The Fire in Moonlight: Stories from the Radical Faeries 1971 - 2010

by Mark Thompson (Editor), Bo Young (Editor), Richard Neely (Editor)

An anthology of essays by gay men who identify as Radical Faeries talking about the history of the movement and the personal influence it has had in their lives.

Beginning with Walt Whitman and Edward Carpenter in the nineteenth century and moving through the liberation movements of the late twentieth, Dancing in the Moonlight speculates far into the twenty-first. It offers a timely compendium of culture wisdom, provocative wit and challenging sensuality. Dancing in the Moonlight gives witness to a groundbreaking movement that painstakingly emerged from the Gay Liberation era. Rooted in the history of radical visionaries, this little known, essential community informs the modern world with new meaning, offering fresh definitions of faith, identity, purpose and gender. Fire in the Moonlight is a series of personal reflections on who the Radical Faeries are, where they've been and where they are going: Radical Faeries in their own words. It is about how a movement has changed lives--and how Radical Faeries contribute to healing a fractured Earth"--P. [4] of cover.

Prelude: Welcome to Planet Faerie / Will Roscoe --
Call to devotion / James Broughton --
FAERIE ROOTS: The making of a tribe / Stuart Timmons --
"After long ages resuming the broken thread": Walt Whitman & Edward Carpenter dream up the Radical Faeries / Joey Cain --
Queer spirit memories grown in the midwest / Donald L. Engstrom-Reese --
THE FIRST GATHERING: Bursting my chrysalis / Sequoia Thom Lundy --
A re-membering / David S. Cohen --
The faeries gather / David Cawley --
Standing on the shoulders of my ancestors / Eric Lichtman (Toozy) --
My first gathering / Orlando --
Ascent, lament and admonistion / Franklin Abbott --
SANCTUARY --
A voice from short mountain / Leopard --
Living on the body of the mountain / Jan/Nathan falling long --
Flight to neverland / Jonas (Peterpansy) --
Faerie gathering --
SEXMAGICK --
A faerie falls in love / Mockingbird --
My first Saturnalia / Michael Rumaker --
The devil's prayer / Tim Doody (Query) --
The faerie high gathering / Mac Del Ray --
How I got my heart-on --
A coming out tale / Carol Kleinmaier --
WINGS --
Faerieland in Oz / Marissa Zaknich --
Radical journey / Gregory Barnes --
Notes from EuroFaerie lovestar / Marco Shokti --
A dialogue with EuroFaeries / Efthimios Kalos (Notre Dame des Arbres) --
ISSUES & IDEAS --
Heterowashing gay liberation and the Radical Faerie antidote / Jerry Berbiar (Jerry the Faerie) --
Choosing Faerie / Chris Bartlett (The Lady Bartlett) --
Impressions of an improbable faerie / Artwit --
A realm of freedom? / David Finkelstein --
Into the woods / Henry Holmes --
Chants of silence: notes of a deaf radical faerie-in-spirit / Raymond Luczak --
Stewarding the future: a call for sacred witness --
THE FAE WAY --
The power of the heart circle: Mountaine Mort Jonas --
Growing up with the faeries / Pete Sturman (Mockingbird/Pistol Pete) --
Faerie and a father / Tyler Tone (Stitch) --
Worlds of wonder / Wow --
No authority but our heart / Yusef Leo Schuman --
Faerie Phallos ceremony / Ian MacKinnon --
REMEMBRANCE --
Inventory / Dennis Miles --
Memory, trees, children and queens / Robert Croonquist (Covelo) --
The star seed / Mati Livinit --
Crooked faerie tales: remembrances of a middle-class fae --
Ripples / Pat Gourley --
Am I a Radical Faerie? / Don Perryman (Dawn) --
A day and a night in the desert / Mark Thompson --
An afterword: the radical power of roots.

Genres: History, Queer

312 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 2011

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads data base.

Mark Thompson is an American writer, editor and activist. His work centers around gay issues, particularly spirituality.

Reviews

[Bill · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a book of history and short essays, almost all ecstatic and poetic, about time spent with the Faeries. I love the inclusion of less than positive accounts of the experience as well. The movement is a way to find the spirituality of gay living. Do we all end up owning surburban homes, getting married, and adopting children? Is this the other path? Read this book. It may transform you.

[Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a pretty informative collection of personal essays and overviews of the Radical Faery movement that was just one twentieth century queer response to cultural oppression--the ideas are dated and may seem limited to modern gay men, but the infusion of spirituality and environmentalism may be interesting for some. Worth the read for their veneration of Walt Whitman and their take on the 'calamus' poems.