Bertram Cope's Year

Welcome to Churchton, Illinois—a quiet college town where the tea is hot, the gossip is hotter, and the handsome young instructor everyone’s talking about is Bertram Cope.Polite, well-mannered, and impeccably dressed, Cope is the picture of early 20th-century respectability. But beneath his calm exterior lies a man navigating the affections, expectations, and entanglements of a social circle that simply refuses to leave him alone. Eager hostesses plot his romantic future, eccentric academics pull him into their schemes, and a trio of bright-eyed young women hover hopefully in his orbit. But Cope’s heart—and his truest companionship—seems to rest elsewhere, in the deep, unspoken bond he shares with his friend Arthur Lemoyne.First published in 1919, Bertram Cope’s Year is a witty, gently subversive comedy of manners that dared to imagine a queer protagonist not as tragedy, scandal, or moral lesson, but as a charming, complex young man simply living his life. Henry Blake Fuller, one of America’s earliest openly gay novelists, imbues this tale with sly humor, social satire, and a knowing wink to those who could read between the lines.Today, this long-overlooked gem reads as both a time capsule of Edwardian-era small-town life and a pioneering work of LGBTQ+ literature—quietly radical in its day, enduringly delightful in ours.Step into Bertram’s year. You may just find it’s the queerest, most charming year you’ve never read. Read more