BAWER, (Theodore) Bruce 1956–

PERSONAL: Born October 31, 1956, in New York, NY; son of Theodore (a physician and medical editor) and Nell Carol (Thomas) Bawer; partner's name, Chris. Education: State University of New York—Stony Brook, B.A., 1978, M.A., 1982, Ph.D., 1983.

ADDRESSES: Home—Olso, Norway. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Doubleday, 1745 Broadway, New York, NY 10019. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER: Freelance writer and editor, 1983–.

MEMBER: National Book Critics Circle, PEN.

AWARDS, HONORS: Choice magazine's 1987 Outstanding Academic Book Award for The Middle Generation; finalist, Reviewer's Citation, National Book Critics Circle, 1987.

WRITINGS:

The Contemporary Stylist, Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 1986.

The Middle Generation: The Lives and Poetry of Delmore Schwartz, Randall Jarrell, John Berryman, and Robert Lowell, Archon (Hamden, CT), 1986.

Diminishing Fictions: Essays on the Modern American Novel and Its Critics, Graywolf (St. Paul, MN), 1988.

The Screenplay's the Thing: Movie Criticism, 1986–1990, Archon (Hamden, CT), 1992.

A Place at the Table: The Gay Individual in American Society, Poseidon (New York, NY), 1993.

The Aspect of Eternity: Essays, Graywolf (St. Paul, MN), 1993.

Prophets and Professors: Essays on the Lives and Works of Modern Poets, Story Line Press (Brownsville, OR), 1995.

(Editor) Beyond Queer: Challenging Gay Left Orthodoxy, Free Press (New York, NY), 1996.

(With Rob Morris and Steve Gunderson) House and Home, Dutton (New York, NY), 1996.

Stealing Jesus: How Fundamentalism Betrays Christianity, Crown (New York, NY), 1997.

Coast to Coast: Poems, Story Line Press (Brownsville, OR), 2002.

While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam Is Destroying the West from Within, Doubleday (New York, NY), 2006.

Literary critic for the New Criterion, 1983–. Contributor to Washington Post Book World, New York Times Book Review, Hudson Review, Advocate, Lambda Book Report, Christian Science Monitor, and Wall Street Journal.

SIDELIGHTS: Bruce Bawer is a literary and social critic whose works have frequently addressed issues concerned with homosexuality in the modern world. A political conservative and practicing Episcopalian, he argued for complete social acceptance of homosexuality in A Place at the Table: The Gay Individual in American Society, and collected the work of like-minded essayists in another book, Beyond Queer: Challenging Gay Left Orthodoxy. In his book Stealing Jesus: How Fundamentalism Betrays Christianity, Bawer made bold claims for what constitutes true Christianity and concluded that Evangelicals and Fundamentalists are far off the track.

Bawer's first published works were concerned with literature. In The Middle Generation: The Lives and Poetry of Delmore Schwartz, Randall Jarrell, John Berryman, and Robert Lowell, for example, he offered critical assessment of the lives and works of poets Delmore Schwartz, Randall Jarrell, John Berryman, and Robert Lowell. A Times Literary Supplement reviewer, Lachlan Mackinnon, found the book marred by its "obsession with personalities," but Robert Phillips, who reviewed the book for Commonweal, found it convincing and original. Phillips was impressed by Bawer's understanding of the influence of T. S. Eliot and Walt Whitman on Delmore Schwartz's poetry, and concluded that Bawer is "a critic of the first order, one of the best we have today."

Bawer examined the state of contemporary fiction in his next book, Diminishing Fictions: Essays on the Modern American Novel and Its Critics. In it, Bawer stated that he has little use for the "relentless negativeness" of most modern novels, nor does he admire metafiction, minimalism, and the politicization of literature. As Chicago Tribune reviewer Jack Fuller observed, Bawer "decries much of what passes these days for excellence in American fiction and in the critical evaluation of it." Fuller praised Bawer's efforts "to save … the enduring value of fictional art" from the "demands of political partisanship." Some reviewers regarded Diminishing Fictions as off the mark, however. John Clute, reviewing the book for Washington Post Book World, commented that the "personalized assaults" on such writers as John Hawkes and Don DeLillo "are rich in accusations of trendiness, but deeply deficient in close reading." Although he found fault with much of the book, he nevertheless commended Bawer for some of his more positive judgments in Diminishing Fictions, including the advocacy of Glenway Wescott and Guy Davenport.

A Place at the Table attracted attention not only for its insistence on complete social acceptance of homosexuality, but also for its criticism of the gay subculture. Bawer states that gay marriage is the only way to provide an alternative to the excesses often associated with underground gay lifestyles. Noting that conservative churches recommend complete celibacy for those with homosexual inclinations, Reason reviewer David Link noted that "Bawer and many other lesbians and gay men are pinched between the church's possible but miserable demands and the homosexual establishment's toujours gai indifference to the emotional consequences of sexual relationships and rejection of genuine moral questions associated with sexuality." Bawer urges homosexuals to see themselves as more than merely sexual beings, finding fault with the mind-set that is mostly concerned with turning traditional morals upside-down. Link concluded: "Bawer is not a champion of any cause except good sense…. A Place at the Table is ultimately a defense of self-determination, and a much-needed one. It stands out because it appears in an age whose politics continues to mock the notion of individuality." New notions of gay identity are also urged in the essay collection Beyond Queer, which was edited by Bawer.

The author returned to more conventional subject matter with Prophets and Professors: Essays on the Lives and Works of Modern Poets. In this volume Bawer discusses modern American poetry and its course since the ascent of William Carlos Williams in the mid-twentieth century. While poetry has become more and more mainstream since that time, the quality of American poetry has plummeted, according to the author. He states his opinions forcefully, according to World Literature Today contributor Leslie Schenk, who noted that Bawer is "exemplary in his cool analyses" but is "even better when his passions are roused." Then, "with all the chutzpah of the child who announced that the Emperor was naked, he dares state certain obvious truths we mere mortals hardly dare think, let alone say out loud." Chief among those in line for Bawer's devastating criticism are Allen Ginsberg and the other members of the Beat Generation group of writers. Schenk advised that Prophets and Professors "certainly constitutes obligatory reading for everybody who thinks poetry does matter."

The author stirred up fresh controversy with his book Stealing Jesus. In it, he divides Christians into "legalistic" and "nonlegalistic" camps. The former, according to Bawer, are conservative Evangelicals and Fundamentalists who emphasize traditional bible teachings and creeds. The latter are more liberal denominations who practice the love and acceptance taught by Jesus rather than handing down lists of sins to avoid, in Bawer's view. He "lauds liberal Christianity as the essence of the Gospel, the kind of religion that Jesus would both recognize and practice because he preached it," stated Peter J. Gomes in Wilson Quarterly. "This is a passionate, articulate, timely, and utterly useful book." Yet other reviewers took exception to the work; Commonweal writer Lawrence S. Cunningham found it marred by the author's "snobbishly condescending" attitude toward rural conservative Christians, and George W. Rutler, a National Review contributor, pointed to the author's "naivete" in treating certain "subjects beyond his grasp," including Catholicism. A Publishers Weekly reviewer also found the book flawed by some "unsupported generalizations," yet concluded that the author's "graceful prose and lucid insights make this a must-read book for anyone concerned with the relationship of Christianity to contemporary American culture."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Bawer, Bruce, Diminishing Fictions: Essays on the Modern American Novel and Its Critics, Graywolf (St. Paul, MN), 1988.

Bawer, Bruce, Stealing Jesus: How Fundamentalism Betrays Christianity, Crown (New York, NY), 1997.

PERIODICALS

Advocate, November 25, 1997, review of Stealing Jesus: How Fundamentalism Betrays Christianity, p. 69.

Booklist, January 15, 1994, review of A Place at the Table: The Gay Individual in American Society, p. 861; May 1, 1996, Ray Olson, review of Beyond Queer: Challenging Gay Left Orthodoxy, p. 1474; August, 1996, Ray Olson, review of House and Home, p. 1861; January, 1997, review of Beyond Queer, p. 808; October 1, 1997, Ray Olson, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 282.

Chicago Tribune, November 20, 1988, pp. 7, 9.

Christian Century, January 18, 1995, Sally B. Geis, review of A Place at the Table, p. 55.

Christopher Street, February, 1994, Stephen H. Miller, review of A Place at the Table, p. 36.

Commonweal, October 24, 1986, pp. 562-563; January 28, 1994, Dennis O'Brien, A Place at the Table, p. 14; November 6, 1998, Lawrence S. Cunningham, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 34.

Conscience, spring, 1998, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 33.

Dissent, fall, 1996, David L. Kirp, review of Beyond Queer, p. 136.

Harvard Gay and Lesbian Review, fall, 1996, review of Beyond Queer, p. 46.

Hudson Review, spring, 1994, David Dooley, review of A Place at the Table, p. 117; summer, 1994, James Finn Cotter, review of Coast to Coast, p. 313; autumn, 1998, Louis Simpson, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 616.

Journal of Homosexuality, January, 1998, Ladelle McWhorter, review of Beyond Queer, p. 114.

Kirkus Reviews, April 1, 1996, review of Beyond Queer, p. 498; September 15, 1997, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 1423.

Lambda Book Report, January, 1995, review of A Place at the Table, p. 42; July, 1996, Jeffrey Escoffier, review of Beyond Queer, p. 16; September, 1996, William Leap, review of House and Home, p. 10.

Library Journal, August, 1995, Tim Gavin, review of Prophets and Professors: Essays on the Lives and Works of Modern Poets, p. 73.

Los Angeles Times Book Review, June 19, 1988, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 4.

Nation, September 9, 1996, David L. Kirp, review of House and Home, p. 44.

National Review, March 9, 1998, George W. Rutler, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 65.

New England Review, spring, 1997, review of Prophets and Professors, p. 163.

New York Times Book Review, June 5, 1994, review of A Place at the Table, p. 26; December 4, 1994, review of A Place at the Table, p. 79; January 29, 1995, review of A Place at the Table, p. 24; January 21, 1996, Andrea Barnet, review of Prophets and Professors, p. 20; August 18, 1996, Andrew Holleran, review of House and Home, p. 34; January 18, 1998, Walter Kendrick, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 26.

Publishers Weekly, September 19, 1994, review of A Place at the Table, p. 66; July 24, 1995, review of Prophets and Professors, p. 59; October 27, 1997, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 70; November 3, 1997, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 57.

Reason, April, 1994, David Link, review of A Place at the Table, p. 65.

Sewanee Review, winter, 1996, review of Prophets and Professors, p. 2.

Southern Humanities Review, spring, 2000, Myles Weber, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 184.

Tikkun, January-February, 1996, David L. Kirp, review of A Place at the Table, p. 91.

Times Literary Supplement, February 6, 1987, p. 128; May 30, 1997, Nigel Ashford, review of Beyond Queer, p. 31.

Tribune Books (Chicago, IL), January 16, 1994, review of A Place at the Table, p. 5.

Virginia Quarterly Review, spring, 1998, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 63.

Washington Post Book World, July 31, 1988, p. 10; February 13, 1994, review of Coast to Coast, p. 8; November 12, 1995, review of Prophets and Professors, p. 12; June 9, 1996, review of Beyond Queer, p. 4.

Wilson Quarterly, winter, 1998, Peter J. Gomes, review of Stealing Jesus, p. 108.

World & I, May, 1994, review of A Place at the Table, p. 312.

World Literature Today, winter, 1997, Leslie Schenk, review of Prophets and Professors, p. 159.

ONLINE

Bruce Bawer's Web site, http://www.brucebawer.com (July 21, 2005).