THE SEXUAL OUTLAW: A Documentary

The principal element in Rechy's nonfiction documentary is a series of explicit homosexual encounters in Los Angeles by the author's persona ""Jim."" He is a hustler, who needs the payment he gets to prove to himself that he is desirable. When he is in the mood, he also has sex without charge with men he finds attractive. Promiscuity is essential to his psychological purposes; love is radically eliminated. This portrait of a hustler as existential outlaw--and narcissist--is a development of the one Rechy gave in City of the Aright, more complex (and raw) this time and influenced by the rise of the gay liberation movement. To Rechy, casual sex in the streets is a revolutionary act expressing the rage of a persecuted minority. He argues on behalf of that minority and also against the sado-masochistic trend within the homosexual world, which he believes represents self-hatred caused by heterosexual oppression. The book opens to view a complicated human being, beset by contradictions, some of which he is aware of, who is living at an extreme compounded of numbness and feeling.