Where to begin? The first time I met John? That was last June after he accepted some of my work for Ganymede. He kindly invited me to accompany him and Ryan Doyle May to the Noguchi museum and Socrates Sculpture Garden here in my neighborhood in Astoria/LIC. I remember the sculpture garden was like a swamp from all that rain we had last spring into the summer, and the thunderstorm we got caught in on our way to a diner afterward. John was full of stories and art world gossip, and full of plans for Ganymede and genuinely baffled over why more journals and writers didn’t go the POD route given the low overhead involved. I saw John next at the July Wilde Boys gathering I hosted at my place where I remember him quickly wanting to accept, on the spot, a poem my friend Saeed had been working on and read for us. I think he’s been to many of the Wilde Boys salons since and has published many of the poets who frequent those gatherings in the pages of Ganymede, along with other fabulous up-and-coming queer writers here in NYC and around the country, such as my friend RJ Gibson, John’s “big discovery” who he bumped up from issue 6 to issue 5, John was so excited about his work and the buzz around RJ.
But then the last time I saw John? That was in February when he invited me to dinner with Lawrence Schimel and Eric Norris at a diner in Chelsea. I remember him being very generous this way, introducing writers to each other, creating connections and community. He introduced me to Jee Leong Koh’s work, amongst others. And the last time I heard from John? Twice in March, the first an invite to attend the Whitney Biennial with him and Eric, which I had to decline as my boyfriend was in town and we had plans. The second was an inquiry over a good chapbook review service or an award program for chapbooks since Lambda Lit doesn’t have a chapbook category. And then evidently sometime in April he died of a heart attack alone in his apartment.
I heard the news this past week from a mutual family friend, Robert C. Neville (“Bob”), Professor of Philosophy, Religion, and Theology at BU. Bob officiated at my sister’s wedding two years ago and had taught my brother-in-law, Ben, at BU. He taught John, too, many years earlier at Fordham, and John had worked on art projects with Bob’s wife Beth over the years. They last saw him in December. Bob also taught John’s niece, Rachel, a conservative Christian minister in NJ, and he has put me in touch with her. It appears Rachel is in charge of organizing a memorial service in NYC for John at some point, maybe in the fall since many people are mobile during the summer. I’ve reached out to Rachel but haven’t heard anything yet. I was going to wait to post this until I heard more from the family, but figured I’d post what I know and update more later.
And what will become of Ganymede? As I mentioned, John was very generous promoting up-and-coming writers alongside the established through the journal and its companion anthologies, so it will be sad to see that end. As far as I know, he was a one-man operation. In this electronic, online age, what becomes of blog spaces and facebook profiles and POD presses when their owners/founders die? I’m sitting here going through my gmail folder for John, looking at the pdfs from the issues he sent me, in particular that “rants” one from the first issue, about MoMA and Almodóvar (two loves of mine), written under one of his pen names, Julian Grenfell (an interesting choice, as the real Julian Grenfell was a British soldier and poet of WWI).
As I hear more news, I will post updates, especially if I hear anything more about a memorial. I’m sure many of us would like to pay our respects.
UPDATE: Bryan Borland and Philip Clark helped put together a tribute site to John where we can leave our stories, memories, etc. You can access the site here.
Matthew,
Thank you for posting this. I had no idea that John had died. I only knew him through email and through him publishing my poems in Ganymede. This is very sad news. He contributed so much to the gay poetry scene with Ganymede. Again, I appreciate you passing on the word.
I am devastated. John was the first to publish me. John designed my first book, and through that process taught me everything I know about publishing. I’ve been worried about John for weeks. It wasn’t like him not to respond to emails. I asked friends, but no one knew.
We were supposed to meet at the Rainbow Book Fair in March, but he had to cancel because he was sick. We promised to meet for dinner the next time I visited New York.
I would not have a book if it were not for John. He was so gentle in the way he taught me. Opinionated, yes. But gentle. I would not have developed the confidence in myself without John publishing that first poem in Ganymede. I already miss him terribly.
Thank you for posting this, Matthew.
On a side note, I know he designed Ganymede months in advance of the publication date. I have a section that was to be included in the June issue. I am certain others received their advance layouts. As a tribute to John, perhaps we could collect these layouts and create something in his honor? What would John have wanted us to do?
I’ve been thinking the last couple of days what we’ve lost with John’s passing. His enthusiasm for our work, his championing of new and emerging poets were always clear to me in our email exchanges. It’s easy enough to provide a venue for work, but it’s impossible to replace that true-believer zeal and passion. He was a better than good friend to my poems, and I’ll always be grateful for that. There are a lot of things I find myself wishing now, but what I hope most is that John had even the slightest inkling how much he was appreciated and how necessary he was.
Bryan, perhaps if we can get all the contributors for the remaining issue(s) together, we could make the last issue a tribute issue to John? If everyone has their pdf sections, they could be assembled. I wish we had access to the template for the cover and a working table of contents to know who all is in it and how John was organizing it. But we could approximate. It sounds like he taught you about layout and design, so if you’re up for it, I say why not?
We could also start a blog page where people could start recording their memories and stories of John.
John sent me two sections that were to appear in forthcoming issues, one with poems from the book he designed for me, and another he was very proud of entitled “Gay at Eton: Digby Mackworth Dolben,” which fittingly opens with the lines, ‘…and the angels, as they passed, / whispered to me, “Loved at last.”’
If we put out a call for the layouts he prepared, I’m sure we could assemble a fitting tribute for John.
We now have a tribute site for John. You can leave your stories, etc., here: http://rememberingjohnstahle.com/