The Wisdom Bar-“Queer Melville: A Secret History of America’s Gay Writers

Name: The Wisdom Bar-“Queer Melville: A Secret History of America’s Gay Writers”
Start: 2026-11-12T18:30:00-05:00
End: 2026-11-12T20:30:00-05:00
Location: New York

Pride Women / Lesbian

Thursday, 12 November 2026 · 6:30 PM – 8:30 PM New York, United States

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Manhattan
Books & Readings
Talks

The Wisdom Bar-“Queer Melville: A Secret History of America’s Gay Writers”

November 12, 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm.

$33

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Queer Melville: A Secret History of America’s Gay Writers. Expert-led lectures in bars and creative spaces across NYC.

🧠 Who doesn’t love to learn about a secret history previously untold? Especially when it pertains to one of the most iconic writers of all time…Join us as we learn about the man behind the myths! 📖

Herman Melville’s legacy as one of the most important figures in queer literary history is somewhat obscured and contested, but his work is suffused with male intimacy, homoerotic encounters, same-sex desire, and permutations of radical faggotry. 🏳️‍🌈Melville was not openly gay in the modern sense, because the categories of sexual identity through which we understand such concepts today had not yet been developed. He uneasily maintained the role of husband and father throughout his life. The term “homosexual” itself wasn’t coined until he was in his 50s. Yet many readers, starting within his own lifetime, understood the queerness that was often allegorically encoded in his narratives, but sometimes achingly blatant. 🏳️‍🌈

🐋 Whether it’s sperm-squeezing and interracial same-sex marriage in Moby-Dick, cross-cultural sexual explorations of Polynesia in his early adventure tales, the gay blade who takes the protagonist of Redburn to a male brothel in London, the unwholesome and sexualized father-worship of Pierre, or Melville’s own febrile romantic yearning for his friend Nathaniel Hawthorne, the textual and historical evidence for a queer reading of Melville’s life and works is abundant and compelling.

Lonely Christopher exhaustively presents the case that, as we uplift the contemporaneous writer Walt Whitman as America’s Great Gay Poet, Herman Melville has been and will be our Great Gay Novelist. 🏳️‍🌈

This might be for you if you…

Are a Herman Melville or Moby Dick enthusiast

Are intrigued by the secret histories of literary icons that were previously unexplored

Are curious about LGBTQ+ representation throughout history

Enjoy lecture-based and conversation-focused events of any kind — think Ted Talks in bars, Lectures on Tap, or micro learning meets dinner party

Want to switch up your usual weeknight. Why not make it interesting? 🤓

AGENDA

6:30 PM: Doors Open

6:30 PM – 7:00 PM: Grab a Drink!

7:00 PM – 7:45 PM: Lecture Begins

7:45 PM – 8:00 PM: Q&A

8:00 PM – 8:30 PM: Meet the Speaker & Mingle

*2 Item Minimum

Lonely Christopher is the managing director of the literary non-profit Segue Foundation and author of several books and plays. His forthcoming work includes the poetry collections White Ruins and Troubleshooting as well as the monograph Herman Melville Crazy: Queer Signs and Wonders. He lives in Brooklyn and also works in the field of HIV treatment and prevention.

🎟️ This is a ticketed event, purchase here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-wisdom-bar-queer-melville-a-secret-history-of-americas-gay-writers-tickets-2003372044715?aff=AMNY

Location:

Bibliotheque

54 Mercer St

New York,
New York
10013

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