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Mark Gerzon wrote A Choice of Heros in 1984, but I found it accidentally in 2008. I thought it was much more recent work, because it includes essays that sound like they could come from the pages of Esquire magazine, except they are even more daring and contemporary in their take on how today's man thinks and feels.
Gerzon's essays sound casual and told in an easy, conversational tone. Compared to other books in Men's/Masculinity Studies, this one is less of a Sociology textbook and more of a disclosure of secrets that he and other men in his life can finally reveal.
http://www.amazon.com/CHOICE-HEROES-92-Mark-Gerzon/dp/0395611520
The stories are best explained for what they are:
A member of his college Crew team they called Hulk because of his size suddenly disappeared from campus and years later found skinny and unhealthy-looking. What happened? He suffered from so much loneliness at school, apart from his girlfriend and family, that it physically changed him, and he never regained his strength.
A war veteran takes his sons to veteran support groups so they could hear real stories told by war survivors and make more informed decisions about enlisting.
They are brief essays that awaken a sensibility about real men today that confront tough experiences and then talk about them as a part of our history. Gerzon's stories are shameless because they are so honest and responsible to young men who need to access an example of that honesty.
I wish I could find more books like his. In the meantime, I will blog this month about men who have influenced my life with their stories.
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