Arthur Bell papers

1966-1984

Arthur Bell (1939-1984) was a writer, journalist, and gay rights activist who lived in New York City. Bell was born in Brooklyn to Samuel Bell, a manufacturer of children's clothing, and, Claire Bodan Bell, a designer. When Bell was in junior high school the family moved to Montreal. Bell returned to New York City in 1960 and found a job writing jacket copy for children's books. He soon became director of publicity for children's books at Viking Press, later leaving Viking Press to work at Random House. Joining the struggle for gay rights, he was one of the twelve founders of the Gay Activists Alliance in 1969 and served for a time as chairman of its publicity committee, often using the pseudonym 'Arthur Irving.'

In 1970, he left Random House to write full time, after accepting an offer by Simon & Schuster to write a book about his experiences in the gay liberation movement. This book, Dancing the Gay Lib Blues: A Year in the Gay Liberation Movement, was published the next year and at the same time, Bell ceased his activities with the Gay Activists Alliance. Throughout the 1970s, Bell wrote consistently for both the gay and mainstream press including Esquire, Gay, the New York Times, and Playboy. Bell wrote a bi-weekly column for Gay Power and a weekly column called "Bell Tells" for the Village Voice. This column had a broad scope and covered opening and closings of restaurants and galleries, reports on gay issues, and celebrity and society gossip. Bell was known for his lively, highly personalized, almost novelistic style in his writing which he proposed as an alternative to what he regarded as a lackluster journalism then in use.

Bell interest in crime reporting was initiated by an Esquire piece he wrote on the mass murders in Houston, and he started writing articles on crimes against gay men in New York City, particularly the attacks and murders that would occur at, and around, bars, bathhouses, and other gay meeting places. While many people appreciated the light Bell's reporting shed on this issue, many readers thought Bell's articles were sensationalist and negatively depicted gay life. Bell was often seen as a polarizing figure in the gay community. In 1978, Bell published Kings Don't Mean a Thing: The John Knight Murder Case about the murder of a newspaper heir in Philadelphia. Parts of Bell's articles inspired the film Cruising, though Bell protested the film's interpretation of gay culture and that it was shot in the East Village.

In 1964, Bell met gay rights advocate and author Arthur Evans and the two had a relationship until 1971. The character of Arthur Klang in The West Side Gang is based off of Bell. Bell died in 1984 from complications related to diabetes, a disease he struggled with throughout his adult life.