The Memoir Land Author Questionnaire #47: Dale Corvino
"I’m obsessed with transportation and travel logistics, beyond what I need to do for my day job. I write about them too, often in the form of sexual travelogues."
Since 2010, in various publications, I’ve interviewed authors—mostly memoirists—about aspects of writing and publishing. Initially I did this for my own edification, as someone who was struggling to find the courage and support to write and publish my memoir. I’m still curious about other authors’ experiences, and I know many of you are, too. So, inspired by the popularity of The Oldster Magazine Questionnaire, I’ve launched The Memoir Land Author Questionnaire.
Here’s the 47th installment, featuring Dale Corvino, author of Afterlife of a Kept Boy: A Memoir. -Sari Botton
Dale Corvino’s essays have appeared in Salon, The Rumpus, and the Gay & Lesbian Review. BONDS & BOUNDARIES, his short story collection, was published in 2023. His memoir of sex work, AFTERLIFE OF A KEPT BOY, won the C&R Press Nonfiction Prize and is scheduled for publication on March 15th, 2025.
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How old are you, and for how long have you been writing?
I am 60 and I’ve been diary-keeping intermittently since the 80’s. I started reading excerpts from my sex worker diary entries at a literary salon under a pseudonym (my worker name) in the Naughts. This led to publishing opportunities and media appearances, all under that pseudonym. The first work published under my government name came out in 2013, and I’ve been publishing personal essays and short fiction since.
What’s the title of your latest book, and when was it published?
AFTERLIFE OF A KEPT BOY is due for release on March 15th, 2025.
What number book is this for you?
My first book was a collection of short stories published by Rebel Satori, a queer indy press out of New Orleans. The memoir is my second.
How do you categorize your book—as a memoir, memoir-in-essays, essay collection, creative nonfiction, graphic memoir, autofiction—and why?
Memoir. The first half is a fairly linear presentation of the decade I spent as the kept boy of a British society decorator. I think of the first part as being told in solar time— regular, relentless, like the fixated gaze of the decorator. The last half chronicles the aftermath and how I shed that kept boy label. It is less linear and more about phases in my afterlife, so I think of it as told in lunar time.
What is the “elevator pitch” for your book?
A sexually confused college kid is introduced to a British society decorator and is quickly entrapped in romantic obsession. In and out of custom suits, he grapples with being an object of longing and other perils. Through the Nineties, the boundaries between uptown’s social climbers and the East Village underground erode along with his own. After the decorator’s death, his secret history is revealed and our kept boy is released. His unkept life unfolds deep in the isolating routines of AOL chatrooms. Amidst the tear gas smoke of a massive populist uprising, he reunites with his chaotic college roommate who’d orchestrated his entrapment. Plunging into themes of personal agency and longing, reckoning with legacies both aesthetic and traumatic, Afterlife of a Kept Boy also casts a queer lens on the Gen X condition as analog children thrust into a digital context.
The first half is a fairly linear presentation of the decade I spent as the kept boy of a British society decorator. I think of the first part as being told in solar time— regular, relentless, like the fixated gaze of the decorator. The last half chronicles the aftermath and how I shed that kept boy label. It is less linear and more about phases in my afterlife, so I think of it as told in lunar time.
What’s the back story of this book including your origin story as a writer? How did you become a writer, and how did this book come to be?
Late at night, I used to read my sex worker diary entries over the phone to my friend Dean Johnson, who found them hilarious for their earnestness. He cajoled me into reading them at his salon, which featured queer writers like Eileen Myles and Edmund White mixed in with characters on the downtown scene. Ever since those appearances at “Reading for Filth,” I’ve been learning my craft, and figuring out how to tell this story. Many of my personal essays and short stories grapple with themes raised in this book. I learned to write in workshops, first in the peer-led writing labs led by The Red Umbrella Project, a sex worker advocacy organization, and later with queer writers Bruce Benderson,
, and (under Lambda Literary’s Emerging Fellows program). This book has been on the horizon all that time.
What were the hardest aspects of writing this book and getting it published?
I like deadlines. I’d just completed a draft of the memoir and wanted to do another pass through it for revisions, to hew it to the organizing notion that had emerged about the first half being solar and the last half being lunar. A press that I followed, C&R, had an upcoming deadline for their annual Nonfiction Prize. I made their submission deadline my deadline to get those revisions done, and hit the send button. I was floored when they sent me notification that I’d won the prize.
So in this case finding a publisher was not a struggle. What I did struggle with was whether or not to publish with a small press, having faced the challenges of getting a book into stores and getting media attention and reviews with my first title. What persuaded me to move forward with C&R Press was their unflagging enthusiasm. I think what matters, small or large press, is having fierce advocates for your work.
How did you handle writing about real people in your life? Did you use real or changed names and identifying details? Did you run passages or the whole book by people who appear in the narrative? Did you make changes they requested?
The antagonist of the story is called Andrés in the book. This is a pseudonym I used at the request of the person depicted. He is aware of his depiction as an instigator and a “chaos demon” as Saeed Jones put it and does not dispute it. In fact, I often relied on his memory and his personal record-keeping to fact-check. Other than that, I didn’t have to worry too much about name changes—most of the people depicted are now dead. I worried a bit about naming some known living figures, but the lawyers cleared it.
Late at night, I used to read my sex worker diary entries over the phone to my friend Dean Johnson, who found them hilarious for their earnestness. He cajoled me into reading them at his salon, which featured queer writers like Eileen Myles and Edmund White mixed in with characters on the downtown scene. Ever since those appearances at “Reading for Filth,” I’ve been learning my craft, and figuring out how to tell this story.
Who is another writer you took inspiration from in producing this book? Was it a specific book, or their whole body of work? (Can be more than one writer or book.)
I was once given an assignment to write a chapter for an academic textbook about representations of male sex work. In preparation, I read just about every novel, memoir, and bio featuring a male sex worker protagonist/subject of the modern era. None is more emotional and expansive than Bruce Benderson’s The Romanian. I then started reading memoirs by women workers. Whip Smart by Melissa Febos stood out to me as getting the insides and the outsides right at all times—meaning the action and the emotion, intertwined. In that respect it has served as a template.
What advice would you give to aspiring writers looking to publish a book like yours, who are maybe afraid, or intimidated by the process?
At a certain point you have to trust in your process which will surely be uniquely yours in some ways. Treasure those people in your life who genuinely believe in your work and advocate for you. Go where it’s warm.
What do you love about writing?
Writing is a must for me, not a desire. I need to get these stories out of me. What I’ve loved the most about having my work out in the world is honing my voice and connecting with listeners one-on-one after a reading.
What frustrates you about writing?
Today we have more people writing more words than ever, which is probably a blessing, but hits like a tsunami.
What about writing surprises you?
The leaps that the mind takes after ruminating on a topic.
Does your writing practice involve any kind of routine or writing at specific times?
I’m writing more intermittently at the moment because I have business of writing stuff on both front burners—edits and revisions, the dedication, cover art, media strategy, reviewers, awards, blurbs, etc. When I write every day, I write mostly in the afternoons, and sometimes on nocturnal tears. I have a job as a traveling salesman so I often write on the road. Trains, planes, commuter rails, subways, ferries, coffee shop stops, terminals, motel rooms.
I was once given an assignment to write a chapter for an academic textbook about representations of male sex work. In preparation, I read just about every novel, memoir, and bio featuring a male sex worker protagonist/subject of the modern era. None is more emotional and expansive than Bruce Benderson’s The Romanian. I then started reading memoirs by women workers. Whip Smart by Melissa Febos stood out to me as getting the insides and the outsides right at all times—meaning the action and the emotion, intertwined. In that respect it has served as a template.
Do you engage in any other creative pursuits, professionally or for fun? Are there non-writing activities do you consider to be “writing” or supportive of your process?
I’m obsessed with transportation and travel logistics, beyond what I need to do for my day job. I write about them too, often in the form of sexual travelogues.
What’s next for you? Do you have another book planned, or in the works?
A novel in gestational form. A trio of short stories about flight attendants. Some essays about the queer condition, analog and digital frictions, and cruising. One appears in the latest issue of Fruitslice .
I was just writing about this name change issue. How lucky your antagonist was so cooperative. I loved this line, "the Gen X condition as analog children thrust into a digital context."
Dean Johnson as in Dean and The Weenies? I loved Dean! Your book sounds fantastic. I look forward to reading it.