Arthur Evans (author)

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
For other authors named Arthur Evans, see Arthur Evans (disambiguation) § Writers and scholars.

Arthur Evans
Born(1942-10-12)October 12, 1942
San Francisco, California, U.S.
Pen nameArthur Evans
OccupationGay rights activist, author
LanguageEnglish
NationalityAmerican
CitizenshipUnited States
EducationBrown University, City College of New York, Columbia University
Alma materCity College of New York
Partner
  • Arthur Bell (1964–1971)
  • Jacob Schraeter (1972–1981)

Arthur Scott Evans (October 12, 1942 – September 11, 2011) was an early

Washington state in 1972,[2] then later moved to San Francisco where he became a fixture in the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood. In his later years, Evans remained politically active and continued as a translator and academic.[3] His 1997 book Critique of Patriarchal Reason argued that misogyny had influenced "objective" fields such as logic and physics.[2][4]

Early life and education

Evans was born on October 12, 1942

Joseph Lewis, president of the Freethinkers Society, and Lewis threatened the paper company with a lawsuit if the scholarship were dropped. The scholarship stayed in place, with Evans switching to a major in political science.[3] Evans withdrew from Brown and moved to Greenwich Village[2] in 1963, which he later described as the best move he ever made in his life.[3] Evans was admitted to City College of New York in 1966,[3] switching his major to philosophy from political science, and graduating in 1967. He afterwards joined the doctoral program at Columbia in philosophy, where he focused on ancient Greek philosophy while continuing to take part in protests.[2] His doctoral advisor was Paul Oskar Kristeller.[3]

Career in writing and activism

New York City

He became politically active in the 1960s, participating in his first

Columbia protests.[3][6] In 1967, Evans signed a public statement declaring his intention to refuse to pay income taxes in protest against the U.S. war against Vietnam.[6] He also participated in the protests at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.[7][3] While at Columbia, Evans joined the Student Homophile League, founded by Nino Romano and Stephen Donaldson, although Evans himself was still closeted.[7]

He was not at the Stonewall Riots in 1969,

John V. Lindsay and demonstrating against legislation of the time, for example a regulation at the time requiring gay people to get approval from a psychiatrist before being allowed to drive a taxi.[2] Evans was often arrested for the zaps.[3]

Although not yet out as gay to his family, in November 1970, he appeared on The Dick Cavett Show with other leaders Marty Robinson,[3][2] along with Dick Leitsch of the Mattachine Society, making them among the first openly gay activists to be prominently featured on a national TV program.[2]

Washington years

Withdrawing from Columbia in 1972,

The Advocate also published a column written by Evans on the political strategy of zapping.[3]

Years in San Francisco

When the Washington living experiment "failed," he and his companion moved to San Francisco,

pagan-inspired group was devoted to ritual play,[9] and later influenced the Radical Faeries.[9][8] Evans has described the group as bringing together "gay sensibility, neo-paganism, and a sheer Whitmanesque celebration of the body and of sex."[8] At 32 Page Street, an early San Francisco gay community center,[10] in early 1976 he gave a series of public "Faeries" lectures based on his research on the historical origins of the gay counterculture.[3]

In 1978 he published his recent research in Witchcraft and the Gay Counterculture: A Radical View of Western Civilization and Some of the People it Has Tried to Destroy,[11] which analyzed evidence that many people accused of "witchcraft" and "heresy" during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance were specifically persecuted for their sexuality and ancient pagan practices.[12][3] Published by the independent Boston imprint Fag Rag Books, the work considered, among other topics, early Celtic rituals and their connection with sexual traditions in gay culture.[13] Historian Rollan McCleary has referred to the book as an "influential cult classic."[14] Others have noted the book's cultural import, describing it "less a history of persecution than it is an invocational litany or an aggrieved magical treatise on the failures of patriarchal liberalism and industrial socialism to adequately recognize and protect the lives of gay people."[9] Witchcraft and the Gay Counterculture was "an apposite resource on the history of social oppression."[9] where Evans argues that magic is an "inherently collective activity, depending for its practice on group song, dance, sex and ecstasy."[9] A poem from the book was included on the 2014 album Why Do The Heathen Rage? by The Soft Pink Truth.[15] A planned re-release with the title The Lady Rises in the East[8] was eventually published with other collected materials under the title The Evans Symposium: Witchcraft and the Gay Counterculture and Moon Lady Rising in 2018.[16]

Among other groups, Evans was involved with the Bay Area Gay Liberation (BAGL) and the

Castro neighborhood, presaging the "Castro clone" moniker.[3] Against the "hyper-masculine Castro clone identity" drawing men in during the disco era, he continued his research into faeries and male involvement in Western spiritual traditions.[3]

Later writings and activism

With the onset of the

ACT UP/SF. He was once arrested while protesting the price-increases on AIDS drugs by pharmaceutical companies along with his friend Hank Wilson.[3]

He directed a 1984 production at the Valencia Rose Cabaret in San Francisco using his own translation of

Dionysos, patron of homosexuality.[3] The translation along with his commentary were published in New York by St. Martin's Press as The God of Ecstasy in 1988.[3]

He began work on a nine-year philosophy project in 1988.

physical science." Evans former doctoral advisor, Kristeller, called the book "a major contribution to the study of philosophy and its history."[3] He focused the book in part on the internal homophobia of gay thinker Ludwig Wittgenstein, and how Wittgenstein's conflicted attitude affected his thinking and logic.[17]

Personal life

He became romantically involved with Arthur Bell in 1964, and the two separated in 1971. He met Jacob Schraeter in 1972 and they spent two years homesteading together in Washington state. The two moved to San Francisco in 1974, and although Schraeter returned to New York in 1981, Evans remained at the apartment at the corner of Haight Ashbury for the remainder of his life.[3] Diagnosed with an aortic aneurysm in October 2010, Evans died in his Haight-Ashbury apartment of a massive heart attack on September 11, 2011. He was survived by his brother, Joe[2][12] and his best friend Naphtali Offen.[3]

Publications

  • 1978: Witchcraft and the Gay Counterculture[1]
  • 1988: The God of Ecstasy[3]
  • 1997: Critique of Patriarchal Reason[2]
  • 2018: The Evans Symposium: Witchcraft and the Gay Counterculture and Moon Lady Rising[18]

References

  1. ^ a b Tim Redmond (September 13, 2011). "Arthur Evans Dies - 69". San Francisco Bay Guardian. San Francisco, California, The United States. Retrieved February 22, 2018.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w Martin, Douglas (September 15, 2011). "Arthur Evans, Leader in Gay Rights Fight, Dies at 68". The New York Times. pp. A33. Retrieved September 25, 2011.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae af ag ah ai "Gay pioneer Arthur Evans dies". The Bay Area Reporter. San Francisco, California, United States. September 15, 2011. Retrieved August 14, 2021.
  4. ISBN 978-0964538412
    .
  5. Irish Times
    . September 24, 2011.
  6. ^ a b “No Income Tax For War!” archived at Horowitz Transaction Publishers Archive
  7. ^ a b c "Karen Ocomb, LGBTpov website entry on Evans (September 13, 2011)". Archived from the original on November 4, 2011. Retrieved September 14, 2011.
  8. ^ a b c d e Raj Ayyar. "Arthur Evans and the Politics of Celebration". Gay Today. Retrieved March 13, 2018.
  9. ^ a b c d e f Jamie Sutcliffe (February 15, 2017). "What We Do Is Secret: The relevance today of Arthur Evans's Witchcraft and the Gay Counterculture". Frieze. Retrieved July 22, 2019.
  10. ^ "Arthur Evans, gay pioneer".
  11. ISBN 9780915480012
    .
  12. ^ a b Douglas Martin (September 17, 2011). "Arthur Evans, at 68; was fervent activist for gay rights". The Boston Globe. Boston, Massachusetts, The United States. Retrieved February 22, 2018.
  13. ISBN 9780964538405
    .
  14. ISBN 9781904768548
    .
  15. ^ Evan Minsker (May 8, 2014). "The Soft Pink Truth (Matmos' Drew Daniel) Covers Black Metal With Antony, Wye Oak on New Album". Pitchfork. Retrieved March 14, 2018.
  16. ISBN 9781732284401
    .
  17. ^ Arthur Evans. "Gay Meaning". Moorish Orthodox Information Kiosk. Retrieved March 14, 2018.
  18. ^ "The Evans Symposium". White Crane Institute. December 4, 2018. Retrieved December 25, 2019.

Further reading

Archival sources

External links

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Arthur_Evans_(author)&oldid=1179778672"