in any era in the U.S. My favorite character is the professor in New York. Someone caught in a life he must elevate, but no sign he deprecated his boys as some do and did. The hustlers are typical, with enough characterization to offer a fair portrayal of most types. As a hustler, the lead character had the greatest difficulty understanding attractive men who wanted to pay, not possibly realizing that it was all about efficiency, simple, quick, cheap in use of time. For me, this ranks right up there with "Giovanni's Room" for story. No, not everyone starts gay with guilt, but many do, and this offers one search for the truth, gay is not bad. Way ahead of its time and still worth a read.
Top reviews from other countries
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Fiorucci DanieleReviewed in Italy on August 8, 20245.0 out of 5 stars Ottimo
Tutto perfetto. Tempi rispettati, volume in perfette condizioni.
Bella copertina.
Paul SeguinReviewed in Canada on May 13, 20215.0 out of 5 stars john rechy`s classic novel of gay hustling..
this is one of mr. Rechy`s best books, as we travel though the cities of New York, New Orleans, chicago and LA, we meet a cast of very different characters, each with their own story... Interersting book even though its probably written for a gay audience..
Juan Arturo CarbajalReviewed in Mexico on October 31, 20202.0 out of 5 stars Full of typos.
Like some other comments in here have pointed out, the book is filled with spelling errors, which make the experience of reading book much less pleasurable, and downright frustrating!
Cliente AmazonReviewed in Spain on July 18, 20175.0 out of 5 stars Excellent
Highly enjoyable read, would recommend. I had heard good things, and it did not disappoint. In fact, I'll be loaning it out to several friends.
Stuart R. PriceReviewed in the United Kingdom on April 27, 20155.0 out of 5 stars A stupendous book, well deserving of it's 'classic' status.
As a heterosexual man I have to say I'm loving this book. Rechy has the knack of bringing to life
a world of hustlers and scores that I know nothing about, or have any interest in exploring outside of literature.
Written in 1963, the sex is [thankfully to me] not graphic, more implied. He introduces a dizzying variety of characters
most of whom are loveable and extremely colourful. A wonderful exploration of the almost universal search for something outside of ourselves,
of alienation, of the need to keep moving, moving, but to where, and why ?

