What is the cause and drive of the impulse to create art? What happens to an individual gifted with talent, but finds himself thwarted? Does that creative spark become some kind of death wish? These are the questions Sky Gilbert explores in The Blue House.

Taking the form of a memoir, the novel relates the story of Rupert Goldmann, a cello virtuoso by the age of twelve, who becomes a composer, and whose life collapses into depression and possible madness when no orchestra will perform his symphonies. Rupert’s musical life includes years of lessons from the great pianist Vladimir Horowitz, who flirts awkwardly and ineffectually with Rupert, and a full-fledged romance with the celebrity composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein.

But as his life narrows, Rupert finds himself immersed in dreams and fantasies, which are interrupted by a superficial and talentless gay rights activist and theatre director, and Simon Reycraft, an early explorer of artificial intelligence, who offers the suicidal Goldmann a legacy of computer-generated music ― posing a significant question for our times: can art be created by a machine, technology without a soul?

Sky Gilbert is a writer, director, and drag queen extraordinaire. He was co-founder and artistic director of Buddies in Bad Times Theatre (North Americaâ??s largest gay and lesbian theatre) for 18 years. His hit plays include The Dressing Gown, Drag Queens on Trial, Play Murder, The Emotionalists, and the Dora Mavor Moore Award-winning The Whoreâ??s Revenge. His first three novels: Guilty (1998), St. Stephenâ??s, (1999) and I Am Kasper Klotz (2001) were critically acclaimed. ECW Press published Skyâ??s first collection of poetry, Digressions of a Naked Party Girl, in 1998, and his theatre memoir, Ejaculations from the Charm Factory, in 2000. His second book of collected poems, Temptations for a Juvenile Delinquent, was published by ECW in 2003. He was recently the recipient of the Margo Bindhardt Award (from the Toronto Arts Foundation), the Silver Ticket Award (from the Toronto Alliance for the Performing Arts), and the ReLit Award (for his fourth novel, An English Gentleman), and also recently received a PhD from the University of Toronto. By day, Sky holds a University Research Chair in Drama and Creative Writing at the University of Guelph.

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