"From Quentin Crisp
cavorting with US marines in 'The Naked Civil Servant' to Jean Genet, Fassbinder and
'Querelle', a celebration of sailors has long been a part of gay culture. But very rarely
has it been the subject of serious study. Here at last is the book that puts all that to
rights. Thoroughly-researched and engagingly written, 'Hello Sailor' looks beyond the
butch, bell-bottomed image and explores the real meaning of gay life for sea-faring men."
Paul Burston, TimeOut
"Innovative, revealing
and brave, this book peers through previously forbidden portholes and unravels a neglected
strand of British history. It tells many fascinating stories of lives lived against the
odds..."
Andy Medhurst, University of Sussex
"...meticulously
researched, cogently argued work of high scholarship...producing an endlessly fascinating
and finely nuanced examination of the culture and mores of homosexuality afloat...This
book is greatly to be commended."
Dr Campbell McMurray OBE, Director, Royal Naval Museum
When gays had to be
closeted, ships were the only places where homosexual men could not only be out but also
camp. And on some liners to the sun and the New World, queens and butches had a ball. They
sashayed and minced their way across the world's oceans.
Never before has the story
been told of the masses. These are the thousands of queer seafarers, mainly stewards, who
sometimes even outnumbered the straight men in the catering departments of ships that were
household names and the pride of the British fleet. Hello Sailor! uniquely shows
what it was like to be queer at sea at a time when land meant straightness.
257 pages