HIS69-410 Behind the Man
Behind the Man
HIS69
HIS69-410
Todd Roberts
$2.95
Behind the Man
HIS69
HIS69-410
Todd Roberts
$2.95
FOREWORD
Nick Conrad, the narrator of Todd Roberts’ novel, is a man in search of his identity as a homosexual. His chance encounter with another man, Vance Bigger, leads him to question his own values and motivations to such an extent that he feels he has lost them. In order to understand himself, he embarks on a quest to discover what lies at the center of another man’s being; there, he thinks, will be the clues to his own private riddle.
Conrad’s obsession with Bigger’s life is, in fact, an obsession to know himself, to discover his own life. He tells us that “Vance Bigger’s story is so much a part of mine that I can no longer separate them.” His quest leads him through the nighttime World of leather bars and casual sex until, at the novel’s climax, Conrad comes face to face with Bigger and with himself.
As the subject of this book is frankly homosexual, Mr. Roberts has dealt explicitly with the sexuality of his characters. This is not for mere sensationalism; it is, rather, the most honest method that the writer can use to explore the depths of his subject. As readers, we must understand the sexualities of Conrad and Bigger in order that we grasp the significance of the book’s aims, to explore the experiences of a man on the road to self-knowledge.
Western society kept all forms of sexuality so firmly under lock and key, that our age is still amazed by the varieties of sexual experience; we are beginning to realize that there are as many forms of sexuality as there are human beings. The more we come to understand how different are our individual natures however, the closer we come to the realization that, despite all differences, we are all united as human beings because of our uniqueness. When we look into the lives of others, we discover that there can be self revelations in the experiences of those who lead lives utterly separate from our own.
Mr. Roberts makes no apologies for his characters or the way they live. He has done what every writer must: he has written a frank depiction of the world he knows and he has been honest in his dealings with his characters. If the reader approaches that world with an open mind, he may discover that Conrad’s quest is his own; at the core of all of us is the burning wish to know and understand ourselves. Todd Roberts’ characters expound the writer’s belief that we can only come to that knowledge through the understanding of others.
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