Richard Stevenson > Quotes

“I like you less when you don't like yourself.”
― Richard Stevenson, Death Trick

“Someday I'll tell you stories about that man that will just curl your hair!"

I looked over at Greco's curly hair and wondered if he'd already heard them.”
― Richard Stevenson, On the Other Hand, Death

“He was the only man I knew who could roll his eyes over the telephone.”
― Richard Stevenson, Ice Blues

“After nineteen years, he still needed explanations from me. If being willing to speak at length into an unresponsive void isn't one of the cornerstones of a rich relationship and enduring love, what is?”
― Richard Stevenson, Shock to the System

“You're a gay detective? I don't think I've ever met one before."

"Of course you have," McWhirter put in emphatically. "You just didn't know they were gay. That's the whole point.”
― Richard Stevenson, On the Other Hand, Death

“Men are usually trying to get into my bed, not out of it.”
― Richard Stevenson

“You have to be able to roll your eyes up into your skull, down the inside of the back of your head, up your jawbone, and into the sockets again. That's how the writers wrote the character, and the producers have too much integrity to alter the conception.”
― Richard Stevenson, Ice Blues

“How long will you be staying?" asked the desk clerk, a middle-aged man with sea-green hair growing out of both ears and all three nostrils.

"Two, three days."

"Want a woman?"

"No, thank you."

"A man?"

"We're here for the Moral Majority convention," Timmy said, "so watch your tongue, mister."

"I can get you a nice religious boy who likes to be hit with a palm frond."

I said, "What about a pair of secular humanist twins who'll recite Rousseau in our ears while they bang it at home? Can you get us that?"

"I'd have to make some calls.”
― Richard Stevenson, Ice Blues

“You'll like LA a little better once we're outside. Think of New Jersey with palm trees.”
― Richard Stevenson

“He touched your face? Kee-rist, Donald." He undulated awkwardly in his seat belt. "Do you want to describe the circumstances, lover, or should I just draw my own sensational conclusions and stick it all in your 'Seven Since June' file? Crimenee. You're just—incredible.”
― Richard Stevenson, On the Other Hand, Death

“In the age of AIDS I had been making it a practice to imagine a skull and crossbones on the forehead of every possibly available comely gay man I found myself alone with, but Slonski's kept fading in, fading out.”
― Richard Stevenson

“Is your new toothbrush in the bathroom?"

"You didn't pick one up? God, you know I hate it when you use my toothbrush."

"I can put your cock in my mouth, but not your toothbrush."

"I don't brush my teeth with my cock.”
― Richard Stevenson

“Mother of God!"

"That was my thought, or the Presbyterian equivalent thereof.”
― Richard Stevenson, Ice Blues

“I loathe safe sex. Safe sex is to erotic communion what the Salisbury steak in a restaurant on the New Jersey Turnpike is to food. I do it because it's what there is, but I don't want to think about it any more that I have to.”
― Richard Stevenson

“Yes, bottle up your negative emotions in a neurotically unhealthy way. For my sake. Just off and on until spring. Your springtime emotions I like a lot."

I took a long swig of beer.

"I don't know, Timothy. I have to tell you, this is a bolt out of the blue. Your proposition is not something I ever dreamed I'd be faced with when we began sharing hearth and home and Vaseline jar. I'm going to have to give this one a lot of thought.”
― Richard Stevenson

“I just want to say one last thing to you, Don. Listen to this. Listen carefully. I was thumbing through your Proust a while ago and came upon a line that jumped right out at me. It seemed so apt, so perfect. It was Swann talking to Odette, but it could as easily have been me to you. He says to her, Swann says, 'You are a formless water that will trickle down any slope that offers itself.' How about that? 'A formless water that will trickle down any slope that offers itself”
― Richard Stevenson, On the Other Hand, Death

“In the end, everybody gay in Albany knows everybody gay in Albany. Eventually you always end up in the bed you started out in. I mean, this is the Hudson Valley, Newell, not West Hollywood. You can do it.”
― Richard Stevenson, On the Other Hand, Death

“Whenever the subject of household chores came up—had come up—I'd say, "You wash and clean, and I'll keep the windmill oiled and the hogs fed." A cushy deal I had. Had had.”
― Richard Stevenson, On the Other Hand, Death

“He looked over at me now, his eyes wet. "Will you come and lay down with me first?"

"Well, gee, Lyle . . . gee. Actually, I think Miss Manners would advise against it. I mean, with my lover waiting down in the car and all. I think you have a good bit to learn about timing—about the social graces. I'm pretty sure we'd both feel very, very bad afterwards. Also, these days I'm a bit overextended in that department.”
― Richard Stevenson, On the Other Hand, Death

“Until I met Timmy I'd always thought coffee was a mineral that occurred in nature as tiny crystals and was mined like coal.”
― Richard Stevenson

“No need to worry. Everything's under control."

"It is?"

"Not my control, but somebody's.”
― Richard Stevenson

“It's no big deal for us to be out of each other's company for a couple of days. We've done it before. We're friends and lovers, not Siamese twins.”
― Richard Stevenson

“His voice breaking, he said, "You loved me once."

An old story. I knew it. I said, "We sucked each other's cocks. That's just friendliness. I don't sneer at it, far from it, but most of the time I'd rank it only a notch or two above helping a stranger change a tire. Well, maybe six or eight notches. And yes, I know, it's a whole lot more fun. Plus, you don't have to wash your hands with Fels-Naphtha afterwards. Though, of course, after changing a tire you don't have to brush your teeth. On the one hand this, on the other hand that.”
― Richard Stevenson, On the Other Hand, Death

“Ned, what's wrong with your face? I don't think you've been drying thoroughly between the folds and interstices.”
― Richard Stevenson

“Has Timmy called?"

"Timmy?"

"Timothy J. Callahan. My great and good friend."

"No. You think I'm running a dating service around here, Strachey? Doing social work among the perverts?"

"I just asked if he'd phoned, Ned. Anyway, I'd never accuse the Albany Police Department of social work. Or even, in a good many cases, police work.”
― Richard Stevenson, On the Other Hand, Death

“Plastic surgeons are not famous for their whimsicality. If they were, we'd all have faces like Valentino's. And cocks like Lyle's.”
― Richard Stevenson, On the Other Hand, Death

“Opera has always been my chief emotional release. Along with sex, of course.”
― Richard Stevenson, Ice Blues

“I said, "I'm gay."

"Huh?"

"I'm a homophile."

"What kinda file?"

"I go for men. Like Dot Fisher goes for women. I'm a homosexual. 'Gay,' we call it. Even if The New York Times won't.”
― Richard Stevenson, On the Other Hand, Death

“Something crossed her mind and, suddenly alert, she gave me the fish-eye. "I suppose you're one of Dorothy's gay-lib friends. Is that it? March up and down the street, make a commotion, get us all into this trouble?"

"I guess I am," I said. "But I don't think I'll march today, Mrs. Stout. Not in this weather.”
― Richard Stevenson, On the Other Hand, Death

“Bowman's idea of "entirely cooperative" was a man who brought along a certified stenographer to take down his own confession.”
― Richard Stevenson