JOHN ARTHUR SWEET

Monologist. Spoken word poet. Writer. Editor. Translator. Queer guy.

Screenshot of me performing my monologue My Fabulous Career as a Heterosexual for the Barnstaple Fringe online, June 2021.

NEWS:

September 25, 2021:  I see it's been almost a year since I've reviewed a book! It's been all films and plays since October 2020. Maybe the pandemic has made me reluctant to commit to a novel? I have read some novels in the past year, but they weren't LGBTQ (including that awful novel by Dickens, The Old Curiosity Shop). Anyway, I've got a new review of a novel by Christopher Isherwood that was first published in the year of my birth. Also, a review of a fairly recent (by my standards) Israeli film.

August 20, 2021:  I've been in a documentary mood recently, and re-watched two docs that I saw years ago and which had stuck with me: We Were Here and The Celluloid Closet. And a sweet gay play. 

June 30, 2021: As Pride Month draws to a close, I've been busily watching LGBT documentaries and read a gay play (with another review of a quasi-gay play). 

May 9, 2021: I've posted a few more reviews: a controversial gay play, an erotic Portuguese film, and a documentary about drag. The rhythm of my reviews has been slow of late, due to pandemic lassitude and work, but I've got a little pile of stuff to read/watch over the pandemic spring/summer.

May 4, 2021: As someone who believes passionately in the value and role of art, why have I not been missing the live performing arts all that much during the pandemic? Some thoughts.

January 28, 2021: Bonne Année à tous! Watched two American independent films currently streaming on Netflix, one a coming-out film, the other more of a going-back-in-the-closet film: Edge of Seventeen and I Am Michael.

December 20, 2020: Reviews of two recent French films, both portraying teenagers in love, both good, one of them a gem: Été 85 (or, if you must, Summer of 85) and I Am Jonas. Merry Christmas to all! Joyeuses Fêtes!

November 16, 2020: I read Hanya Yanagihara's looooong novel A Little Life. Find out why I find it astonishing that it's been called the Great Gay Novel here. And a couple of new movie reviews: the new Netflix version of The Boys in the Band and an old British film, Victim.

November 4, 2020: Review of Matthew Lopez's The Inheritance. Is this THE great gay play?

November 2, 2020: Since there's no theatre happening these days, I wrote a little piece of theatre, about theatre; it's here. It's in the same form as a piece I recently wrote for the Quebec Writers' Federation, which can be found here.