Out Writer and Publisher Felice Picano Dies at the Age of 81, Leaves a Rich Literary Legacy

Openly gay writer and publisher Felice Picano has died at the age of 81, the New York Times reported. He leaves behind a literary legacy that includes his own novels and memoirs, as well as the works of other gay writers he championed.

"Felice Anthony Picano was born on Feb. 22, 1944, in Queens, the third of four children in what he described as "a middle-class Italian American family," the Times detailed.

As a young writer, Picano "took a job at Rizzoli, the high-class bookstore on Fifth Avenue and 56th Street, where his customers included Salvador Dalí, Jerome Robbins, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Gregory Peck, Elton John, Mick Jagger and S.J. Perelman," the Times said.

"After leaving work, he would often write all night."

His output included work for magazines such as Blue Boy, The Harvard Gay & Lesbian Review, Christopher Street, and The Advocate, among other publications, the writeup detailed.

Among the literary work helped usher into print: "Torch Song Trilogy" by Harvey Fierstein, and books by Dennis Cooper.

Of his own work, Picano "published 17 novels and eight volumes of memoirs," the Times reported.

Picano, the obituary noted, "was a member of the Violet Quill, a group of seven gay male writers who met regularly in Manhattan and on Fire Island in the early 1980s to discuss their works in progress, at a time when gay literature was just entering the mainstream."

"Two Violet Quill members, both best-selling authors, survive him: Andrew Holleran ('Dancer From the Dance') and Edmund White ('A Boy's Own Story')."

The obituary went on to note that "Of his fellow Violet Quill members, Mr. Picano wrote in an email last month: 'We shared the hope that one day any lesbian or gay teenager could go into any bookstore or library and get a book about his or her own kind.'"

"Our dream has come true!" the email said, according to the Times.

Picano's first books did not include gay themes, but then he wrote "The Lure," a thriller set in a gay demimonde but featuring a heterosexual law enforcement officer who poses as gay as part of a homicide investigation. After that, he wrote "Like People in History," a novel about two queer cousins, which – he later said – was based on his own life.

"He established Sea Horse Press in 1977 to publish the work of other gay writers," the Times detailed. "In 1981, he teamed up with two other publishers to form Gay Presses of New York. Together, he said, the presses lasted 18 years and published 78 books (including three of his own)."

Author Brad Gooch, whose work was published by Picano, told the Times that Picano "was a literary matchmaker who helped create an audience for our work."

"In various memoirs, he described encounters with the authors Gore Vidal and Edward Gorey, the poet W.H. Auden, the photographer Robert Mapplethorpe and the actor Anthony Perkins," the Times article said.

"His partner for 15 years, Robert Allen Lowe, a lawyer, succumbed to AIDS-related illnesses in 1991."