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Queer Cowboys: And Other Erotic Male Friendships in Nineteenth-Century American Literature
Why do the earliest representations of cowboy-figures symbolizing the highest ideals of manhood in American culture exclude male-female desire while promoting homosocial and homoerotic bonds? Evidence from the best-known Western writers and artists of the post-Civil War period - Owen Wister, Mark Twain, Frederic Remington, George Catlin - as well as now-forgotten writers, illustrators, and photographers, suggest that in the period before the word 'homosexual' and its synonyms were invented, same-sex intimacy and erotic admiration were key aspects of a masculine code. These males-only clubs of journalists, cowboys, miners, Indian vaqueros defined themselves by excluding femininity and the cloying ills of domesticity, while embracing what Roosevelt called 'strenuous living' with other bachelors in the relative 'purity' of wilderness conditions. Queer Cowboys recovers this forgotten culture of exclusively masculine, sometimes erotic, and often intimate camaraderie in fiction, photographs, illustrations, song lyrics, historical ephemera, and theatrical performances.
153 pages, Hardcover
First published May 11, 2005
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
January 25, 2023
An attempt to re-imagine what all those lonely cowboys were up to (written before Brokeback Mountain gave us one answer); this academic exercise is only moderately convincing. Clues, hints and innuendo are sometimes misleading and secrets remain untold. "Never underestimate the love of straight men" is a motto which would undermine many of this book's assertions.
Homosocial is not homosexual and should never be conflated. Pair bonds between males are not the same as same sex marriage. On the other hand, I am convinced that a lot went on in those lonely bunkhouses and mining camps. This book, however, burdened by its academic posturing, is unlikely to provide much illumination into darker recesses. Except to make the simple point that yes, in days gone by, there were people who were, as we would say today, gay or perhaps bi-curious.
Homosocial is not homosexual and should never be conflated. Pair bonds between males are not the same as same sex marriage. On the other hand, I am convinced that a lot went on in those lonely bunkhouses and mining camps. This book, however, burdened by its academic posturing, is unlikely to provide much illumination into darker recesses. Except to make the simple point that yes, in days gone by, there were people who were, as we would say today, gay or perhaps bi-curious.
June 30, 2011
Does not allow for the existence of *any* platonic friendship. Surely, like the infamous cigar, sometimes a sidekick is just a sidekick?
A little repetitive. (Yes, this leads to skimming parts.) But full of stuff I didn't know - especially about Mark Twain - and I'd consider it a good resource for those interested in the subject matter. Thanks to this book, I discovered another fave Bret Harte story. (Bret Harte rocks!)
A little repetitive. (Yes, this leads to skimming parts.) But full of stuff I didn't know - especially about Mark Twain - and I'd consider it a good resource for those interested in the subject matter. Thanks to this book, I discovered another fave Bret Harte story. (Bret Harte rocks!)
December 26, 2014
Quite a difficult book to rate really. It promised a lot but delivered very little but then it depends on what you were hoping would be delivered I suppose.
This is largely an academic work - possibly a Masters Thesis put into book form. The wiser academic students tend to double with a subject which will get them their degree and which can be used then as the foundation for a book. The entire subject matter is structured around an academic work and there are copious references for the reader's further perusal. Exactly what those references will throw up is another matter. Judging by the content of this work I would suggest very little of any import.
The author uses quite a lot of academic jargon which is completely unnecessary in a book on this subject. He is also trying to make a rather simple subject very complicated. He has practically nothing to go on for a start so examines, in the opening chapters, the homoerotic double meanings in the Western genre from the 1840s onwards with particular reference to 2 writers. To be honest the vague references in the books is milked to the nth degree. The writer is looking for meanings which just aren't there.It would be like looking for sadomasochism in Agatha Christie. Look hard enough you can find anything. I suspect that the conclusion was reached long before a word was written and there is a lot of the writer's own longings evident on each page.
In reality there is very little written evidence of what went on in the Wild West of the 1830s onwards. The cowboys were largely illiterate and immigrants from various countries whose first language wasn't English anyway. I think the writer was looking for a cowboy parallel to 'situational homosexuality' which is found in those formal social structures where women are largely excluded and men are left to their own devices i.e. prisons, the Army, boarding schools, segregated religious societies etc. Shame faced fumbling becomes the norm and because nearly everyone knows it is going on they can participate if they wish or just leave it. Once the situation is ended then the man returns to his normal expected role in society with no ill effects for the most part. There is no emotional aspect attached to the behavior.
Without reading anything on the subject it is possible to imagine that thousands of young 'gay' males of the time found themselves the object of male lust while working as cowboys. The situation would have been ripe for sexual attachments to have been formed but they were hardly going to write about it or broadcast them from the nearest corral. There are extensive photograph collections available of cowboys on the range and the images are none too homoerotic - dirt and beards feature a lot. But always, to the side or in the background there are the young cowboys standing with a horse or a tin of beans. What their story is has never been told and probably never will be. So many immigrants were thrown onto that way of life without education or financial means of support or the emotional support of family life. The cowboy 'herd' became their family and support. It is not unreasonable to surmise that the homosexually inclined found outlets at night under a blanket. But you won't find any revelations in this book on that topic.
This is no Brokeback Mountain expose.
This is largely an academic work - possibly a Masters Thesis put into book form. The wiser academic students tend to double with a subject which will get them their degree and which can be used then as the foundation for a book. The entire subject matter is structured around an academic work and there are copious references for the reader's further perusal. Exactly what those references will throw up is another matter. Judging by the content of this work I would suggest very little of any import.
The author uses quite a lot of academic jargon which is completely unnecessary in a book on this subject. He is also trying to make a rather simple subject very complicated. He has practically nothing to go on for a start so examines, in the opening chapters, the homoerotic double meanings in the Western genre from the 1840s onwards with particular reference to 2 writers. To be honest the vague references in the books is milked to the nth degree. The writer is looking for meanings which just aren't there.It would be like looking for sadomasochism in Agatha Christie. Look hard enough you can find anything. I suspect that the conclusion was reached long before a word was written and there is a lot of the writer's own longings evident on each page.
In reality there is very little written evidence of what went on in the Wild West of the 1830s onwards. The cowboys were largely illiterate and immigrants from various countries whose first language wasn't English anyway. I think the writer was looking for a cowboy parallel to 'situational homosexuality' which is found in those formal social structures where women are largely excluded and men are left to their own devices i.e. prisons, the Army, boarding schools, segregated religious societies etc. Shame faced fumbling becomes the norm and because nearly everyone knows it is going on they can participate if they wish or just leave it. Once the situation is ended then the man returns to his normal expected role in society with no ill effects for the most part. There is no emotional aspect attached to the behavior.
Without reading anything on the subject it is possible to imagine that thousands of young 'gay' males of the time found themselves the object of male lust while working as cowboys. The situation would have been ripe for sexual attachments to have been formed but they were hardly going to write about it or broadcast them from the nearest corral. There are extensive photograph collections available of cowboys on the range and the images are none too homoerotic - dirt and beards feature a lot. But always, to the side or in the background there are the young cowboys standing with a horse or a tin of beans. What their story is has never been told and probably never will be. So many immigrants were thrown onto that way of life without education or financial means of support or the emotional support of family life. The cowboy 'herd' became their family and support. It is not unreasonable to surmise that the homosexually inclined found outlets at night under a blanket. But you won't find any revelations in this book on that topic.
This is no Brokeback Mountain expose.
February 11, 2014
This is a very short book, like a respectable length for a thesis. Lots of nice archival pictures including a shirtless Mark Twain and some very cuddly cowboys!
Other than the pictures this book was kinda a bummer, because I LOVE books about “homosocial environments,” especially with men, but this book does some overreaching with the literary analysis I think. Now, yes, pardner’d men alone in the woods in the 1800s probably did some crazy amounts of gay sex, but I don’t think that means every period depiction of cowboys in Western pulp fiction can be analyzed as homoerotic. However, the author has dug up many, many unpublished homoerotic poems and prose from writers of the period that certainly shed a new light on some of the important literary figures of the West, particularly Mark Twain, which is what gives this slim little volume it's main value. The bibliography is definitely worth scraping if 19th century masculinity is your bag.
The author also makes the observation that depictions of male bonds in literature change drastically after the “invention” of homosexuality at the turn of the century, but doesn't bust out any examples of this, which isn't much use to you the reader.
An interesting re-analysis of Western literature but not necessarily the drastic re-writing of the cowboy narrative it tries to be.
Other than the pictures this book was kinda a bummer, because I LOVE books about “homosocial environments,” especially with men, but this book does some overreaching with the literary analysis I think. Now, yes, pardner’d men alone in the woods in the 1800s probably did some crazy amounts of gay sex, but I don’t think that means every period depiction of cowboys in Western pulp fiction can be analyzed as homoerotic. However, the author has dug up many, many unpublished homoerotic poems and prose from writers of the period that certainly shed a new light on some of the important literary figures of the West, particularly Mark Twain, which is what gives this slim little volume it's main value. The bibliography is definitely worth scraping if 19th century masculinity is your bag.
The author also makes the observation that depictions of male bonds in literature change drastically after the “invention” of homosexuality at the turn of the century, but doesn't bust out any examples of this, which isn't much use to you the reader.
An interesting re-analysis of Western literature but not necessarily the drastic re-writing of the cowboy narrative it tries to be.
February 1, 2021
I read this. This is a book that I read.
In its essence, it's an academic look at queer relationships in westerns. I suggest you read some, if not all of the books it references beforehand; The Virginian, Deerslayer, Two College Friends, and Live Boys. I intend to read them, ad College Friends sounds particularly gay and the author's a distant relative of mine.
Merged review:
Cowboys gay.
I definitely would've enjoyed it more if I had read the books before this. All of them are spoiled, and I learned to skim the summaries. Still, it made me think about queer male culture in terms of white american masculinity- most of the male queer rep we get nowadays tend to avoid typical masculinity.
Honestly would not have read this if it weren't for Dean Winchester's fetish, but I'm glad to have read it.
In its essence, it's an academic look at queer relationships in westerns. I suggest you read some, if not all of the books it references beforehand; The Virginian, Deerslayer, Two College Friends, and Live Boys. I intend to read them, ad College Friends sounds particularly gay and the author's a distant relative of mine.
Merged review:
Cowboys gay.
I definitely would've enjoyed it more if I had read the books before this. All of them are spoiled, and I learned to skim the summaries. Still, it made me think about queer male culture in terms of white american masculinity- most of the male queer rep we get nowadays tend to avoid typical masculinity.
Honestly would not have read this if it weren't for Dean Winchester's fetish, but I'm glad to have read it.
January 31, 2019
I was very interested in the bits of lesser-known queer and erotic ephemera that Packard has collected, like Whister’s poetry about explicit art, and Claude Hartland’s pseudo-medical account of (gay) sex addiction. I wish that there was a solid final concluding chapter that wrapped things up, though.
November 28, 2010
While my usual genre is historical fiction, I am always on the lookout for research of a historical variety. Therefore, although it has been around for a while, “Queer Cowboys: And other erotic male friendships in nineteenth-century American literature” by Chris Packard (Palgrave Macmillan, 2005) is one such work.
The stated objective of this thesis is to explore the “bonds that hold … [same-sex partners, i.e. ‘sidekicks’] together, particularly the erotic affection that undergirds their friendship.” To do this it painstakingly explores the “originary” texts of seminal, nineteenth-century writers who, individually and collectively, created the prevailing stereotype of the devoted same-sex partners. Moreover, the author undertakes to “teach readers how to recognize homoerotic affection in a historical discourse that was free from the derogatory meanings associated with post-1900 evaluations of male-male erotic friendships”—a not overly presumptuous ambition, given that Packard teaches literature and writing at New York University and New School University.
Okay, I am one such hypothetical reader, so let’s see how well Professor Packard achieved his objectives.
At the risk of oversimplifying Packard’s thesis, it starts with an underlying premise that before 1900—i.e. before “the modern invention of the ‘homosexual’ as a social pariah”—cowboy relationships were freely represented as quite a bit more affectionate than they are after that date. Moreover, although the stereotypes generally depicted ethnic warfare; citing the threat of “savagery” as justification for ethnic slaughter, and the freeing-up of territory to make way for European homesteaders, writers like James Fennimore Cooper wrote about friendships, “even marriage rituals,” between members of warring groups based on shared values. In addition friendships between young whites and natives were quite common. These mixed friendships usually had the natives tutoring the boys in the primitive ways of the wilderness, and included rituals of brotherhood, i.e. exchanging blood, and other physical, nuptial-like rites.
Notably absent from this literary same-sex scenario is any role for femininity, which is described by one quoted authority, Walter Benn Michaels, as “…the problem of heterosexuality.” The ‘problem’ being the threat of reproduction in a period when fear of mixed-ethnicity through sex or marriage was keen in American culture. Moreover, femininity and reproduction ran contrary to the strong, independent, and particularly ‘free’ nature of the cowboy characters.
“Within canonical as well as ignored literature, high culture as well as low, homoerotic intimacy is not only present, but it is thematic in works produced before the modern want him to be queer. America’s official emblem of masculinity is not one who settles down after he conquests … rather, he moves on, perpetually conquering, and repeatedly affirming his ties to the wilderness and his male partner.”
Having thus stated his hypotheses, Packard then goes on to support these with an anthology of mostly “canonical” writings—i.e. Cooper’s “The Leatherstocking Tales,” Owen Wister’s “The Virginian,” and Walt Whitman’s poetry. He also introduces some lesser known examples, such as Claude Hartland’s “The Story of a Life,” Frank Harris’s “My Reminiscences as a Cowboy,” and Frederick Loring’s “Two College Friends.”
While circumstantial, when read from a homoerotic perspective Packard makes a very compelling case, over all. There are no ‘smoking-gun’ examples, of course, because such blatancies would have been considered excessive by Eastern readers—meaning east of the Mississippi, but it is evident that the implication was there just below the surface. Consequently, he has also taught us how to recognize homoerotic affection in “historic discourse.”
To get to that level of edification, however, the reader has had to wade through an Introduction that I found to be a jumble of complex ideas, confusingly presented and fraught with academic jargon—i.e. “nexus,” “praxis,” “lingua franca,” and so forth. A case on point:
“Given the instant and undying popularity of cowboys in U.S. popular culture during a period of rapid national expansion, to identify a homoerotic core in its myth about the supremacy of white American masculinity is to imply that American audiences want their frontiersmen to practice nonnormative desires as part of their roles in nation building. In other words, if there is something national about the cowboy (and other frontier heroes of his ilk), and if there is something homoerotic about American national identity as it is conceived in the American West.”
Perhaps I am a bit slow on the uptake, but I didn’t find the “In other words” any more elucidating than the original statement.
Happily, once he launches into the body of the argument his tone becomes somewhat less esoteric, and apart from belabouring some points—giving a new dimension to the term ‘moot point’—he presents a very interesting and informative perspective on nineteenth-century thought.
Those looking for titillating erotica, however, are bound to be disappointed but well-informed after reading this work.
The stated objective of this thesis is to explore the “bonds that hold … [same-sex partners, i.e. ‘sidekicks’] together, particularly the erotic affection that undergirds their friendship.” To do this it painstakingly explores the “originary” texts of seminal, nineteenth-century writers who, individually and collectively, created the prevailing stereotype of the devoted same-sex partners. Moreover, the author undertakes to “teach readers how to recognize homoerotic affection in a historical discourse that was free from the derogatory meanings associated with post-1900 evaluations of male-male erotic friendships”—a not overly presumptuous ambition, given that Packard teaches literature and writing at New York University and New School University.
Okay, I am one such hypothetical reader, so let’s see how well Professor Packard achieved his objectives.
At the risk of oversimplifying Packard’s thesis, it starts with an underlying premise that before 1900—i.e. before “the modern invention of the ‘homosexual’ as a social pariah”—cowboy relationships were freely represented as quite a bit more affectionate than they are after that date. Moreover, although the stereotypes generally depicted ethnic warfare; citing the threat of “savagery” as justification for ethnic slaughter, and the freeing-up of territory to make way for European homesteaders, writers like James Fennimore Cooper wrote about friendships, “even marriage rituals,” between members of warring groups based on shared values. In addition friendships between young whites and natives were quite common. These mixed friendships usually had the natives tutoring the boys in the primitive ways of the wilderness, and included rituals of brotherhood, i.e. exchanging blood, and other physical, nuptial-like rites.
Notably absent from this literary same-sex scenario is any role for femininity, which is described by one quoted authority, Walter Benn Michaels, as “…the problem of heterosexuality.” The ‘problem’ being the threat of reproduction in a period when fear of mixed-ethnicity through sex or marriage was keen in American culture. Moreover, femininity and reproduction ran contrary to the strong, independent, and particularly ‘free’ nature of the cowboy characters.
“Within canonical as well as ignored literature, high culture as well as low, homoerotic intimacy is not only present, but it is thematic in works produced before the modern want him to be queer. America’s official emblem of masculinity is not one who settles down after he conquests … rather, he moves on, perpetually conquering, and repeatedly affirming his ties to the wilderness and his male partner.”
Having thus stated his hypotheses, Packard then goes on to support these with an anthology of mostly “canonical” writings—i.e. Cooper’s “The Leatherstocking Tales,” Owen Wister’s “The Virginian,” and Walt Whitman’s poetry. He also introduces some lesser known examples, such as Claude Hartland’s “The Story of a Life,” Frank Harris’s “My Reminiscences as a Cowboy,” and Frederick Loring’s “Two College Friends.”
While circumstantial, when read from a homoerotic perspective Packard makes a very compelling case, over all. There are no ‘smoking-gun’ examples, of course, because such blatancies would have been considered excessive by Eastern readers—meaning east of the Mississippi, but it is evident that the implication was there just below the surface. Consequently, he has also taught us how to recognize homoerotic affection in “historic discourse.”
To get to that level of edification, however, the reader has had to wade through an Introduction that I found to be a jumble of complex ideas, confusingly presented and fraught with academic jargon—i.e. “nexus,” “praxis,” “lingua franca,” and so forth. A case on point:
“Given the instant and undying popularity of cowboys in U.S. popular culture during a period of rapid national expansion, to identify a homoerotic core in its myth about the supremacy of white American masculinity is to imply that American audiences want their frontiersmen to practice nonnormative desires as part of their roles in nation building. In other words, if there is something national about the cowboy (and other frontier heroes of his ilk), and if there is something homoerotic about American national identity as it is conceived in the American West.”
Perhaps I am a bit slow on the uptake, but I didn’t find the “In other words” any more elucidating than the original statement.
Happily, once he launches into the body of the argument his tone becomes somewhat less esoteric, and apart from belabouring some points—giving a new dimension to the term ‘moot point’—he presents a very interesting and informative perspective on nineteenth-century thought.
Those looking for titillating erotica, however, are bound to be disappointed but well-informed after reading this work.
August 29, 2023
I found this at a thrift store and couldn't resist. It actually ended up reading better than I anticipated, though I do have to agree with the majority of the reviews I read in noting it leaves something to be desired as a work of scholarship.
In fairness, the chapter featuring Whitman isn't too bad, and I did learn something from the chapter on men's clubs. My big hangup is with the first chapter, which looks at queer interracial families. Packard does eventually make a compelling point about reading non-explicitly queer characters as queer, explaining how some of them end up living together and raising children together. Before that, though, Packard seems to be reaching just a bit to make his case that these characters are queer-coded. One of his arguments lies in the use of the terms "fri'nd" and "fancy". Another argument draws on a myth about a swan that uses fire to signify sexual/romantic interest. Packard mentions this myth, which is seemingly not mentioned in the source material, and then mentions a character putting out a fire before sleeping as a sign of romantic interest. Within this same argument, Packard refers to an embrace after two characters are reunited in a dire circumstance as a "commitment ceremony". It might have just been the mood of the day, but I laughed quite a bit reading the first chapter.
So, overall, I will not be reading this again. I did not need to read it in the first place. I definitely did not need to buy it, but it did at least make me smile, and it didn't take me anywhere near as long to read as I thought.
In fairness, the chapter featuring Whitman isn't too bad, and I did learn something from the chapter on men's clubs. My big hangup is with the first chapter, which looks at queer interracial families. Packard does eventually make a compelling point about reading non-explicitly queer characters as queer, explaining how some of them end up living together and raising children together. Before that, though, Packard seems to be reaching just a bit to make his case that these characters are queer-coded. One of his arguments lies in the use of the terms "fri'nd" and "fancy". Another argument draws on a myth about a swan that uses fire to signify sexual/romantic interest. Packard mentions this myth, which is seemingly not mentioned in the source material, and then mentions a character putting out a fire before sleeping as a sign of romantic interest. Within this same argument, Packard refers to an embrace after two characters are reunited in a dire circumstance as a "commitment ceremony". It might have just been the mood of the day, but I laughed quite a bit reading the first chapter.
So, overall, I will not be reading this again. I did not need to read it in the first place. I definitely did not need to buy it, but it did at least make me smile, and it didn't take me anywhere near as long to read as I thought.
December 20, 2017
I found this to be an interesting and probable "thesis". "Intimate camaraderie" in 1800's photographs and thinly veiled references to same-sex intimacy in cowboy fiction... A fast and original read.
August 3, 2022
Don't read many criticism books on lit, but this was super readable and well organised which I appreciated big love Chris x
October 5, 2022
This book was so well researched that about 99% of it went over my head as someone who really hasn't read any 19th century American literature.
April 11, 2024
walt whitman 🔛🔝
October 1, 2025
fairly good research for how short it is! a bit repetitive, and the mark twain chapter was not my fave, but overall a good read!
December 27, 2024
Queer Cowboys is worth a read, though for me, there was more digging than I'd like through a heavily repetitive and stilted style. The illustrations, the introduction, and the notes, however, are quite enjoyable and give a valuable social and political context for the literature review that is the bulk of the book.
This striking line from the introduction hits me each time I read it: "Today in America, when every teenager learns how not to be gay, it is difficult to suspend prejudice while looking at erotic male friendships in history." Casual affection between male friends was accepted before 1900 in a way that it wasn't after 1900, when "homosexuality" became less socially acceptable.
But here's the crux of the problem for this book: "Without much evidence to go on, the contours of same-sex erotic intimacies in the nineteenth century are difficult to recognize." However, author Chris Packard maintains that "[In] literature, the contours are visible and the emotional qualities of same-sex desire can be discerned." Sometimes, though, we have to look quite closely to see the shapes Chris Packard wants to show us.
Queer Cowboys does demonstrate that there were affectionate and perhaps even erotic bonds between nineteenth century cowboys, and that the fiction, poetry, and autobiographies that hinted at or outright revealed these bonds were often popular with American readers for various reasons. Mixed-race male-male partnerships and families also feature in many of the stories Packard examines. Queer Cowboys' exploration of racism, misogyny, Manifest Destiny, and class in Western stories, and of the cowboy's essential bachelor identity, is historically valuable and fascinating.
If we take "queer" to mean the cowboy is "odd; he doesn't fit in; he resists community; he eschews lasting ties with women but embraces rock-solid bonds with same-sex partners...", e.g. his sidekick, I think Chris Packard has shown that queer cowboys existed. And he has shown that in some cases, the cowboy "practices same-sex desire," whether situational or ongoing. Overall, this book contributed to my knowledge of Western literature and of American social structures between 1820 to 1920, and if you're interested in that, give it a go.
This striking line from the introduction hits me each time I read it: "Today in America, when every teenager learns how not to be gay, it is difficult to suspend prejudice while looking at erotic male friendships in history." Casual affection between male friends was accepted before 1900 in a way that it wasn't after 1900, when "homosexuality" became less socially acceptable.
But here's the crux of the problem for this book: "Without much evidence to go on, the contours of same-sex erotic intimacies in the nineteenth century are difficult to recognize." However, author Chris Packard maintains that "[In] literature, the contours are visible and the emotional qualities of same-sex desire can be discerned." Sometimes, though, we have to look quite closely to see the shapes Chris Packard wants to show us.
Queer Cowboys does demonstrate that there were affectionate and perhaps even erotic bonds between nineteenth century cowboys, and that the fiction, poetry, and autobiographies that hinted at or outright revealed these bonds were often popular with American readers for various reasons. Mixed-race male-male partnerships and families also feature in many of the stories Packard examines. Queer Cowboys' exploration of racism, misogyny, Manifest Destiny, and class in Western stories, and of the cowboy's essential bachelor identity, is historically valuable and fascinating.
If we take "queer" to mean the cowboy is "odd; he doesn't fit in; he resists community; he eschews lasting ties with women but embraces rock-solid bonds with same-sex partners...", e.g. his sidekick, I think Chris Packard has shown that queer cowboys existed. And he has shown that in some cases, the cowboy "practices same-sex desire," whether situational or ongoing. Overall, this book contributed to my knowledge of Western literature and of American social structures between 1820 to 1920, and if you're interested in that, give it a go.
July 24, 2020
Hard to review. Packard’s presentation of evidence and text was methodical and understandable, but became repetitive and even a little bit of a reach in some areas. I think if Packard had delved more into the definition of “queer” as being wholly anti-normative, rather than ‘synonymous’ with gay or bisexual (as he frequently did), then it would have allowed for a more rich and diverse consideration of the cowboy identity. Especially since so much of the Cowboy has been sanitized both sexually **and** racially, this just felt a little one-dimensional in its scope. For research purposes, I think it could be very useful, since it was successful in providing me with instances of gayness in cowboy culture that I was previously unaware of.
August 18, 2009
If the homoerotic potential of two men living alone in the wilderness had never occurred to you, this book might not be 100% boring. But hey, if you want to read a book called 'queer cowboys' you are probably already aware of how totally queer cowboys can be. If that is the case, then you might enjoy some of the nice old-timey photos of cowboys touching each other, and also the shirtless photo of Mark Twain...but Mr. Chris Packard is not really going tell you anything you didn't already know. Because you already know that cowboys are kinda gay, including fictional cowboys.
June 12, 2010
Reading the story and seeing the movie, Brokeback Mountain, prompted me to delve more into glbt literature. The book was an eye opener as such I never thought of cowboys as queer. I viewed them as the Marlboro man who is manly, tough, and masculine. Please note, my statement is not be taken as offensive but merely an observation.
August 3, 2013
Interesting look at male same-sex relationships in America up to the time of the Old West, using the works of James Fenimore Cooper, Walt Whitman and Mark Twain (among others). It reads a bit like three distinct articles welded together to make a distinct, if brief, whole.
January 13, 2008
Interesting argument, but like too much of queer theory, it sometimes reaches too far to prove its point.
August 4, 2016
Read a little like a doctoral dissertation. And I'm not sure I buy into all the conclusions reached by the author. But an interesting premise nonetheless.
April 7, 2016
Interesting read of a part of Gay history that is all far to often overlooked. It has been something I always wondered about but I am sure was never discussed.
April 21, 2016
Whitman-est
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews