When I bought the first version of this book, called A Couple of Friends, back in '96 or '97, I didn't even know any gay people personally, and it came out well before the TV show about such relationships. I bought it because of my interest in learning more about gays since a singer I like is gay. I found it a very easy-to-read and insightful book, but it soon started collecting dust on my bookshelf for a few years.About two years ago, purely by accident, I developed a close friendship with a gay man. When I discovered I still had the book this summer and re-read it, I was amazed about how closely the relationship between my friend and I gibed with what was in the book.
So, I wondered if my buddy had even heard of the book, and I thought it'd be a good idea if I gave it to him for Christmas! Well, I discovered to my disgust that they had changed the name, and therefore the focus of the book. Inside, it's more or less the same. Almost to be expected, there are new references to the sitcom Will and Grace, but that wasn't what bothered me about it. What bothered me was that the title they gave the revised version of the book focused on, I believe, the wrong aspect of these unique relationships. The old title, A Couple of Friends, focused on the friendship. In fact, the subtitle was,The Remarkable Friendship Between Straight Women and Gay Men. Friends in huge letters in the title, friends in the subtitle. And that's what my buddy and I have. We're just a couple of friends, and we do indeed have a remarkable friendship.
Compare that with the new title. Big letters: Straight Women, Gay Men. As if that's the most important thing about the relationship! Then, in little bitty letters: Absolutely Fabulous Friendships. Almost absolutely inconsequential.
I think this is wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. The whole point of the first book is that my orientation and his orientation (or for that matter, our races) don't matter between us. Even though they are the inescapable components in our lives and help shape how we relate to our worlds, our friendship comes FIRST.
So, I bought it, because I want my buddy to read what it has to say about us and other friendships like ours. I hope he likes it. I know for SURE that he'll have his own outspoken opinion about it either way! But I'm also tempted to find an older copy with the original title and picture, because I believe it was a little more to the point than this supposedly "updated" revision.
I hope that one day the publisher will realize that what we have as friends isn't to be trivialized for the sake of attention-grabbing commercialism (Straight Women! Gay Men! Oh, No!!), and will restore future revisions to the more appropriate emphasis on men and women who live in two different worlds and yet are the very best of friends.
