A Quiet Foghorn: More Notes from a Deaf Gay Life

How does one find a true family? In this collection of essays, Raymond Luczak once again offers readers powerful and deeply personal reflections on his experiences as a Deaf gay man. He begins his journey with the printed word where lipreading is not required, and discovers a family of sorts through the writings of Walt…

publishing date

genre

Nonfiction

isbn

9781954622111

pages

176

publisher

Gallaudet University Press

Against a vignette-style blue background, a photo of a foghorn from below. It is centered and angled so that the slightly arched title text at the top of the cover resembles sound waves emerging from the horn. The title reads, A Quiet Foghorn, with the letters in the words a quiet in different pastel colors: yellow, green, blue, purple, orange, and red; the word foghorn in white. Smaller black text is the subtitle: more notes from a deaf gay life. At the bottom is the author’s name in white: Raymond Luczak.

Description

A QUIET FOGHORN: more notes from a deaf gay life (trailer)

How does one find a true family?

In this collection of essays, Raymond Luczak once again offers readers powerful and deeply personal reflections on his experiences as a Deaf gay man. He begins his journey with the printed word where lipreading is not required, and discovers a family of sorts through the writings of Walt Whitman and others; he ventures deeper into the queer community with thoughts on ageism, disability, and radical faeries. Luczak explores the many nuances within the Deaf community and the audist attitudes of hearing people, particularly in the media, and takes a detour into ASL gloss poetry. He speculates on what the Deaf community will look like a century from now and ends with a long bike ride that celebrates the ongoing questions of being a Deaf gay man.

Reviews

A must-read book that gives a poignant, sometimes funny, and always fascinating insight into the life of a Deaf gay man. With a clear voice, Raymond Luczak provides a deeply personal account of the joys, sorrows, and insights that come from his fascinating life experience.

Lennard J. Davis, My Sense of Silence: Memoirs of a Childhood with Deafness

This exuberant, highly readable collection opens Luczak’s world—both his personal world and his broader worlds as a Deaf gay man, a writer, a creative, and a member of interlinked communities—and invites us to share in celebrating the beauty of his life. These essays speak to me of radical joy, which is a rare, transcendent, and sustaining quality that we as readers need now.

Kelly Davio, It’s Just Nerves: Notes on a Disability

With A Quiet Foghorn, Raymond Luczak again provides us with the life-sustaining exploration of Deaf and queer life that has characterized all his work. This is a book about the importance of connecting with others, pushing through loneliness and fear to the joy that comes from discovering and sustaining community.

Robert McRuer, Crip Theory: Cultural Signs of Queerness and Disability
Skip to content