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True Stories: Portraits from My Past
From author Felice Picano, co-founder of the path breaking Violet Quill Club, comes a new collection of memoirs, many of which have never appeared in print. Picano presents sweet and sometimes controversial anecdotes of his precocious childhood, odd, funny, and often disturbing encounters from before he found his calling as a writer and later as one of the first GLBT publishers. Throughout are his delightful encounters and surprising relationships with the one-of-a-kind and the famous—including Tennessee Williams, W.H. Auden, Charles Henri Ford, Bette Midler, and Diana Vreeland.
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First published January 1, 2007
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About the author
Felice Picano
99 books211 followersFelice Anthony Picano was an American writer, publisher and critic who encouraged the development of gay literature in the United States. His work is documented in many sources.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
October 26, 2015
2011 Rainbow Awards Honorable Mention (5* from at least 1 judge)
July 10, 2020
Felice Picano is such an interesting guy. Having read most of his memoirs in the past couple of months, I (almost) feel like I actually know him, and would be thrilled to meet him in real life.
This book is a collection of scenes from his life, highlighting some of the interesting people he had met, loved, hated, both known and unknown. Many pieces are rewrites from his precious memoirs, notably “Ambidextrous,” and “Men Who Loved Me.” If you’ve read those, you will find some of these stories familiar, but don’t be tempted to skip them over. Felice has unveiled the names of some people and institutions that previously appeared pseudonymously. Some have new sections interspersed, or new epilogues detailing encounters with these subjects in the years after original publication. His story of interviewing Diana Vreeland is a complete and delightful rewrite of the story as it appeared previously.
Felice highlights his encounters with august figures such as W H Auden (The British Auntie), Bette Midler, Charles-Henri Ford, and a neat meeting with Tennessee Williams I hadn’t read alluded to before. Felice also highlights some of the amazing or downright infamous people in his life that are not remembered today, often because of the tragedy of the AIDS plague.
Felice delves a little deeper into his overwhelming loss over those years, and the sense of often feeling like the last survivor of a war he’s not convinced he was meant to survive. The depression this period has so obviously darkened his life with since is a palpable one. Although not unexpected, and by now a common trope of this period in gay mens’ lives, it is nevertheless dealt with in a sensitive and vulnerable way, revealing his pain in a way most survivors, and Felice himself, have seemed unready to let slip into previous works. His lover Bob Lowe receives more “page time,” as Felice is obviously more ready to talk about him as a real man than he seemed ready to before. A haunting ghost story involving Bob is one of the most moving tales of this book.
So too is his tale of a second childhood experienced with a young man in his last days dying of AIDS, not a sexual relationship, but a true friendship as if both were boys again. Through it you get to see the man Felice became after all the loss, understandable and touchingly sick with life, and his reappraisal of the world through an innocent, dying man’s prodding.
Honestly, I want to wrap Felice into my arms in a tight hug, and keep the past at bay for him, at least for an evening. But I doubt I have in me the sophistication to amuse him.
Felice is like a force of nature incarnated on these pages. There are moments where I recognize choices, or experiences that palely mirror my own life, but he lived his so fearlessly and in the moment. I can only marvel and appreciate the impact from a great distance. And yet, in this work, he takes a largely passive, back seat role to the amazing people surrounding him.
I’ll never meet him, and I kind of love the guy.
This book is a collection of scenes from his life, highlighting some of the interesting people he had met, loved, hated, both known and unknown. Many pieces are rewrites from his precious memoirs, notably “Ambidextrous,” and “Men Who Loved Me.” If you’ve read those, you will find some of these stories familiar, but don’t be tempted to skip them over. Felice has unveiled the names of some people and institutions that previously appeared pseudonymously. Some have new sections interspersed, or new epilogues detailing encounters with these subjects in the years after original publication. His story of interviewing Diana Vreeland is a complete and delightful rewrite of the story as it appeared previously.
Felice highlights his encounters with august figures such as W H Auden (The British Auntie), Bette Midler, Charles-Henri Ford, and a neat meeting with Tennessee Williams I hadn’t read alluded to before. Felice also highlights some of the amazing or downright infamous people in his life that are not remembered today, often because of the tragedy of the AIDS plague.
Felice delves a little deeper into his overwhelming loss over those years, and the sense of often feeling like the last survivor of a war he’s not convinced he was meant to survive. The depression this period has so obviously darkened his life with since is a palpable one. Although not unexpected, and by now a common trope of this period in gay mens’ lives, it is nevertheless dealt with in a sensitive and vulnerable way, revealing his pain in a way most survivors, and Felice himself, have seemed unready to let slip into previous works. His lover Bob Lowe receives more “page time,” as Felice is obviously more ready to talk about him as a real man than he seemed ready to before. A haunting ghost story involving Bob is one of the most moving tales of this book.
So too is his tale of a second childhood experienced with a young man in his last days dying of AIDS, not a sexual relationship, but a true friendship as if both were boys again. Through it you get to see the man Felice became after all the loss, understandable and touchingly sick with life, and his reappraisal of the world through an innocent, dying man’s prodding.
Honestly, I want to wrap Felice into my arms in a tight hug, and keep the past at bay for him, at least for an evening. But I doubt I have in me the sophistication to amuse him.
Felice is like a force of nature incarnated on these pages. There are moments where I recognize choices, or experiences that palely mirror my own life, but he lived his so fearlessly and in the moment. I can only marvel and appreciate the impact from a great distance. And yet, in this work, he takes a largely passive, back seat role to the amazing people surrounding him.
I’ll never meet him, and I kind of love the guy.
October 9, 2014
Felice Picano is a survivor and a great storyteller. If you've ever had the pleasure of attending any of his readings, you know that he enjoys telling personal stories as much as writing them. In this collection (and its sequel), Picano shares personal tales of his life with an amazing collection of fascinating people who helped shape his career, sadly most of them gone.
April 28, 2012
Felice Picano writes so casually yet very smartly about his life and his experiences. I've really enjoyed reading his novels...though I haven't been able to get into Drylands End yet.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews