This is a rare unread vintage and out of print copy of The Gay Book of Days: An Evocatively Illustrated Who's Who of Who Is, Was, May Have Been, Probably Was, and Almost Certainly Seems to Have Been Gay During the Past 5000 Years, by Martin Greif (Author) and published and distributed by Lyle Stuart / Carol Publishing in 1989 featuring lists of the various homosexual authors, composers, actors, artists, royalty, and figures from history, who were born on each day of the year. This 224 page HARDCOVER book and dust jacket measures 8.5 x 0.75 x 11 inches. IT IS UNREAD BUT see shelf damage to dust jacket. See photos for condition.

There's never been a book quite like this one. There are lots of Books of This and Books of That - Books of Hours, of Kells, of Martyrs-but The Gay Book of Days is not like any of them. It is rowdy, rambunctious, and racy. It is sprightly and gay- both in the modern usage of that second word, and in the "merrie" sense of jollity and wit. It is an astonishing collection of fact and lore about hundreds of world-famous men and women who are, were, may have been, or were thought to have been homosexual during the past 5,000 years.

Who would ever imagine that the Danish tenor Lauritz Melchior was actually the personal Great Dane of writer Hugh Walpole? Or that Melchior and poet Hart Crane owned common stock in a well-proportioned sailor?
That Cole Porter and Jackie O's daddy were once an item? That both Winston Churchill and Marilyn Monroe strayed occasionally from the straight and narrow? Or that the saintly inventor of the American dream, Horatio Alger, wore his wickedness like a sulfurous halo? You'll find them all here, their peccadilloes and fetishes and hangups and pleasures.

The Gay Book of Days uses humor to make a very serious point: that gayness has always been a natural condition of kings, composers, engineers, poets, housewives, and bus drivers-that it is, has been, and always will be a vital part of the human experience.
Read this unique book any way you want - an entry a day or from cover to cover - but read it. Its provocative treatment of a controversial subject will leave you helpless with laughter, shock, or outrage. Whatever your response, you'll find reading The Gay Book of Days very much like eating salted peanuts.

Illustrations on jacket: (front, left to right) Sir Philip Sidney, Sidonie Colette, Casey Donovan; (rear, left to right) King Edward II and Piers Gaveston, George Sand, Ramon Novarro.

Due to recent delivery issues with the USPS I now ship all items via Priority Mail. $100 of insurance is included in this price. I’m selling my collection of vintage 1960-1980s gay pulp paperback novels, pictorial & hardcore magazines, physique photography, magazines & artwork.