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Pennsylvania Station
Manhattan,1962. Frederick Bailey is a quiet, cultured, closeted architect reluctantly drawn into the effort to save Pennsylvania Station from being demolished. But when he meets Curt, a vibrant, immature gay activist more than half his age, he is overtaken by passions he hasn't felt in years, putting everything he cares about--his friends, his family, his career and reputation--at risk. As the elegant old train station is dismantled piece by piece to make way for the crass new Madison Square Garden sports arena, Frederick must undergo a reckoning he has dreaded all his life. Award-winning author Patrick E. Horrigan delves into the fractured psyches of mid-twentieth-century gay men, conjuring a picture of New York City and the nation on the brink of explosive cultural change.
272 pages, Kindle Edition
Published March 23, 2018
25 people are currently reading
252 people want to read
About the author
Patrick E. Horrigan
4 books20 followersBorn and raised in Reading, Pennsylvania, Patrick E. Horrigan received his BA from The Catholic University of America and his PhD from Columbia University. He is the author of the novel PENNSYLVANIA STATION (Lethe Press), about a troubled romance between a closeted architect and a much younger gay rights activist in mid-1960s New York; PORTRAITS AT AN EXHIBITION (Lethe Press), about a young man’s search for the meaning of life amid a gallery of old master portraits; and WIDESCREEN DREAMS: GROWING UP GAY AT THE MOVIES (University of Wisconsin Press), an analysis of several popular films from the 1960s and 70s. His one-act play, MESSAGES FOR GARY: A DRAMA IN VOICEMAIL, composed entirely of answering machine messages received by the activist and socialist scholar Gary Lucek, was a critically-acclaimed hit of the Third International Fringe Festival. With his husband, the actor and writer Eduardo Leanez, he co-wrote the solo show YOU ARE CONFUSED! about the relationship between a gay Venezuelan boy and his charismatic mother. He and Mr. Leanez are the hosts of ACTORS WITH ACCENTS, a recurring variety show on Manhattan's Lower East Side. Since 1993, he has taught English at the Brooklyn campus of Long Island University. He lives in Manhattan.
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Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
February 23, 2022
Patrick Horrigan's Pennsylvania Station is a blend of history, art, self-development, and queer love.
Frederick is an architect in 1960s New York City still reeling from the loss of his WWII-era lover-turned-married heterosexual man. He goes to work, designs buildings, and otherwise hides his identity from everyone in his life. That is until one night at the theater he bumps into Curt, a transplant to New York 20 yeas his junior. From the beginning Curt fails to treat Frederick with the respect and love Frederick desires, reflective of the fact that Curt is a 20-year old gay man coming into his own identity. What ensues is a tumultuous tale with an important message: we deserve love and nothing less.
Pennsylvania Station is a recreation of gay life in the years leading up to Stonewall when the major activism in the LGBTQ+ movement was via the much more conservative (but still important) Mattachine Society. The characters in this story are reflective of the generational tension that was happening in the moment as older, wealthier, whiter gays sought to blend in and hide their identities, while their more youthful counterparts sought a more militant approach in demanding recognition of their identities and rights. This tension plays out throughout the story in the romantic relationships and the platonic ones. Horrigan does an incredible job writing complex characters though at times the book is far too overwritten with too many parentheticals stretching on for far too long. Nonetheless, this book is a powerful story that I hope will leave as big an impact on you that it left on me.
Frederick is an architect in 1960s New York City still reeling from the loss of his WWII-era lover-turned-married heterosexual man. He goes to work, designs buildings, and otherwise hides his identity from everyone in his life. That is until one night at the theater he bumps into Curt, a transplant to New York 20 yeas his junior. From the beginning Curt fails to treat Frederick with the respect and love Frederick desires, reflective of the fact that Curt is a 20-year old gay man coming into his own identity. What ensues is a tumultuous tale with an important message: we deserve love and nothing less.
Pennsylvania Station is a recreation of gay life in the years leading up to Stonewall when the major activism in the LGBTQ+ movement was via the much more conservative (but still important) Mattachine Society. The characters in this story are reflective of the generational tension that was happening in the moment as older, wealthier, whiter gays sought to blend in and hide their identities, while their more youthful counterparts sought a more militant approach in demanding recognition of their identities and rights. This tension plays out throughout the story in the romantic relationships and the platonic ones. Horrigan does an incredible job writing complex characters though at times the book is far too overwritten with too many parentheticals stretching on for far too long. Nonetheless, this book is a powerful story that I hope will leave as big an impact on you that it left on me.
April 28, 2020
Wow. I couldn’t put that down. I love a New York City book that really GETS it. Beautiful writing but a few draggy parts and an ending that ought to come with a cyanide capsule, Jesus. I don’t need the perfect happy ending but give me a scrap of hope. A shred. Something...
June 10, 2018
In his second novel, author Horrigan deftly covers an infrequently fictionalized time, pre-Stonewall New York, the growing gay activist community, and older reluctant and closeted gay men in the 1960s. Adding the architectural preservation concerns of protagonist Frederick Bailey's colleagues places it in a crucial moment in urban history.
The beautiful Penn Station is set to be demolished, and Frederick is drawn into his friends' hopes to save it. He also endures a violent attack by a man he brings home. Meeting the young, fickle yet passionate Curt forces him to adjust to a new life and a new generation. The era of discreet cruising and closeted life erodes as a new life forces itself upon him; a fascinating read.
The beautiful Penn Station is set to be demolished, and Frederick is drawn into his friends' hopes to save it. He also endures a violent attack by a man he brings home. Meeting the young, fickle yet passionate Curt forces him to adjust to a new life and a new generation. The era of discreet cruising and closeted life erodes as a new life forces itself upon him; a fascinating read.
June 25, 2018
I enjoyed reading Patrick E. Horrigan's "Pennsylvania Station," a historical novel set in the early 1960s in New York City and Reading, Pennsylvania. It has several threads that build and keep the reader fully engaged. It weaves a love relationship between two polar opposite men, the early movement to preserve historical buildings in New York City, the civil rights movement, the early gay rights movement, and the main character's relationship with his family back home. There is also a trip to Italy which we see through an architect's eyes.
Frederick Bailey is an architect who moved to New York for work. He is a loner who had one love but that man got married to a woman and so he ended the relationship. The love interest in this novel is a much younger man who seeks him out after witnessing him be kind to a woman in the street during a play intermission. Curt is twenty years old, not reliable, he never shows up on time, he lives on the edge with another man who he argues with and there is physical abuse. through the novel I kept thinking his brain is not fully developed, as with any twenty year old. Fredrick and Curt are an odd match, but Fredrick is starved for connection and love and this young man is very attractive and they have sexual chemistry.
The age difference highlights the early dispositions about being gay. Fredrick is closeted and full of decorum, his basic premise is that what gays do is immoral and against the law. Curt has no decorum and wants gays to fight for their rights like the blacks are doing through the Civil rights movement. He moved to New York from Chicago where he had a very freeing sexual experience around men. He starts attending the New York Mattachine meetings, a gay rights group. Curt wants freedom and in his words, "not to be owned by anyone." This being his main issue it shows up with both the men he is involved with throughout the novel.
There is research involved in this book to get both histories right, there are many interesting historical facts woven into the fabric of the book, including quotes by James Baldwin, Martin Luther King and poems by Walt Whitman. Definitely a period piece, but it has wide appeal and I love how the author carries the book through the intimate relationship of these two men without villianizing either one. There is much compassion in how they navigate a challenging relationship, which of course has to end by the end of the novel. They are simply too different. But Fredrick does grow in a few ways. Near the beginning he says he is not a joiner, yet by the end of the novel he has joined with at least one movement fully, that of historical preservation. Something he was ambivalent about at the beginning of the book. And he does attend one very disturbing Mattachine meeting with Curt. He grapples with the differences emotionally throughout and we get to feel his pain and love.
Frederick Bailey is an architect who moved to New York for work. He is a loner who had one love but that man got married to a woman and so he ended the relationship. The love interest in this novel is a much younger man who seeks him out after witnessing him be kind to a woman in the street during a play intermission. Curt is twenty years old, not reliable, he never shows up on time, he lives on the edge with another man who he argues with and there is physical abuse. through the novel I kept thinking his brain is not fully developed, as with any twenty year old. Fredrick and Curt are an odd match, but Fredrick is starved for connection and love and this young man is very attractive and they have sexual chemistry.
The age difference highlights the early dispositions about being gay. Fredrick is closeted and full of decorum, his basic premise is that what gays do is immoral and against the law. Curt has no decorum and wants gays to fight for their rights like the blacks are doing through the Civil rights movement. He moved to New York from Chicago where he had a very freeing sexual experience around men. He starts attending the New York Mattachine meetings, a gay rights group. Curt wants freedom and in his words, "not to be owned by anyone." This being his main issue it shows up with both the men he is involved with throughout the novel.
There is research involved in this book to get both histories right, there are many interesting historical facts woven into the fabric of the book, including quotes by James Baldwin, Martin Luther King and poems by Walt Whitman. Definitely a period piece, but it has wide appeal and I love how the author carries the book through the intimate relationship of these two men without villianizing either one. There is much compassion in how they navigate a challenging relationship, which of course has to end by the end of the novel. They are simply too different. But Fredrick does grow in a few ways. Near the beginning he says he is not a joiner, yet by the end of the novel he has joined with at least one movement fully, that of historical preservation. Something he was ambivalent about at the beginning of the book. And he does attend one very disturbing Mattachine meeting with Curt. He grapples with the differences emotionally throughout and we get to feel his pain and love.
July 6, 2018
Set in the 1960s and anchored by moments of social upheaval, Pennsylvania Station is fully immersed in its time. It's reminiscent in feel and subject matter of other works from the period—think John Schlesinger’s Sunday, Bloody Sunday (1971), or the diaries of Christopher Isherwood and his intergenerational love letters with Don Bachardy.
Set in New York, Pennsylvania, Italy, and Munich, it explores the passage of time from multiple directions. With characters in every phase of life, some of them are growing up while others are growing old. Horrigan’s book draws a parallel: between the demolition and reconstruction of beloved monuments, and the build-up of memories and choices that form one man’s life.
Set in New York, Pennsylvania, Italy, and Munich, it explores the passage of time from multiple directions. With characters in every phase of life, some of them are growing up while others are growing old. Horrigan’s book draws a parallel: between the demolition and reconstruction of beloved monuments, and the build-up of memories and choices that form one man’s life.
January 3, 2019
A sad book. Frederick, the protagonist, is a middle-aged gay man living in NYC in the 60s. He is neither the hopelessly tragic type nor a happy man; he has absorbed the negative image of homosexuality that dominated the era but at times has come close to love. Aging, he has built walls around his heart and keeps people, including his family, at a distance. An affair with a much younger man gives him a glimpse of a more liberated life, but Curt, the young lover, is a mix of vivacity, impetuousness, progressiveness, and thoughtlessness, an imperfect match, and too much of a threat. One has the sense that a fuller life might have been within Frederick's reach at another time, but the attitudes of his era have taken their toll on his chances to be happy.
The novel feels slight at first but grows in effectiveness. I had some formal issues with its structure. Horrigan tells the story mostly from Frederick's point of view, but then throws in a single, jarring chapter from Curt's perspective, and later adopts a kind of omniscient voice for some of the chapters in its latter half.
The novel feels slight at first but grows in effectiveness. I had some formal issues with its structure. Horrigan tells the story mostly from Frederick's point of view, but then throws in a single, jarring chapter from Curt's perspective, and later adopts a kind of omniscient voice for some of the chapters in its latter half.
December 15, 2019
Wonderful novel!!!
September 18, 2019
This work is very original. The combined telling of the beginning of the homophile (gay rights) movement combined with the historic building preservation movement in NYC during the early 60s.
The protagonist is a deeply closeted architect who has an affair with a younger man. The younger man is much less closeted and is much more public with his sexual orientation. The story of their relationship drives the action. The architect is slightly involved with the historic building preservation movement at the same time. It is an important book because the time in which it was written is falling into the mists of time. This revisits the trauma of closeted gay people at that time and gave me more of an insight as to how damaging having to hide sexual orientation was.
The protagonist is a deeply closeted architect who has an affair with a younger man. The younger man is much less closeted and is much more public with his sexual orientation. The story of their relationship drives the action. The architect is slightly involved with the historic building preservation movement at the same time. It is an important book because the time in which it was written is falling into the mists of time. This revisits the trauma of closeted gay people at that time and gave me more of an insight as to how damaging having to hide sexual orientation was.
January 9, 2019
Audiobook review. Narrator Hunter Elliott.
Well-written and well-narrated story of a somber forty year old man, closeted and conservative, who gets into a relationship with an egocentric twenty year old boy who fights for gay rights. The writer pays lots of attention to the history of New York in the sixties. We are witnessing a long stream of memories and his thoughts on historic buildings, old age and relationships. It’s a distantly told story with well worked out characters and suppressed emotions.
In some passages there is a distracting background noise in the recording. The chosen tone of the narrator fits the story very well.
Well-written and well-narrated story of a somber forty year old man, closeted and conservative, who gets into a relationship with an egocentric twenty year old boy who fights for gay rights. The writer pays lots of attention to the history of New York in the sixties. We are witnessing a long stream of memories and his thoughts on historic buildings, old age and relationships. It’s a distantly told story with well worked out characters and suppressed emotions.
In some passages there is a distracting background noise in the recording. The chosen tone of the narrator fits the story very well.
July 1, 2019
A marvelous story capturing the gay mores and struggles of the era. I'm amused that people are so fraught over the characters - the fact that they are sometimes irate over what happens is proof that Horrigan has succeeded in populating his book with fully-fleshed out characters. The relationship is a complex one, as each of the pair brings his own hopes and fears to the table. This is not a romance nor a tale tinted through a feel-good filter but rather a moving story of what happens when a man finds himself drawn into a relationship and discovers the limits of what he is able to do.
June 2, 2018
This book was wonderful since it contained two of my favorite subjects...pre Stonewall LGTB folks and historic preservation in 1960s NYC. The period detail was well observed, the central romance about two mismatched lovers was interesting but it seemed doomed from the start. I identified with the older guy and would not have given the younger one as many chances. Still it was well observed and heartfelt.
August 27, 2019
I enjoyed and was upset by this book. It deserves a second read.
February 3, 2023
Set in the 1960s, Pennsylvania Station is a jarring pastiche of Death in Venice and My Fair Lady. Its central character, Frederick Bailey, is a 48-year-old closeted architect living in New York City. His lover has just married a woman and his life has desiccated into arid purposelessness. At a second viewing of My Fair Lady, he meets twenty-year-old Curt, a free, uninhibited and uncompromising gay man. The two are antitheses: Frederick thinks that homosexuality probably is degenerate and, pouring himself into his passion for architecture, spends his spare time fighting for the preservation of heritage buildings; Curt, however, wants change. Observing the nascent civil rights movement, the clarion call of Martin Luther King's speeches, Curt bristles at the placating cautiousness of the Mattachine Society and starts organizing protests. Frederick defends the status quo; Curt wants rights, liberation, revolution. Their romance is doomed and a vacation in Venice distills the generational and ideological distance between them.
Like Gustav von Aschenbach, Frederick is enamoured with Renaissance art and idealizes Venice as the vestige of a bygone heyday of creative genius. He is the sentimental artist who thinks that only the past is beautiful while the present is just corruption and loss. Curt, however, is the naive boy, the intuitive, innocent, uneducated child with the poetic awareness and unsullied clarity to see through the trappings of convention and civilized decorum. Frederick tries to be the Professor Higgins of My Fair Lady, teaching the uncouth Eliza Doolittle, only to discover that his ideas of propriety and rectitude are corseting and self-destructive. The novel is a clash of fin-de-siecle feeling and revolutionary zeitgeist.
I thought it was a little sappy at times but I enjoyed reading it.
Like Gustav von Aschenbach, Frederick is enamoured with Renaissance art and idealizes Venice as the vestige of a bygone heyday of creative genius. He is the sentimental artist who thinks that only the past is beautiful while the present is just corruption and loss. Curt, however, is the naive boy, the intuitive, innocent, uneducated child with the poetic awareness and unsullied clarity to see through the trappings of convention and civilized decorum. Frederick tries to be the Professor Higgins of My Fair Lady, teaching the uncouth Eliza Doolittle, only to discover that his ideas of propriety and rectitude are corseting and self-destructive. The novel is a clash of fin-de-siecle feeling and revolutionary zeitgeist.
I thought it was a little sappy at times but I enjoyed reading it.
July 18, 2024
An interesting novel about a gay couple in 1960's New York. Frederick is a considerably older architect and more conservative, and Curt is younger and involved in the Mattachine Society and other homophile organizations of the day.
Eventually they break up; finding that they are not really compatible. I believe the destruction of the old Penn Station serves as a metaphor for the changes that society is undergoing at the time. Since Frederick is a preservationist, his instincts are set against change in buildings and change in social conditions.
Some good things: I was interested in the characters and the setting of the novel. I liked the depiction of Frederick's family (elderly mother, put-upon sister). I liked the use of Whitman's poetry as a theme.
Some things that did not work as well:
* The trigger for the breakup is not really about public acknowledgment of homosexuality but about monogamy. While Frederick and Curt are on vacation in Europe, Curt leaves Frederick behind to go off with an Italian man for a week. That is pretty outrageous and drains much of the reader's sympathy for Curt.
* The two go to the March on Washington and hear MLK speak. I didn't find this particularly believable. Were there a lot of gay white men at this march?
Eventually they break up; finding that they are not really compatible. I believe the destruction of the old Penn Station serves as a metaphor for the changes that society is undergoing at the time. Since Frederick is a preservationist, his instincts are set against change in buildings and change in social conditions.
Some good things: I was interested in the characters and the setting of the novel. I liked the depiction of Frederick's family (elderly mother, put-upon sister). I liked the use of Whitman's poetry as a theme.
Some things that did not work as well:
* The trigger for the breakup is not really about public acknowledgment of homosexuality but about monogamy. While Frederick and Curt are on vacation in Europe, Curt leaves Frederick behind to go off with an Italian man for a week. That is pretty outrageous and drains much of the reader's sympathy for Curt.
* The two go to the March on Washington and hear MLK speak. I didn't find this particularly believable. Were there a lot of gay white men at this march?
September 25, 2020
Emotionally true and resonant. Horrigan has a gift of creating sympathetic characters even when they don't do what you want them to do -- the reasons why they do what they do are painfully clear and believable. I particularly love how the main characters are such products of their times. Their are beautiful moments of rhapsodic writing particularly when describing the March of Washington and architecture. Recommended reading.
March 27, 2025
I fear I’ve lost the passion of Curt and only remain the realness of Frederick.
A beautiful story, I felt very connected to the characters. While the story is fictional, the emotions are real and the characters endearing. My only critique is that there was no happy ending. Though, I wasn’t hoping for them to end up together. I just wish there was more queer joy in the world.
So it goes.
A beautiful story, I felt very connected to the characters. While the story is fictional, the emotions are real and the characters endearing. My only critique is that there was no happy ending. Though, I wasn’t hoping for them to end up together. I just wish there was more queer joy in the world.
So it goes.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 7, 2024
Engaging story. Main characters do get on my nerves at times and I got tired of them at times, but the story keeps me going. An interesting look at a pre -stonewall era from two different generations point of view.
December 11, 2019
Good LGBTQ historical fiction, but a somewhat disappointing ending.
October 9, 2020
It really sneaks up on you and becomes rather devastating by the end. Probably worth rereading at some point, too. I’ll miss ending my nights in this author’s company.
April 11, 2021
1960s New York. A young hustler and an older, miserable man meet during a play (My Fair Lady). Stuff happens, but nothing changes except Penn Station is torn down.
July 9, 2024
Mainly entertaining read with some wow so neurotic characters.
October 16, 2023
Horrigan brilliantly captures both the emotional and social struggles of mid-century NYC queers and the geist of cultural transformation in this beautifully written, thoroughly engaging novel. What a pleasure!
December 23, 2022
Horrigan, Patrick E. Pennsylvania Station. Lethe Press (2018).
This novel was set in the past, 1962-1965, in Manhattan. Its historical backdrop was the unsuccessful grassroots fight by preservationists to keep Penn Station and other grand, historic structures in midtown Manhattan from being torn down and replaced by more modern, if less distinctive and idiosyncratic, architecture. Another seemingly lost grassroots cause featured in the narrative are the protests by the Mattachine Society to win dignity in the workplace for homosexual men and women. Their goal was to dispel the public’s fear and misunderstanding of people with same-sex attractions by having homosexuals dress in everyday business attire while carrying picket signs.
Frederick is an interesting character to me, because he has already lived through such a dynamic period of American history, where he served in World War II, attended college on the GI Bill, and established himself in Manhattan as a professional architect. During the war, Frederick fell in love with Jonathon, a fellow soldier. It was a mutual attraction, and Frederick never got over those years when he and Jonathon were everything to each other. Frederick had a feedback loop playing in his head that featured Jonathon’s abandonment of their love when he arranged to marry a woman. Frederick was not willing to share Jonathon, so he cut himself loose. Whenever Frederick is reminded of Jonathon’s betrayal, which is often, he chews his fingernails and cuticles to the point that they bleed.
Fast forward a decade and Frederick has allowed himself to get involved with a much younger man, Curt, who claimed he was drawn to New York from Chicago to work with the Mattachine Society for gay rights. Horrigan has captured the essence of their on-again, off-again May-October romance. I’m not sure the pratfalls of this affair between an older man and a younger man were any different than in the 1980s, when I participated in such a pairing as the “daddy.” Curt gives Frederick many additional reasons to chew and mutilate his fingers.
Frederick was interesting to me, too, because he was so conservative in his personal life, especially with regard to his homosexuality. It was a mindset with Frederic that homosexuals should not be demonstrating in public for their civil rights, even while he supported the efforts of black Americans to demonstrate publicly in the same way. Frederick was more inclined to demonstrate for black civil rights than for his own right to love another man openly. Is such a mindset easily understood by people born this century?
It’s not necessarily a bad thing that a book leaves one asking a lot of questions on the final page. Here are my additional questions about Pennsylvania Station and its characters. I hope other readers of this novel will weigh in and comment on this review with their opinions.
1. Does Frederick change in any way? One of the requisites of a plot is that the protagonist change or even transform. Frederick seems to be in deep emotional trouble when we leave him in tears on the final page. All his fears and regrets about being a homosexual are still intact, and he’s alone—again.
2. What about Frederick’s family? How much did Frederick’s parents and siblings understand about his friendship with Jonathon? Wouldn’t they have accepted anyone that he chose to love? When the old photo of Frederick and Jonathon came into Curt’s possession (from Clare, Frederick’s mom), why didn’t that feature more prominently in the plot and resolution?
3. What about May-October pairings today? Are they more frequent or less frequent since gay marriage became legal in the United States? Do they all still follow a similar trajectory as the flawed pairing between Frederick and Curt?
4. Couldn’t these stories of disappointing same-sex romances have occurred in Manhattan in any decade in the 20th century? Doesn’t that raise the importance of the setting that Horrigan chose? Is the slow demolition of Penn Station supposed to mirror how Frederick is breaking down? He’s in really bad shape on the final page of the novel.
This novel was set in the past, 1962-1965, in Manhattan. Its historical backdrop was the unsuccessful grassroots fight by preservationists to keep Penn Station and other grand, historic structures in midtown Manhattan from being torn down and replaced by more modern, if less distinctive and idiosyncratic, architecture. Another seemingly lost grassroots cause featured in the narrative are the protests by the Mattachine Society to win dignity in the workplace for homosexual men and women. Their goal was to dispel the public’s fear and misunderstanding of people with same-sex attractions by having homosexuals dress in everyday business attire while carrying picket signs.
Frederick is an interesting character to me, because he has already lived through such a dynamic period of American history, where he served in World War II, attended college on the GI Bill, and established himself in Manhattan as a professional architect. During the war, Frederick fell in love with Jonathon, a fellow soldier. It was a mutual attraction, and Frederick never got over those years when he and Jonathon were everything to each other. Frederick had a feedback loop playing in his head that featured Jonathon’s abandonment of their love when he arranged to marry a woman. Frederick was not willing to share Jonathon, so he cut himself loose. Whenever Frederick is reminded of Jonathon’s betrayal, which is often, he chews his fingernails and cuticles to the point that they bleed.
Fast forward a decade and Frederick has allowed himself to get involved with a much younger man, Curt, who claimed he was drawn to New York from Chicago to work with the Mattachine Society for gay rights. Horrigan has captured the essence of their on-again, off-again May-October romance. I’m not sure the pratfalls of this affair between an older man and a younger man were any different than in the 1980s, when I participated in such a pairing as the “daddy.” Curt gives Frederick many additional reasons to chew and mutilate his fingers.
Frederick was interesting to me, too, because he was so conservative in his personal life, especially with regard to his homosexuality. It was a mindset with Frederic that homosexuals should not be demonstrating in public for their civil rights, even while he supported the efforts of black Americans to demonstrate publicly in the same way. Frederick was more inclined to demonstrate for black civil rights than for his own right to love another man openly. Is such a mindset easily understood by people born this century?
It’s not necessarily a bad thing that a book leaves one asking a lot of questions on the final page. Here are my additional questions about Pennsylvania Station and its characters. I hope other readers of this novel will weigh in and comment on this review with their opinions.
1. Does Frederick change in any way? One of the requisites of a plot is that the protagonist change or even transform. Frederick seems to be in deep emotional trouble when we leave him in tears on the final page. All his fears and regrets about being a homosexual are still intact, and he’s alone—again.
2. What about Frederick’s family? How much did Frederick’s parents and siblings understand about his friendship with Jonathon? Wouldn’t they have accepted anyone that he chose to love? When the old photo of Frederick and Jonathon came into Curt’s possession (from Clare, Frederick’s mom), why didn’t that feature more prominently in the plot and resolution?
3. What about May-October pairings today? Are they more frequent or less frequent since gay marriage became legal in the United States? Do they all still follow a similar trajectory as the flawed pairing between Frederick and Curt?
4. Couldn’t these stories of disappointing same-sex romances have occurred in Manhattan in any decade in the 20th century? Doesn’t that raise the importance of the setting that Horrigan chose? Is the slow demolition of Penn Station supposed to mirror how Frederick is breaking down? He’s in really bad shape on the final page of the novel.
April 25, 2021
CREATIVE DESTRUCTION
Creative destruction is an economic term meaning the destruction of something obsolete and inefficient to make way for something new, modern, and much more productive. Horrigan employs this concept to engage us in a romance between a conservative older man who falls for a much younger progressive just a few years prior to Stonewall. Horrigan effectively uses allegory to draw us to the conflict that erupts between them. The older man is a successful architect fighting the destruction of Penn Station, a landmark in New York City (thus the book's title), to make way for Madison Square Garden, a brand new ultra modern sports complex.
Horrigan perfectly captures the architect's deeply closeted self-loathing so typical of that generation. Deeply in the closet, he has surrendered and accepted the condemnation of his family and society at large: homosexuality is immoral and abnormal. The sparks fly, as one would expect, when he meets and falls in love with a man in his twenties, brazen, rebellious and ready to embrace gay liberation and change the world.
To Horrigan's credit, I found myself empathizing with the older man, while at the same time becoming disgusted with some of his beliefs and choices. The novel is historical in nature and uses real events in the 1960s to help create an accurate portrait of life in America for gay people at that time. I also related to the younger man who wants to be respected and treated equally in a country that promises "all men (and women) are created equal." He joins the Mattachine Society protesting our government "... in order to form a more perfect union" for its gay citizens. Yet, I reacted negatively to his immature, manipulative, and self-absorbed behavior so commonly found in young adults. This is Horrigan's talent: both men, indeed all the characters in this novel, are fully developed, complex flawed, and completely three-dimensional persons. This is a well crafted and exceptionally adept story that vividly captures its time and place.
A former social studies teacher I would define "conservative" for my students as those, regardless of subject, who resist change. While, in contrast, progressives see the need for change, advocate for and embrace it. Horrigan gets it right! He correctly concludes that while the pace of progress may ebb and flow, (to quote MLK) "... the arc of history bends toward justice."
Creative destruction is an economic term meaning the destruction of something obsolete and inefficient to make way for something new, modern, and much more productive. Horrigan employs this concept to engage us in a romance between a conservative older man who falls for a much younger progressive just a few years prior to Stonewall. Horrigan effectively uses allegory to draw us to the conflict that erupts between them. The older man is a successful architect fighting the destruction of Penn Station, a landmark in New York City (thus the book's title), to make way for Madison Square Garden, a brand new ultra modern sports complex.
Horrigan perfectly captures the architect's deeply closeted self-loathing so typical of that generation. Deeply in the closet, he has surrendered and accepted the condemnation of his family and society at large: homosexuality is immoral and abnormal. The sparks fly, as one would expect, when he meets and falls in love with a man in his twenties, brazen, rebellious and ready to embrace gay liberation and change the world.
To Horrigan's credit, I found myself empathizing with the older man, while at the same time becoming disgusted with some of his beliefs and choices. The novel is historical in nature and uses real events in the 1960s to help create an accurate portrait of life in America for gay people at that time. I also related to the younger man who wants to be respected and treated equally in a country that promises "all men (and women) are created equal." He joins the Mattachine Society protesting our government "... in order to form a more perfect union" for its gay citizens. Yet, I reacted negatively to his immature, manipulative, and self-absorbed behavior so commonly found in young adults. This is Horrigan's talent: both men, indeed all the characters in this novel, are fully developed, complex flawed, and completely three-dimensional persons. This is a well crafted and exceptionally adept story that vividly captures its time and place.
A former social studies teacher I would define "conservative" for my students as those, regardless of subject, who resist change. While, in contrast, progressives see the need for change, advocate for and embrace it. Horrigan gets it right! He correctly concludes that while the pace of progress may ebb and flow, (to quote MLK) "... the arc of history bends toward justice."
June 15, 2019
I think the back cover copy for Pennsylvania Station was a little misleading. This is no modern version of Death in Venice and Curt isn't a "vibrant, immature gay activist." (Well, he is immature.) Curt doesn't seem to take anything very seriously in life, including his activism. He seems like a straight-up hustler to me, moving in and out of Frederick's life only when it suits him. And Frederick is just a miserable man in and out. He seems to live in a perpetual state of dissatisfaction. This is a book about two people in a bad relationship.
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