Overview
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| Ben Duncan, far right, soon after placement in first foster home. West End, Birmingham, Alabama, c. 1939. |
On November 2, 2005, John Howard spoke at Outwrite Books in Atlanta about the new edition of The Same Language, a memoir written by Alabama native Ben Duncan. First published in England in 1962, The Same Language chronicled Duncan's life from his birth in Birmingham through his experiences as an orphan in Depression-era foster homes, his military service, his education at Oxford University, and his career as a writer and commentator in England. As a gay man living in Great Britain at a time when homosexuality was aggressively prosecuted in the courts, Duncan was unable to tell his whole story when his memoir first appeared. Prof. Howard, who edited the new edition (University of Alabama Press, 2005), and wrote the Afterword, talks of working with Duncan on this project and reads excerpts from the memoir. Shifting from past to present and using italicized passages to indicate new additions, The Same Language now includes Duncan's account of his evolving sexuality, the many masks he was forced to contrive for survival and acceptance, and a vivid rendering of the underground world of gay life in 1950s and 1960s Britain.
Video
Part 2: Howard reads the short opening chapter from the original edition of The Same Language
Part 3: Howard reads Duncan's account of meeting Dick Chapman, a piece Duncan was unable to publish in the early 1960s
About the Presenter
A native of Mississippi, John Howard is an alumnus of the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa, where he received an MA in American Studies. He completed his PhD at the Graduate Institute of Liberal Arts at Emory University. Prof. Howard currently teaches in the Department of American Studies at King's College, University of London. He is the author of Men Like That: A Southern Queer History (University of Chicago Press, 1999) and editor of Carryin' On in the Lesbian and Gay South (New York University Press, 1997).
About Ben Duncan
A native of Alabama, Ben Duncan is a writer and broadcaster based in England. He is the author of the novel Little Friends and numerous articles in The Guardian, New Society, Punch, The Spectator, and The Times Literary Supplement.
