Anne Rice’s Homoerotic Vampires and Gay Culture

One thing Anne Rice never did was appropriate gay men or gay culture. She wrote characters with a homoerotic twist that didn’t always cross the line…but were close to crossing the line. I remember the first time I read her book, Interview with the Vampire, I was shocked at the homoerotic characters because I’d never seen anything like that before in mainstream fiction. I couldn’t put the book down. And I know I’m not the only one. I’ve had many discussions with gay men over the years about this. 

With that said, Rice did leave an impression on gay culture as well. 

While the book failed to impress critics, it became an immediate commercial success, in large part because of its popularity among gay readers. The novel centers on vampires Louis and Lestat. Louis tells a young reporter, whom he meets in a dark San Francisco bar, about immortal life alongside his sinister and seductive maker, Lestat.

Here’s more. At the time, no one else in the mainstream was doing anything like this. And Interview with the Vampire is not what I would call gay fiction or gay paranormal. The books are all still very hetero, but with that homoerotic twist. 

Rice also did some erotic romance under the pen name, Anne Rampling A. N. Roquelaure, which I think are worth checking out. 

The Wizard of Pride

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