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The Burning Library
Along with his groundbreaking essays that redefine politics, language, identity, and friendship in the light of gay experience and desire, this magisterial collection of 25 years of White's nonfiction writings includes dazzling subversive appreciations of cultural icons as diverse as Truman Capote and Cormac McCarthy, Robert Mapplethorpe and the singer formerly known as Prince. Reading tour.
417 pages, Paperback
First published May 19, 1994
19 people are currently reading
235 people want to read
About the author
Edmund White
139 books908 followersEdmund Valentine White III was an American novelist, memoirist, playwright, biographer, and essayist. He was the recipient of Lambda Literary's Visionary Award, the National Book Foundation's Lifetime Achievement Award, and the PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction. France made him Chevalier (and later Officier) de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 1993.
White was known as a groundbreaking writer of gay literature and a major influence on gay American literature and has been called "the first major queer novelist to champion a new generation of writers."
White was known as a groundbreaking writer of gay literature and a major influence on gay American literature and has been called "the first major queer novelist to champion a new generation of writers."
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
March 12, 2024
These disconnected essays shouldn’t really be in the same book should they
August 5, 2015
This book first came out in 1995 and I must have read it then, but I only remembered a few parts of it. It's a large book, almost four hundred pages, a real compendium of Edmund White's shorter non-fiction as of that time. And it includes some favorites of mine: his essay On Becoming a Model for Male Smut, Sweating Mirrors: A Conversation with Truman Capote, This is not a Mammal: A Visit with William Burroughs and Thoughts on White on Black On White: Coleman Dowell. Unfortunately White did what I as a writer expressly never did during all those years after Stonewall: he expressed his ideas and feelings about being gay, about gay life, about gay literature and all that to folks who were not gay and it is those essays that have aged pretty much the worst with their "explanatory" urge now feeling like some kind of incipient Uncle Tomism. He's best when reviewing books or writers; James Merrill, James Schuyler, Nabokov, Pasolini, Barthes, Isherwood and Tennessee Williams' letters, where he can just enjoy himself in the work he admires so much. But pieces like the Paris Review interview are too long by a great deal, as are several others here. And even when he's reviewing books it seems like someone is looking over White's shoulder and insisting he follow the Company Line; calling William Gass' "Omensetter's Luck" one of the few masterpieces of our time. Believe me I tried reading it yet again this year for the nth time and it is overwritten,overindulgent tripe. Sometimes one gets the feeling that White is sitting for his oral exam and hopeful to get it all just right with the proctors. There is not one totally off the wall author here that he has discovered or has a guilty pleasure in reading. The closest he comes to utter honesty is with Dowell: a curious figure when he was alive and even more curious since his death. But there is some loyalty here too, which is admirable, and one of the best pieces is a moving eulogy for White's friend, David Kalstone. David Bergman's introduction is curiously objective since in other works he loses all judgement about White's writing, so here he is really useful.
July 18, 2013
"I myself am in favor of desacralizing literature, of dismantling the idea of a few essential books, of retiring the whole concept of a canon. A canon is for people who don't like to read, people who want to know the bare minimum of titles they must consume in order to be considered polished, well rounded, civilized. Any real reader seeks the names of more and more books, not fewer and fewer."
October 12, 2025
When I finished this collection of essays back in 2021 I noted "Varied but not all fascinating or great - I never thought I'd say that about an Edmund White book - more later" well now it is later and White is newly dead and I find my response to him and his works has been transformed, if only the knowledge that there will be no more books by Edmund White and I fear, there will never be another Edmund White because our world has grown small and White is like one of those figures the Saint Simon, Alexis de Tocqueville, Edmond de Goncourt - giants who we separated from by more then time by revolutions. That it is giants of French literature that come to mind is not surprising - has any other writer in English been so comfortably absorbed in the Francophone world? Perhaps Samuel Beckett but no English writer. Yet White never ceased to be American, or unique.
Shortly before White's death the reviewer of White's last book 'The Loves of My Life' in the UK Guardian newspaper wrote the following:
"‘I thought,’ White wrote in his autobiographical masterpiece The Farewell Symphony (1997), ‘that never had a group been placed on such a rapid cycle, oppressed in the 50s, freed in the 60s, exalted in the 70s, and wiped out in the 80s.’ He was describing, as he always did, the generation of gay men of which he was a part. To his and our luck, he survived, living to be applauded in the 90s, unjustly overlooked in the 00s, and rediscovered in the 10s and the 20s by a new generation of gays for whom prophylactic antiretrovirals have brought back the industrial sexual liberation he wrote about in his novels." from a review in The Guardian of 'The Loves of My Life'
The same reviewer also said:
"It is worth remembering that even thirty years after Stonewall how homophobic the literary discourse remained. "John Updike opened a review of Alan Hollinghurst’s 1998 novel The Spell in the New Yorker with the complaint that Hollinghurst’s novels are ‘relentlessly gay’ and lack the ‘chirp and swing and civilising animation’ of ‘a female’. In gay fiction, Updike went on, ‘nothing is at stake but self-gratification’; even the most frivolous heterosexual writing, he proposed, was ‘sacralised’ by the ‘institution of the family’ and the ‘perpetuation of the species’. It is presumably such sacred bonds that Updike had in mind when he wrote, in The Widows of Eastwick (2008): ‘She said nothing then, her lovely mouth otherwise engaged, until he came, all over her face ... Her face gleamed with his jism in the spotty light of the motel room.’
"Two years earlier, James Wolcott wrote in the Wall Street Journal that The Farewell Symphony, the third part of White’s magisterial trilogy of gay life beginning with A Boy’s Own Story,had ‘a rather fancy title for a book that might have been more honestly called Hilly Buttocks I Have Known’. For Wolcott, a novel describing in rich prose the coming together in ecstatic communion and fast, painful, untimely death of a generation was ‘trashy’ gossip. Proposing that gay promiscuity requires a ‘defence’, Wolcott, in a sentence dripping with disdain, wrote that White ‘crams the page with such graphic, gross, non-stop, indiscriminate, inside-gayworld flutter and abandon that giving the characters names seems a mere courtesy, they’re such interchangeable receptacles’."
Who or what is James Wolcott? Does it matter? he has written a novel called 'Catsitters' isn't that enough? he is as unimportant as all the other 'slings and arrows of outrageous fortune' that bedevil the great and the good.
Edmund White is always worth reading because even when he is bad he is so much better than almost anyone else. At the time of its publication Publishers Weekly said of 'The Burning Library':
"White's collection, unified by sharp wit and seemingly boundless erudition, has a surprising drawback: his trademark elegance of style, which works well in his book reviews (a large portion of which are reproduced here) is less appropriate to his political rhetoric. In those pieces the edges seem sanded down by restrained prose, even as White describes his anger at the marginalization of gays since Stonewall and the oppression that gay people, including himself, ``no stranger to gay militancy,'' have traditionally faced from straight society. Yet when White assays literature, he nears perfection. His critiques of Tennessee Williams, Jean Genet, Coleman Dowell, James Jones, James Merrill, Cormac McCarthy and other writers are persuasive, especially when the authors discussed are White's friends or acquaintances. As readers of ``A Boy's Own Story'' and ``The Beautiful Room Is Empty'' will expect, White can be forcefully self-revealing; the autobiographical references are moving. But his writing on politics (he acknowledges his ``nearly total silence'' on AIDS) is insightful rather than inciting and seems to invite placid contemplation, not argument or action."
The extraordinary thing is that White's failure to engage AIDS in the visceral, but inevitably parochial voice, that so many demanded is why his 'political' pieces now resonate while those writing jeremiads and burying themselves under metaphors of plague are forgotten.
In my review of White's 'The Loves of My Life' I wrote:
'That Edmund White survived for new generations of readers to discover and to continue writing brilliant inventive books is a miracle. Quite how unique White's talent is only becomes obvious when you see how few writers of White's generation, never mind later ones, have produced an oeuvre of similar significance and quality.
'Everyone has to die and every death diminishes us all but, perhaps the sky god I don't believe in does have a sense of humour because while his acolytes were celebrating the apparent demise of 'gays' from his non existent wrath he allowed White to survive so gays could never be forgotten. Whether we should thank God for White's life is doubtful - but I am deeply thankful for it nonetheless.'
Never stop reading White, it may be the only real protest that matters one day.
Shortly before White's death the reviewer of White's last book 'The Loves of My Life' in the UK Guardian newspaper wrote the following:
"‘I thought,’ White wrote in his autobiographical masterpiece The Farewell Symphony (1997), ‘that never had a group been placed on such a rapid cycle, oppressed in the 50s, freed in the 60s, exalted in the 70s, and wiped out in the 80s.’ He was describing, as he always did, the generation of gay men of which he was a part. To his and our luck, he survived, living to be applauded in the 90s, unjustly overlooked in the 00s, and rediscovered in the 10s and the 20s by a new generation of gays for whom prophylactic antiretrovirals have brought back the industrial sexual liberation he wrote about in his novels." from a review in The Guardian of 'The Loves of My Life'
The same reviewer also said:
"It is worth remembering that even thirty years after Stonewall how homophobic the literary discourse remained. "John Updike opened a review of Alan Hollinghurst’s 1998 novel The Spell in the New Yorker with the complaint that Hollinghurst’s novels are ‘relentlessly gay’ and lack the ‘chirp and swing and civilising animation’ of ‘a female’. In gay fiction, Updike went on, ‘nothing is at stake but self-gratification’; even the most frivolous heterosexual writing, he proposed, was ‘sacralised’ by the ‘institution of the family’ and the ‘perpetuation of the species’. It is presumably such sacred bonds that Updike had in mind when he wrote, in The Widows of Eastwick (2008): ‘She said nothing then, her lovely mouth otherwise engaged, until he came, all over her face ... Her face gleamed with his jism in the spotty light of the motel room.’
"Two years earlier, James Wolcott wrote in the Wall Street Journal that The Farewell Symphony, the third part of White’s magisterial trilogy of gay life beginning with A Boy’s Own Story,had ‘a rather fancy title for a book that might have been more honestly called Hilly Buttocks I Have Known’. For Wolcott, a novel describing in rich prose the coming together in ecstatic communion and fast, painful, untimely death of a generation was ‘trashy’ gossip. Proposing that gay promiscuity requires a ‘defence’, Wolcott, in a sentence dripping with disdain, wrote that White ‘crams the page with such graphic, gross, non-stop, indiscriminate, inside-gayworld flutter and abandon that giving the characters names seems a mere courtesy, they’re such interchangeable receptacles’."
Who or what is James Wolcott? Does it matter? he has written a novel called 'Catsitters' isn't that enough? he is as unimportant as all the other 'slings and arrows of outrageous fortune' that bedevil the great and the good.
Edmund White is always worth reading because even when he is bad he is so much better than almost anyone else. At the time of its publication Publishers Weekly said of 'The Burning Library':
"White's collection, unified by sharp wit and seemingly boundless erudition, has a surprising drawback: his trademark elegance of style, which works well in his book reviews (a large portion of which are reproduced here) is less appropriate to his political rhetoric. In those pieces the edges seem sanded down by restrained prose, even as White describes his anger at the marginalization of gays since Stonewall and the oppression that gay people, including himself, ``no stranger to gay militancy,'' have traditionally faced from straight society. Yet when White assays literature, he nears perfection. His critiques of Tennessee Williams, Jean Genet, Coleman Dowell, James Jones, James Merrill, Cormac McCarthy and other writers are persuasive, especially when the authors discussed are White's friends or acquaintances. As readers of ``A Boy's Own Story'' and ``The Beautiful Room Is Empty'' will expect, White can be forcefully self-revealing; the autobiographical references are moving. But his writing on politics (he acknowledges his ``nearly total silence'' on AIDS) is insightful rather than inciting and seems to invite placid contemplation, not argument or action."
The extraordinary thing is that White's failure to engage AIDS in the visceral, but inevitably parochial voice, that so many demanded is why his 'political' pieces now resonate while those writing jeremiads and burying themselves under metaphors of plague are forgotten.
In my review of White's 'The Loves of My Life' I wrote:
'That Edmund White survived for new generations of readers to discover and to continue writing brilliant inventive books is a miracle. Quite how unique White's talent is only becomes obvious when you see how few writers of White's generation, never mind later ones, have produced an oeuvre of similar significance and quality.
'Everyone has to die and every death diminishes us all but, perhaps the sky god I don't believe in does have a sense of humour because while his acolytes were celebrating the apparent demise of 'gays' from his non existent wrath he allowed White to survive so gays could never be forgotten. Whether we should thank God for White's life is doubtful - but I am deeply thankful for it nonetheless.'
Never stop reading White, it may be the only real protest that matters one day.
September 17, 2020
“The Burning Library” is a collection of key essays written by Edmund White over the course of three decades (1970s — 1990s). At first this seems an impressive span of years. But when one considers that White began his writing career in the 1960s and is still going strong today—two decades into the third millennium CE—his productivity and range of interests is truly awesome. [To follow his interests into the current millennium you’ll want to pick up his two subsequent essay collections: “Arts and Letters” (2004) and “Sacred Monsters” (2011).]
What’s nice about the essays editor David Bergman selected for inclusion is how nicely each one demonstrates White’s skill at research and argumentation, care for is subject, and respectful regard for his audience (the reader). Not to mention his mere mastery of the sentence (No academic brain massaging going on here). These are well-considered essays, not mere opinion pieces. White has kept up with literary theory (Barthes, Benjamin, Foucault), but hasn’t let any of these voices interfere with his love of reading nor allowed them to entice him into futile debates over the canon. Likewise, White interfaces with certain iconic figures of his day (Capote, Tennessee Williams, Burroughs, Mapplethorpe, Isherwood) as their equal without the need to either fawn or debunk, resulting in some interesting (though partial) portraits. The essays on Gay Liberation, the vocabulary around homosexuality, the impact of AIDS on the lives of gay men and lesbians remain important benchmarks for an ever-evolving “insider” discussion. Some of this will feel outdated to some readers. I for one appreciated his honesty and transparency on those matters and for his reminders that he speaks only for himself (white, gay, male, uni-educated, middle class, etc.) and his awareness that he must trust others (women, minorities, etc.) to speak for themselves. That said, I also appreciated White’s introducing me to some authors outside my usual sphere—Christina Stead, Harry Matthews, Juan Goytisolo, and Darryl Pinckney. The collection offers a good range of literary and cultural topics, a little something for just about anyone.
What’s nice about the essays editor David Bergman selected for inclusion is how nicely each one demonstrates White’s skill at research and argumentation, care for is subject, and respectful regard for his audience (the reader). Not to mention his mere mastery of the sentence (No academic brain massaging going on here). These are well-considered essays, not mere opinion pieces. White has kept up with literary theory (Barthes, Benjamin, Foucault), but hasn’t let any of these voices interfere with his love of reading nor allowed them to entice him into futile debates over the canon. Likewise, White interfaces with certain iconic figures of his day (Capote, Tennessee Williams, Burroughs, Mapplethorpe, Isherwood) as their equal without the need to either fawn or debunk, resulting in some interesting (though partial) portraits. The essays on Gay Liberation, the vocabulary around homosexuality, the impact of AIDS on the lives of gay men and lesbians remain important benchmarks for an ever-evolving “insider” discussion. Some of this will feel outdated to some readers. I for one appreciated his honesty and transparency on those matters and for his reminders that he speaks only for himself (white, gay, male, uni-educated, middle class, etc.) and his awareness that he must trust others (women, minorities, etc.) to speak for themselves. That said, I also appreciated White’s introducing me to some authors outside my usual sphere—Christina Stead, Harry Matthews, Juan Goytisolo, and Darryl Pinckney. The collection offers a good range of literary and cultural topics, a little something for just about anyone.
October 10, 2025
Collections of essays, grouped according to decades: 1970s, 1980s, 1990s. The AIDS virus stalks this book like a bogeyman or burglar who you never see, only known from the chaos and destruction he leaves behind in your home and hearth, the creeping, immeasurable loss. White was a very smart guy, very literate. There are many great book reviews in here. White also wrote many commentaries on gay life, relationships, manners, politics, etc that are invaluable glimpses inside, as the decades roll on. I’d only read two of his biographies before this point: on Genet and Proust. White was a Francophile and lived in Paris for much of his life, and that knowledge comes across very well. I’d recommend this book for its literacy, sensitivity, and humor. I didn’t read every single essay, maybe that’s why I gave four stars, some just didn’t interest me. Nothing really against the book or the writer. I was impatient to be done with the book after a while, I guess.
July 29, 2023
So confusingly?? He was clearly very progressive for his time and I don’t doubt he was a big part of gay liberation but also like ??? So obviously he didn’t reject a lot of the stuff he was raised with?? Like for a feminist he was SO male-centric, and especially so bio-essentialist??
I ((personally)) enjoyed the essays on literary criticism far more than the other stuff + you could REALLY tell how much that man liked Nabokov <3 and like me too boo Xx
I ((personally)) enjoyed the essays on literary criticism far more than the other stuff + you could REALLY tell how much that man liked Nabokov <3 and like me too boo Xx
October 10, 2013
An astonishing collection of literary reviews and social gay histories that is a must read for anyone interested in literature, queer culture and art. i.e. interviews with Truman Capote and William Burroughs through to Sado Machismo and mini biographical writings on Genet and Tenessee Williams.
March 7, 2015
Like "Fire In The Belly" before it, "The Burning Library" served as a radial title. Mr. White's prolific education and worldview introduced a host of heretofore unknown authors and their works. "The Burning Library" is a must for any serious reader in search of challenging, intellectual works.
January 28, 2009
Edmund White can be tedious at times. He's quite a name dropper. Many of the essays here did not interest me, but he's a beautiful writer.
did-not-finish
April 17, 2018For now, I've only read two of the essays ('Danilo Kiš: The Obligations of Form' and 'Nabokov: On Parody'), but I really liked White's arguments and how he writes, so noting it down here as DNF so maybe I'll remember to read more of White's work in the future and perhaps more of this collection of essays.
Want to read
July 2, 2018TR A Boy's Own Story
TR The Beautiful Room Is Empty
TR Marcel Proust
TR Fanny
TR The Unpunished Vice: A Life of Reading
TR Rimbaud: The Double Life of a Rebel
TR The Burning Library
TR The Beautiful Room Is Empty
TR Marcel Proust
TR Fanny
TR The Unpunished Vice: A Life of Reading
TR Rimbaud: The Double Life of a Rebel
TR The Burning Library
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews