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The Bitterweed Path
Long out-of-print but rediscovered in this new edition, Thomas Hal Phillips' novel tells the story of two boys growing up in the cotton country of Mississippi a generation after the Civil War. Originally published in 1950, the novel's unique interest lies in its subtle treatment of same-sex love across class lines.
The Bitterweed Path vividly invokes life in Mississippi at the turn of the twentieth century. In elegant prose drawing on the Old Testament story of David and Jonathan, the author tells of the relationship between two boys--one a white sharecropper's son, the other the son of the wealthy land owner, a man whose own attentions complicate the plot when they fall upon his son's friend.
Part of a small body of early twentieth century gay literature, The Bitterweed Path does not sensationalize homosexuality but instead portrays it as part of a continuum of human behavior. The result is a book that challenges modern assumptions about the portrayal in novels of gay characters during the era before Stonewall.
The Bitterweed Path vividly invokes life in Mississippi at the turn of the twentieth century. In elegant prose drawing on the Old Testament story of David and Jonathan, the author tells of the relationship between two boys--one a white sharecropper's son, the other the son of the wealthy land owner, a man whose own attentions complicate the plot when they fall upon his son's friend.
Part of a small body of early twentieth century gay literature, The Bitterweed Path does not sensationalize homosexuality but instead portrays it as part of a continuum of human behavior. The result is a book that challenges modern assumptions about the portrayal in novels of gay characters during the era before Stonewall.
336 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1949
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Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
May 21, 2022
2.5, rounded up. [WARNING: in order to elucidate my feelings about the novel, several key plot elements are divulged in the following. Caveat emptor!]
This is a most peculiar example of mid-20th century gay lit - and there are myriad problems attempting to come to grips with it 70 years following its initial publication. Phillips wrote this as his MFA thesis for a creative writing degree at the Univ. of Alabama at Tuscaloosa back in 1948 - and it was published 2 years later - and if nothing else, it shows that such efforts haven't changed that much in 70 years - this is both woefully overwritten and underdeveloped. The 'gay' content is so subliminal and coded as to be almost non-existent -until the final few pages, which are also suitably oblique.
The storyline begins promisingly circa 1890, with the story of two adolescent boys, Roger and Darrell, who become almost sibling-like growing up in the post-Civil War south. There is a definite undercurrent of sexual longing on at least ONE of their parts - which culminates in a less than chaste kiss before they part ways for most of the rest of the novel. This first third has a lovely lyrical quality that put me in mind of the classic To Kill a Mockingbird.
Then we have a long and not always interesting slog as Darrell sublimates his longing for Roger via four OTHER relationships -- with Miriam, Roger's tease of a younger sister; with the town's slutty/artistic preacher's daughter, Nolie; and his eventual wife, the noble and saintly OTHER preacher's daughter, whom he eventually marries, Emily. Concurrently, Darrell ALSO pines/lusts for Roger's father - the burly and manly Malcolm. who is something of a surrogate father for him - but also an object of barely suppressed longing. PHEW!!
As one can tell from this truncated synopsis, the novel veers off into tangents that are not always foreseeable, and for the most part, the prose is both proficient and interesting. But I am not quite sure it ever comes together in any coherent fashion; but perhaps that is a factor of the necessary constraints upon the author in order to get it published at all. It is definitely still worth reading, but more as a curio than as an indispensable lost piece of gay lit.
This is a most peculiar example of mid-20th century gay lit - and there are myriad problems attempting to come to grips with it 70 years following its initial publication. Phillips wrote this as his MFA thesis for a creative writing degree at the Univ. of Alabama at Tuscaloosa back in 1948 - and it was published 2 years later - and if nothing else, it shows that such efforts haven't changed that much in 70 years - this is both woefully overwritten and underdeveloped. The 'gay' content is so subliminal and coded as to be almost non-existent -until the final few pages, which are also suitably oblique.
The storyline begins promisingly circa 1890, with the story of two adolescent boys, Roger and Darrell, who become almost sibling-like growing up in the post-Civil War south. There is a definite undercurrent of sexual longing on at least ONE of their parts - which culminates in a less than chaste kiss before they part ways for most of the rest of the novel. This first third has a lovely lyrical quality that put me in mind of the classic To Kill a Mockingbird.
Then we have a long and not always interesting slog as Darrell sublimates his longing for Roger via four OTHER relationships -- with Miriam, Roger's tease of a younger sister; with the town's slutty/artistic preacher's daughter, Nolie; and his eventual wife, the noble and saintly OTHER preacher's daughter, whom he eventually marries, Emily. Concurrently, Darrell ALSO pines/lusts for Roger's father - the burly and manly Malcolm. who is something of a surrogate father for him - but also an object of barely suppressed longing. PHEW!!
As one can tell from this truncated synopsis, the novel veers off into tangents that are not always foreseeable, and for the most part, the prose is both proficient and interesting. But I am not quite sure it ever comes together in any coherent fashion; but perhaps that is a factor of the necessary constraints upon the author in order to get it published at all. It is definitely still worth reading, but more as a curio than as an indispensable lost piece of gay lit.
February 27, 2015
Why have we never read Thomas Hal Phillips before? It feels like we've stumbled upon buried treasure. The Bitterweed Path does address the subject of homosexuality, which was indeed remarkable for its time. (The book was first published in 1950.) More remarkable, though, is the fantastic job Phillips does of telling this story. His prose is lyrical and intense, setting the reader firmly in each moment of the story. The characters are deftly drawn. The friendship between Darrell and Roger reminded us somewhat of Benjamin Alire Sáenz's Aristotle and Dante, whom we loved. The look at life in Mississippi so soon after the Civil War was entrancing. This is, simply put, a beautiful book.
May 22, 2010
This review will be very interesting to compare and contrast with the review of the next book I’m going to review – “A Room in Chelsea Square” by Michael Nelson. They are both lost gay novels, republished, and they were both written in the 1950′s – but oh! The Difference!
I’m afraid I didn’t like The Bitterweed Path very much. Although at times beautifully written I found it a frustrating read and sometimes hugely self-conscious and self-indulgent.
It’s the story of a young man from a family of religious and strict people who meets up with the Pitts, a more liberal and friendly family. Darrell, the young man from the strict upbringing is attending a running meet, and his own father doesn’t attend, despite the fact that Darrell is a great young runner and he wins the race easily. Malcolm Pitt is an easy going, well-off landowner who owns land adjacent to Darrell’s Ku Klux Klan father and right from the first meeting Darrell and Malcolm hit it off. Malcolm’s own son, Roger has been unable to attend the meet due to injury, and when Darrell wins easily, Malcolm accompanies Darrell to collect his trophy, tells lies and says that Darrell is his “other son.”
Gradually, Darrell is drawn into this warmer, friendlier world than his own, much to the disgust of his father, and then his grandmother. Despite this, his life is enmeshed with the Pitts forever–the boys become great friends.
First of all I had great problems with Darrell himself. He’s almost entirely passive. Everything seems to happen to him without him instigating anything himself. The most active thing he does is win the race, and there ends his pro-activity. Perhaps (and this is another reason why I don’t like the book much, because I don’t know if that’s supposed to be the message, or whether I’ve entirely got the wrong end of the stick) this is deliberate, that after he meets the Pitts, he’s swept up like a piece of flotsam and his life is never his own again.
The thing is, compared with The Charioteer (1953 UK, 1959 USA) – The Bitterweed Path is almost so heavily coded (if indeed it’s coded at all, and not just a What You See is What You Get book) that I found it rather difficult to follow. Other reviews and blurbs I’ve seen state that Darrell falls in love with Roger but it certainly doesn’t seem that way to me, he certainly is extremely fond of Roger, and it’s clear that Roger is probably in love with Darrell, but like so many aspects of this book, it’s pushed to one side. Darrell refuses to write to Roger, and doesn’t even see him for several years after he’s been sent away to school and his friendship with Malcolm continues.
I was convinced even at the end, that it was Malcolm (if anyone) that Darrell had “unsuitable” feelings for, but as I say, it’s rather hard to tell, as he doesn’t really seem to care deeply about anyone. Except his puppy at the beginning (to which horrible things happen–twice–so be warned.) But then again – perhaps that is part of the theme too, perhaps the puppy is indicative of his feelings or something. Roger is (probably understandably) jealous of Darrell’s place in Malcolm’s life. After all, Roger was sent away to school, then to medical college and rarely came home – whereas Darrell was the piggie that stayed home and Malcolm lavished with trips away (where they slept in the bed together, arms around each other), his attention, and half his business.
There’s at least one character who–as far as I’m concerned–was entirely superfluous. I didn’t understand her existence, I don’t know what she was set up to show about Darrell and I don’t know her point. Nothing Darrell does, as I said – due to his enormous passivity–convinces. I don’t feel he cares about anyone, even Miriam (Roger’s sister) who he professes to be in love with and expects to marry and doesn’t, or his wife who he obviously marries in rebound, or even his own children. There’s also much that is not followed through, too. We are told that Darrell’s grandmother is a hell and damnation type, but we don’t really see much of this, and after his father dies, Darrell seems to do exactly as he pleases and his grandmother goes along with it. Nothing is ever done about Darrell’s running which seemed a bit odd – the whole running scenario seemed shoe-horned in just to show how evil Darrell’s father was in comparison to Malcolm Pitt.
At the end–almost in an afterthought, perhaps the author realised he was being far too vague – Roger breaks down and says that he loved Darrell, probably too much, and Darrell says that he never loved Roger that way, but he thinks that he probably loved Malcolm too much. I don’t think there was any sexual activity in the entire book, even hidden away in the way it is in The Charioteer, and I wasn’t expecting it but I would like to have stopped feeling so confused.
It’s been compared with David and Jonathan from the Biblical story and I really can’t agree; at no point do I ever feel that Darrell and Roger have that kind of love “surpassing that of women” – especially as they are separated for most of the book and don’t even bother to write to each other.
If flow of consciousness narrative is your cup of tea, then you will probably enjoy this, but if, like me, you get annoyed with having to second guess what’s actually going on, I’d say give it a miss. Beautiful in parts but made me feel dim and left me with a bit of a headache.
I’m afraid I didn’t like The Bitterweed Path very much. Although at times beautifully written I found it a frustrating read and sometimes hugely self-conscious and self-indulgent.
It’s the story of a young man from a family of religious and strict people who meets up with the Pitts, a more liberal and friendly family. Darrell, the young man from the strict upbringing is attending a running meet, and his own father doesn’t attend, despite the fact that Darrell is a great young runner and he wins the race easily. Malcolm Pitt is an easy going, well-off landowner who owns land adjacent to Darrell’s Ku Klux Klan father and right from the first meeting Darrell and Malcolm hit it off. Malcolm’s own son, Roger has been unable to attend the meet due to injury, and when Darrell wins easily, Malcolm accompanies Darrell to collect his trophy, tells lies and says that Darrell is his “other son.”
Gradually, Darrell is drawn into this warmer, friendlier world than his own, much to the disgust of his father, and then his grandmother. Despite this, his life is enmeshed with the Pitts forever–the boys become great friends.
First of all I had great problems with Darrell himself. He’s almost entirely passive. Everything seems to happen to him without him instigating anything himself. The most active thing he does is win the race, and there ends his pro-activity. Perhaps (and this is another reason why I don’t like the book much, because I don’t know if that’s supposed to be the message, or whether I’ve entirely got the wrong end of the stick) this is deliberate, that after he meets the Pitts, he’s swept up like a piece of flotsam and his life is never his own again.
The thing is, compared with The Charioteer (1953 UK, 1959 USA) – The Bitterweed Path is almost so heavily coded (if indeed it’s coded at all, and not just a What You See is What You Get book) that I found it rather difficult to follow. Other reviews and blurbs I’ve seen state that Darrell falls in love with Roger but it certainly doesn’t seem that way to me, he certainly is extremely fond of Roger, and it’s clear that Roger is probably in love with Darrell, but like so many aspects of this book, it’s pushed to one side. Darrell refuses to write to Roger, and doesn’t even see him for several years after he’s been sent away to school and his friendship with Malcolm continues.
I was convinced even at the end, that it was Malcolm (if anyone) that Darrell had “unsuitable” feelings for, but as I say, it’s rather hard to tell, as he doesn’t really seem to care deeply about anyone. Except his puppy at the beginning (to which horrible things happen–twice–so be warned.) But then again – perhaps that is part of the theme too, perhaps the puppy is indicative of his feelings or something. Roger is (probably understandably) jealous of Darrell’s place in Malcolm’s life. After all, Roger was sent away to school, then to medical college and rarely came home – whereas Darrell was the piggie that stayed home and Malcolm lavished with trips away (where they slept in the bed together, arms around each other), his attention, and half his business.
There’s at least one character who–as far as I’m concerned–was entirely superfluous. I didn’t understand her existence, I don’t know what she was set up to show about Darrell and I don’t know her point. Nothing Darrell does, as I said – due to his enormous passivity–convinces. I don’t feel he cares about anyone, even Miriam (Roger’s sister) who he professes to be in love with and expects to marry and doesn’t, or his wife who he obviously marries in rebound, or even his own children. There’s also much that is not followed through, too. We are told that Darrell’s grandmother is a hell and damnation type, but we don’t really see much of this, and after his father dies, Darrell seems to do exactly as he pleases and his grandmother goes along with it. Nothing is ever done about Darrell’s running which seemed a bit odd – the whole running scenario seemed shoe-horned in just to show how evil Darrell’s father was in comparison to Malcolm Pitt.
At the end–almost in an afterthought, perhaps the author realised he was being far too vague – Roger breaks down and says that he loved Darrell, probably too much, and Darrell says that he never loved Roger that way, but he thinks that he probably loved Malcolm too much. I don’t think there was any sexual activity in the entire book, even hidden away in the way it is in The Charioteer, and I wasn’t expecting it but I would like to have stopped feeling so confused.
It’s been compared with David and Jonathan from the Biblical story and I really can’t agree; at no point do I ever feel that Darrell and Roger have that kind of love “surpassing that of women” – especially as they are separated for most of the book and don’t even bother to write to each other.
If flow of consciousness narrative is your cup of tea, then you will probably enjoy this, but if, like me, you get annoyed with having to second guess what’s actually going on, I’d say give it a miss. Beautiful in parts but made me feel dim and left me with a bit of a headache.
July 25, 2020
This is a beautifully written and perfectly conceived novel, which makes the top 5 of my favourite gay novels. There is so much lightness of touch here in the treatment of same-sex desire, and so much sexiness... (I said sexiness, not sex.) A very atypical love triangle, with characters you can fall in love with. The main character and his vulnerabilities are beautifully portrayed. In fact the account is so affecting that several times it makes you wish you could be there, to hold his hand, and tell him all will be all right. A very powerful sense of place: you will feel you are in rural Mississippi even if you never visited it. For a novel from the 1950s, it spares the reader the tragedy so often associated with stories of homosexuality of the time. Wonderful, wonderful book.
October 12, 2025
What an incredible novel. I've had this book on my radar for a little while and I'm extremely grateful for the opportunity to review the 75th anniversary edition.
I'll start off by saying that this is a novel of queerness in its purest sense: the lines are blurred, there are no modern definitions, there are no binaries. We are primarily dealing with homoerotic love, but it's so much more than that. It is also a novel of 'what ifs': what if Malcolm sent Darrell to school with Roger, what if Roger chose his relationship with Darrell above everything else, what if Leta didn't interfere with Miriam? The decisions forced by circumstance and society impact the growth and trajectory of the character, making your heart break for the characters as feelings change and romances are stifled.
As the reader, you are left to sit with uneasy feelings. This is one of those novels that you can't really 'know' the answer to so many questions. You just have to sit there and let the events of the novel wash over you. Contrary to the analysis in the introductions and afterward (which are great for adding a layer of analysis, highlighting a lot of what makes the novel queer), there is so much ambiguity in the relationships that I don't think we can pin a clear winner on the love triangle (quadrangle? pentagon?). I'm not surprised to see so many reviewers come away with vastly different interpretations. (Except for the people who say it's too coded or not very queer - the romantic and sexual love between Roger/Darrell and Roger/Malcolm is pretty obvious and there are several implied sex/intimate scenes that are especially obvious by the end of the novel.)
The novel had a way of completely absorbing you into the lives of those in this small town in Mississippi. The slow pacing absolutely worked for me and I came away feeling like I knew these characters.
Thank you to the University of North Carolina Press and NetGalley for the ARC! This may be one of my favourite early queer novels that I've read.
I'll start off by saying that this is a novel of queerness in its purest sense: the lines are blurred, there are no modern definitions, there are no binaries. We are primarily dealing with homoerotic love, but it's so much more than that. It is also a novel of 'what ifs': what if Malcolm sent Darrell to school with Roger, what if Roger chose his relationship with Darrell above everything else, what if Leta didn't interfere with Miriam? The decisions forced by circumstance and society impact the growth and trajectory of the character, making your heart break for the characters as feelings change and romances are stifled.
As the reader, you are left to sit with uneasy feelings. This is one of those novels that you can't really 'know' the answer to so many questions. You just have to sit there and let the events of the novel wash over you. Contrary to the analysis in the introductions and afterward (which are great for adding a layer of analysis, highlighting a lot of what makes the novel queer), there is so much ambiguity in the relationships that I don't think we can pin a clear winner on the love triangle (quadrangle? pentagon?). I'm not surprised to see so many reviewers come away with vastly different interpretations. (Except for the people who say it's too coded or not very queer - the romantic and sexual love between Roger/Darrell and Roger/Malcolm is pretty obvious and there are several implied sex/intimate scenes that are especially obvious by the end of the novel.)
The novel had a way of completely absorbing you into the lives of those in this small town in Mississippi. The slow pacing absolutely worked for me and I came away feeling like I knew these characters.
Thank you to the University of North Carolina Press and NetGalley for the ARC! This may be one of my favourite early queer novels that I've read.
February 16, 2015
This is a deceptive book. On first read, I enjoyed it but felt like it dragged in a couple of places. However, I really liked the two adolescent boys and their relationship, so the book stayed in my head. The more I thought about, the more I realized I wasn't exactly sure what happened. So, I went back and read it a second time, and man was I impressed. Phillips published this novel at the height of the McCarthy era and he was writing it as his thesis at I believe the University of Alabama. Talk about learning how to write between the lines! He succeeded better than I would have thought possible. On first read I didn't pick up on the sex in the book at all and that was one of my disappointments. On second read, I realized the sex was there, undeniably, just skillfully written into the text so that the reader can't be certain sex has occurred until later in the book when the author reveals, almost in code, that it did. This changed everything. It's a very brave book, with a young adolescent protagonist who enjoys beautiful relationships, including sex, with both his best friend and his best friend's father. Given that, and given the time it was written, I think it's a brilliant, incredibly brave masterpiece of gay fiction. It might even be my favorite book.
October 3, 2009
Historical gay fiction....late 1800s, Mississippi....male love before gay recognition.
Touching, emotional, internal struggles.
Touching, emotional, internal struggles.
February 4, 2015
This response is a bit scattered. It’s as close to stream-of-consciousness as I will ever get so enjoy it.
I jumped this book up my list because someone was getting antsy. For some reason, he didn’t think I wanted to read anything he suggested, or that I didn’t like his last recommendation, Last Summer , so I’ve made a deal with him that I’ll read a book at least every other month from him (talk about dictating!). Thankfully I’ve really enjoyed both books he’s recommended so far. His next recommendation is Anne Rice’s The Witching Hour and these recommendations don’t even include the ones of his that I WANT to read!
I was a little torn on John Howard’s introduction as it felt a bit misleading, but it did provide an excellent history of Phillips life and the setting of the novel. Howard wrote about his own experience as an LGBT academic and activist, and the self-serving nature of getting this book re-published for its early LGBT themes. He mentioned Phillips lack of acknowledgement about his own sexuality, which was interesting, and noted that none of his other books did as well as The Bitterweed Path and didn’t contain LGBT themes.
Click here to continue reading on my blog The Oddness of Moving Things.
I jumped this book up my list because someone was getting antsy. For some reason, he didn’t think I wanted to read anything he suggested, or that I didn’t like his last recommendation, Last Summer , so I’ve made a deal with him that I’ll read a book at least every other month from him (talk about dictating!). Thankfully I’ve really enjoyed both books he’s recommended so far. His next recommendation is Anne Rice’s The Witching Hour and these recommendations don’t even include the ones of his that I WANT to read!
I was a little torn on John Howard’s introduction as it felt a bit misleading, but it did provide an excellent history of Phillips life and the setting of the novel. Howard wrote about his own experience as an LGBT academic and activist, and the self-serving nature of getting this book re-published for its early LGBT themes. He mentioned Phillips lack of acknowledgement about his own sexuality, which was interesting, and noted that none of his other books did as well as The Bitterweed Path and didn’t contain LGBT themes.
Click here to continue reading on my blog The Oddness of Moving Things.
April 29, 2016
Darrell's family is a difficult one that carries baggage from long ago battlefields and social slights. When he meets the Pitt family, he finds his way out: Malcolm, the father, is the picture of what a man ought to be. Roger, the son, is perfect and smart. Miriam, the daughter, is beautiful and insightful. Only the mother is out of focus, and Darrell rarely crosses her path.
He becomes embedded in the Pitt family, much to the consternation of his own relatives, and loves and appreciates all that they do, all that they are. Some think that Darrell is too Pitt; the reader knows just how deep the connections are.
This is the story of deep intimacy, intense relationships, and lifelong love. It's also a picture of a time and a place, and of love that must be hidden. A thoughtful and complex narrative, this book paints the world of mid-century northern Mississippi and its hidden truths.
He becomes embedded in the Pitt family, much to the consternation of his own relatives, and loves and appreciates all that they do, all that they are. Some think that Darrell is too Pitt; the reader knows just how deep the connections are.
This is the story of deep intimacy, intense relationships, and lifelong love. It's also a picture of a time and a place, and of love that must be hidden. A thoughtful and complex narrative, this book paints the world of mid-century northern Mississippi and its hidden truths.
June 9, 2020
The edition that I read was a reissued (1996) version of a book originally published in 1949. Without resorting to major spoilers, it is the story of a young Mississippi sharecropper in the late 1800s and his relationships with both the father and son, who own the property where he lives. There is a lot of implicit homoerotic subtext in all three relationships and it is fascinating to read. The book is beautifully written and I wish it was better known. It is quite daring in its own way.
September 22, 2017
A great book. You have to sort of read between the lines.
September 22, 2025
NetGalley ARC for the rerelease. I liked this enough to stay up late to read it straight through but can’t quite articulate why. I like that it’s a very quiet story, and it’s also been a while since I read something not written recently and I forgot how subtle and lyrical the writing can be, and I think that just lulled me in :)
Definitely had to push through the violent beginning (cw for dog death); if that had been the tone of the whole book I likely would have stopped reading. But that part is quickly over and exists to show the stark contrast between Darrell’s family and his neighbors the Pitts, whose warmth and goodness are magnetic to Darrell. He quickly falls in (understated, written-in-the-1950s-and-set-in-the-1800s style) love with their son Roger, and we see them grow up together and see Darrell essentially adopted into the family as a second son. They drift apart and back together throughout the novel, and as subtle as the book is about their relationship, and regardless of who else they end up with, it’s always clear that this is the relationship that should be happening but isn’t. You wonder how the book would have played out if it was set in a time where they were allowed to be together.
The afterward mentions a controversial relationship in the book, but to me the relationship was ambiguous enough that I thought it was just the protagonist having a crush on the older character. I’m choosing to stick to that interpretation because thinking of that relationship as anything other than familial would seriously change my opinion of the book.
Definitely had to push through the violent beginning (cw for dog death); if that had been the tone of the whole book I likely would have stopped reading. But that part is quickly over and exists to show the stark contrast between Darrell’s family and his neighbors the Pitts, whose warmth and goodness are magnetic to Darrell. He quickly falls in (understated, written-in-the-1950s-and-set-in-the-1800s style) love with their son Roger, and we see them grow up together and see Darrell essentially adopted into the family as a second son. They drift apart and back together throughout the novel, and as subtle as the book is about their relationship, and regardless of who else they end up with, it’s always clear that this is the relationship that should be happening but isn’t. You wonder how the book would have played out if it was set in a time where they were allowed to be together.
The afterward mentions a controversial relationship in the book, but to me the relationship was ambiguous enough that I thought it was just the protagonist having a crush on the older character. I’m choosing to stick to that interpretation because thinking of that relationship as anything other than familial would seriously change my opinion of the book.
November 1, 2023
First, the genres for this book are listed as Gay Fiction, Queer, LGBT, Gay Fiction, Historical Fiction and Sexuality. The only descriptions I find I can agree with are the last two, and it took me forever to read for much like the movie version of Killers of the Flower Moon, it spends an enormous amount of words going over every little detail. The Goodreads entry also states it was “published in 1950, and the novel's unique interest lies in its subtle treatment of same-sex love across class lines.” Perhaps it did so, but in such a subtle yet long-winded way that it was almost completely lost on this reader
The book invokes life in the southern United States at the turn of the twentieth century. In “prose drawing on the story of David and Jonathan, it tells of the relationship between two boys--one a white sharecropper's son, the other the son of a wealthy land-owner,” a man whose attentions focus frequently and specifically on his son's friend somewhat to the detriment of the love he should be showing his son and daughter, but The Bitterweed Path does not sensationalize homosexuality, in fact, it barely hints at it. I found it a tough slog often filled with too much poetic, not very interesting back-story.
The book invokes life in the southern United States at the turn of the twentieth century. In “prose drawing on the story of David and Jonathan, it tells of the relationship between two boys--one a white sharecropper's son, the other the son of a wealthy land-owner,” a man whose attentions focus frequently and specifically on his son's friend somewhat to the detriment of the love he should be showing his son and daughter, but The Bitterweed Path does not sensationalize homosexuality, in fact, it barely hints at it. I found it a tough slog often filled with too much poetic, not very interesting back-story.
August 31, 2025
First published in 1950, this is a quietly ground-breaking novel that portrays male same-sex love with nuance, subtlety (sometimes too subtle), dignity and compassion at a time when such love was condemned by society and the law. It’s set in post-civil war Mississippi and follows Darrell, the son of a poor sharecropper who forges deep bonds with a local family, in particular the son of the house. The sexual feelings of the protagonists are definitely coded, perhaps necessary for the era, and sometimes the reader has to read between the lines, but overall it’s a tender and insightful novel about relationships of all sort, as well as about class and race. It’s not a great novel but one well worth reading, long out of print but now available to a new readership.
November 14, 2025
It's hard to define exactly what genre The Bitterweed Path is: it has the shape of a tragic family saga, but it's not a truly tragic tale; and it has elements of Southern Gothic, but that label doesn't really fit it either. Whatever genre it is, it is a beautiful, profoundly moving story told with subtlety and grace.
My thanks to the University of North Carolina Press for republishing this masterpiece.
Received via NetGalley.
My thanks to the University of North Carolina Press for republishing this masterpiece.
Received via NetGalley.
March 20, 2013
This novel bills itself as a re-discovered subtle gay pre-Stonewall story. Originally with a "pulp" style cover illustration that depicts a man and woman in a suggestive pose, the new cover is more tasteful with three male torsos on their sides reminiscent of a mountain range. In reading the novel one has to look very hard within the writing to discover anything gay about it. The story is about a sharecropper's son and the land owners son growing up together and how the landowner's father sees the other boy as the son he wishes in his own. This love is also reflected in the sharecropper's son for the owner. At one point, the reader will sense that the owner and the boy might have gay feelings for each other and at another point, the two boys for each other. This sense of intimacy isn't ever realized until the last three pages and even then it is only suggested. Overall, it is a good story set in the south a generation after the Civil War along the lines of a Robert Wilder book like "Written on the Wind".
October 4, 2015
The beginning of The Bitterweed Path was good when Darren and Roger were young boys. Phillips did a good job of showing how Darrell's misery with his home life and his father and how he was drawn to the Pitt family because their household represented everything that his own didn't: love, stability, financial security. But when Darren and Roger became adults, the book just meandered. People kept saying things they didn't mean and endless pages of dialogue that just went nowhere. "Did you like New Orleans?" "Yes, I liked New Orleans." Arrr!! I didn't get that this was a "gay" novel at all. I did feel that Michael Pitt's adoration of Darrell when he was younger was pedo-ish and I'm surprised the author was able to get away with that when the book was published. Either people just ignored it or overlooked it entirely. I didn't really feel that the relationship between Darrell and Roger was romantic. They certainly liked each other and each man seemed to want to emulate the other one, but I never felt that they shared some great lust for each other.
December 8, 2008
I picked this book up at a tent sale because the idea of a rediscovered homoerotic novel interested me. It was okay, but not spectacular. The story jumped around a lot, which makes sense if you're trying to cover 10 years or more. But the times when the author chose to stop and tell about events seemed wrong, like the important event was right before or right after what was being told. Odd book. But there were parts that were well written.
April 1, 2017
A novel full of luscious symbolism that describes the intricacies and vagaries of relationships and love in the Antebellum South. Phillips handles the varying expressions of masculinity and sexuality with aching tenderness. A book unique for its time and still highly relevant today.
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