The Charioteer
About this book
After enduring an injury at Dunkirk during World War II, Laurie Odell is sent to a rural veterans' hospital in England to convalesce. There he befriends the young, bright Andrew, a conscientious objector serving as an orderly. As they find solace and companionship together in the idyllic surroundings of the hospital, their friendship blooms into a discreet, chaste romance. Then one day, Ralph Lanyon, a mentor from Laurie's schoolboy days, suddenly reappears in Laurie's life, and draws him into a tight-knit social circle of world-weary gay men. Laurie is forced to choose between the sweet ideals of innocence and the distinct pleasures of experience.
Originally published in the United States in 1959, **The Charioteer** is a bold, unapologetic portrayal of male homosexuality during World War II that stands with Gore Vidal's **The City and the Pillar** and Christopher Isherwood's **Berlin Stories** as a monumental work in gay literature.
Subjects
- conscientious objectors
- england, fiction
- fiction
- fiction, gay
- fiction, historical
- fiction, historical, general
- fiction, psychological
- fiction, romance, historical, general
- gay men
- gay men, fiction
- lgbtq fiction before stonewall
- veterans
- veterans' hospitals
- world war, 1939-1945
- world war (1939-1945) fast (ocolc)fst01180924 (uri) http://id.worldcat.org/fast/fst01180924
- world war, 1939-1945, fiction