Monette, Paul

Biography

Paul Landry Monette was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts, on October 16, 1945; BA, English, Yale, 1967; taught at Cheshire Academy, Connecticut, 1968-70; taught at Milton Academy, Massachusetts, and Pine Manor College, 1970-76; published first book of poetry, The Looker-on: Fra Angelico, Crucifixion, About 1450 (1973); met Roger Horwitz in 1974 and the two of them moved to Los Angeles, California, 1977; writings include Carpenter at the Asylum (1975), Taking Care of Mrs. Carroll (1978), The Gold Diggers (1979), Long Shot (1981), and No Witnesses (1981); after Horwitz's death in 1986, Monette wrote Love Alone: 18 Elegies for Rog (1988), Borrowed Time: an AIDS Memoir (1988), Afterlife (1990), and Halfway Home (1991); Monette's work, Borrowed Time: an AIDS Memoir, was nominated as best biography for the National Book Critics' Circle Award; Monette wrote of his struggle for identity as a gay man in his book, Becoming a Man: Half a Life Story (1992), which won the National Book Award for nonfiction in 1992; final publications include Last Watch of the Night (1994) and West of Yesterday, East of Summer (1994); he was diagnosed as HIV-positive in 1990 and died of complications from AIDS on February 10, 1995.

Biographical Note

Several printed obituaries and appreciations have been collected in Special Collections URL and can be found in the papers. Major critical overviews include those in Contemporary Authors: A Bio-Bibliographical Guide to Current Writers in Fiction, General Nonfiction, Poetry, Journalism, Drama, Motion Pictures, Television, and Other Fields vol. 139, edited by Donna Olendorf. Detroit, Washington, D.C., London: Gale Research Incorporated, [1993], Gay & Lesbian Literature, edited by Sharon Malinowski. Detroit and London: St. James Press, [1994], and Paul Monette, by David Roman, in Contemporary Gay American Novelists: A Bio-bibliographical Critical Sourcebook, edited by Emmanuel S. Nelson, Westport, Connecticut: Greenwod Press, 1994.

A Chronology of Paul Monette

By Paula Zeszotarski

• October 16, 1945: Paul Landry Monette born in Lawrence, Massachusetts
• 1951: Brother Robert Monette born
• 1963: Graduated from Phillips Andover Academy
• September 1963: Entered Yale University as a member of Jonathan Edwards College
• Summer 1966: On scholarship to Cambridge University to work on senior thesis and travel in Europe
• 1967: Graduated from Yale University with Bachelor of Arts in English
• September 1967 - June 1968 : Spent year on Carnegie Teaching Fellowship at Yale
• November 1968 - June 1970 : Taught at Cheshire Academy, Cheshire, Connecticut
• September 1970 - 1976 : Taught at Milton Academy, Milton, Massachusetts and Pine Manor College and lived in Boston
• 1973: First book of poetry published, The Looker-On: Fra Angelico, Crucifixion, about 1450
• September 4, 1974: Met Roger Horwitz
• 1975: Carpenter at the Asylum published
• November 1977: Moved with Roger to Los Angeles
• 1978: First novel published, Taking Care of Mrs. Carroll
• 1979: Gold Diggers published
• 1981: Long Shot published
• 1981: No Witnesses published
• 1983: First novelization published, Scarface
• November 29, 1984: Receives City of West Hollywood Certificate of Commendation
• October 22, 1986: Roger Horwitz dies
• 1988: Love Alone: 18 Elegies for Rog published
• 1988: Borrowed Time published
• 1989: Borrowed Time nominated for National Book Critic's Circle Award
• 1990: Afterlife published
• February 22, 1990: PM's mother dies
• September 19 1990: Stephen Kolzak dies
• 1990(?): Met Winston Wilde
• 1991: Halfway Home published
• 1992: Becoming a Man published
• 1992*: Won National Book [Critic's Circle] Award for Becoming a Man* the award was for 1992 but was given in 1993
• June 1994: Last Watch of the Night published
• July 1994: West of Yesterday, East of Summer published
• February 10 1995: PM dies of complications from AIDS

From the guide to the Paul Monette papers, 1945-1995, (University of California, Los Angeles. Library. Department of Special Collections.)