Page 242 - Gay San Francisco: Eyewitness Drummer - Vol. 1

222 Jack Fritscher, Ph.D.
sweating; sometimes with desire, sometimes with horror; then
don’t even try it! Fritscher is not a light weight, either in terms
of subject matter or literary style.
If, however, you can stand the heat — if you are willing to
go places in literary mode that you would likely never want to go
in person — then Jack Fritscher is an ideal tour guide. Part James
Joyce, part William Faulkner, and a whole lot more than the
Marquis de Sade, I am forced to repeat the cliche: Jack Fritscher
is a unique voice, and one who, if you are up to it, you should
hear. The songs are steamy and scary, but God! Can this man
sing! — ©1999 Mason Powell.
http://home.pon.net/rhinoceroslodge/reviews.htm
Retrieved July 12, 2003. Used with permission.

(I really should meet Mason Powell and take him to lunch anywhere
he wants.)
Style for me is strong word choice, rhythmic phrases, colorful meta-
phor, filmic editing of space and time and memory, distinct objective
dialog as well as the streaming-consciousness, the convoluted monolog
of thought and conscience which reveals characters seen by themselves in
contrast to how other characters see them.
“How Buddy Left Me,” one of my favorite stories, is an example of
strong word choice that turns a porno story into a love story. “Chasing
Danny Boy” is full of rhythmic phrases born of the sex-rhythms of jerking
off. “Titanic” spins on evergreen queer/queen metaphor: survival.
In the hold of Titanic, the second night of the ill-fated voyage, sex
occurs. Style sample:
Edward and the Stoker, two different classes of men, were as
perfect an odds-on match as Titanic was for the North Atlantic.
“When I beat you, young gentleman, sir . . . ,” the Stoker said.
He appreciated Edward’s cock and cockiness. “ . . . You will stay
with me for 24 focking hours below decks in the hold, in the
boiler room, maybe even in chains in the brig, just so you see,
young gentleman, how men like you make men like us live.”
Edward, ever the knightly aristocrat, picked up the gauntlet.
He hated socialism and bolshevism . . . . Edward either had to take
the Stoker’s 14-fat-inches down his throat, and, mind you, up his
ass, or he had to spend a day and a night in the hold getting up
to the Stoker’s “focking” speed, outdistancing his old sculling
records, the way Titanic, slicing through the still, cold waters
was outdistancing herself and her sister ship, Olympic.

©Jack Fritscher, Ph.D., All Rights Reserved—posted 05-05-2017
HOW TO LEGALLY QUOTE FROM THIS BOOK