Robert Ferro

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Robert Ferro (October 21, 1941 – July 11, 1988) was an American novelist whose semi-autobiographical fiction explored the uneasy integration of homosexuality and traditional American upper middle class values.

Biography

He was born in Cranford, New Jersey and graduated from Cranford High School.CHS 1957 yearbook http://www.digifind-it.com/cranford/DATA/yearbooks/1957.pdf; 2/23/1984 Cranford Chronicle. Cranford Remembered Fondly in a Novel by Robert Ferro He went to college at Rutgers University and received a Master's Degree from the University of Iowa. In late 1965 Ferro met Andrew Holleran at the Iowa Writer's Workshop.{{cite book|title=The violet quill reader : the emergence of gay writing after Stonewall|url=https://archive.org/details/violetquillreade00berg|url-access=registration|year=1994|publisher=St. Martin's|location=New York|isbn=0-312-11091-X}} He later lectured at Adelphi University.{{cite web |title=Robert Ferro, 46, Dies |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DEFDF1F30F931A25754C0A96E948260 |date=1988-07-12 |access-date=2007-08-08 |work=The New York Times}}

He was a member of The Violet Quill.{{cite web |url=http://www.glbtq.com/literature/ferro_r.html |title=Ferro, Robert (1941-1988) |last=Consoli |first=Joseph P. |year=2002 |work=glbtq.com |access-date=2007-08-08 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070814030912/http://www.glbtq.com/literature/ferro_r.html |archive-date=2007-08-14 |url-status=dead }}

He died of AIDS a few months after his partner, Michael Grumley, in 1988 at his father's home in Ho-Ho-Kus, New Jersey, age 46.[https://web.archive.org/web/20140728194049/http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/1988-07-13/news/8802100718_1_adelphi-university-homosexuality-robert-ferro Sun Sentinel, July 13, 1988] Grumley and Ferro are buried together under the Ferro-Grumley memorial in Rockland Cemetery, Sparkill, New York.

Following their deaths, the Ferro-Grumley Foundation, which manages their estate, created and endowed the annual Ferro-Grumley Award for LGBT fiction in conjunction with Publishing Triangle.

Themes

Robert Ferro's works are especially interested in the phenomena of homosexual integration into the traditional family. Love of family is a theme that appears in both The Family of Max Desir, and Second Son and reflects his traditional Italo-American sentiments.{{cite web|last=Consoli|first=Joseph P.|title=GLBTQ|url=http://www.glbtq.com/literature/ferro_r.html|work=Ferro, Robert (1941-1988)|access-date=February 27, 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120309155026/http://www.glbtq.com/literature/ferro_r.html|archive-date=2012-03-09|url-status=dead}}

In 1984, Ferro told the "Cranford Chronicle" that the town in his novel The Family of Max Desir was a fictionalized version of his hometown, Cranford, New Jersey. The novel's "Indian River" is meant to be the Rahway River and acts as "the heart of the town and the center of [the main character's] imagination." "Indian Park," host to a revived Victorian water carnival in "Desir," is a fictionalized version of the real-life Nomahegan Park on the Rahway River.1984 Chronicle interview; Encyclopedia of Contemporary LGBTQ Literature of the United States [2 volumes]

Books

{{cite book|title=The Others|year=1977|publisher=Scribner|isbn=0-684-15137-5}}
{{cite book|title=The Family of Max Desir|year=1983|publisher=Dutton|isbn=0-525-24197-3}}
{{cite book|title=The Blue Star|year=1985|publisher=Plume|isbn=0-452-25819-7|url=https://archive.org/details/bluestar00ferr}}
{{cite book|title=Second Son|year=1988|publisher=Crown|isbn=0-517-56815-2|url=https://archive.org/details/secondsonnovel00ferr}}

References

=Archival sources=

[http://hdl.handle.net/10079/fa/beinecke.ferro Robert Ferro papers, 1963-1988] (8.5 linear feet) are housed at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University.