Maupin was born in Washington, D.C., to Diana Jane (Barton) and Armistead Jones Maupin.[1] His great-great-grandfather, Congressman Lawrence O'Bryan Branch, was from North Carolina and was a railroad executive and a Confederate general during the American Civil War.[6] His father, Armistead Jones Maupin, founded Maupin, Taylor & Ellis, one of the largest law firms in North Carolina.[7] Maupin was raised in Raleigh.[8]
Maupin worked at WRAL-TV in Raleigh, a station managed by future U.S. Senator Jesse Helms. Helms nominated Maupin for a patriotic award, which Maupin won. Maupin said he was a typical conservative and segregationist at this time and admired Helms as a hero figure. Maupin later changed his opinion and condemned Helms at a gay pride parade on the steps of the North Carolina State Capitol.[8][11][10] Maupin is a veteran of the U.S. Navy and served several tours of duty including one in the Vietnam War.[12]
Maupin worked at a Charleston newspaper and the San Francisco bureau of the Associated Press in 1971.[13][14] In 1974, he began what would become the Tales of the City series as a serial in a Marin County-based newspaper, the Pacific Sun, moving to the San Francisco Chronicle after the Sun's San Francisco edition folded.[15]
In 1978, Maupin publicly accused San Francisco Police Inspector Dave Toschi of faking one of the Zodiac Killer's taunting letters to the media, seriously and irreparably damaging Toschi's career and reputation. Maupin claimed to have noticed a similarity between anonymous fan mail Toschi had sent him after Maupin based one of his Tales of the City characters on him, and a Zodiac letter received by the San Francisco Chronicle on April 24, 1978. Although the USPS crime lab cleared Toschi of being the Zodiac letter's author, Toschi admitted to writing the fan mail and was removed from the case, destroying his chances of succeeding Charles Gain as chief of the San Francisco PD.[16] The incident is portrayed in the 2007 David Fincher film Zodiac.
Tales of the City is a series of novels, the first portions of which were published initially as a newspaper serial starting on August 8, 1974, in a Marin County newspaper, The Pacific Sun, picked up in 1976 by the San Francisco Chronicle, and later reworked into the series of books published by HarperCollins (then Harper and Row). The first of Maupin's novels, entitled Tales of the City, was published in 1978. Five more followed in the 1980s, ending with the last book, Sure of You, in 1989.[15]
A seventh novel published in 2007, Michael Tolliver Lives, continues the story of some of the characters. It was followed by an eighth volume, Mary Ann in Autumn, published in 2010 and a ninth volume, The Days of Anna Madrigal, in 2014.[17]InBabycakes, published in 1984, Maupin was one of the first writers to address the subject of AIDS.[18] Of the autobiographical nature of the characters, he says "I've always been all of the characters in one way or another."[19]
The Tales of the City books have been translated into ten languages, and there are more than six million copies in print. Several of the books have been adapted and broadcast on BBC Radio 4.[20]
The first three books in the series have also been adapted into three television miniseries starring Olympia Dukakis and Laura Linney. A co-production with the UK's Channel 4, the first miniseries was on PBS; subsequent miniseries appeared on Showtime.[21] Dukakis, Linney, and various other cast members from the original series, reunited for the 2019 Tales miniseries on Netflix which was not based directly on one of Maupin's novels but used elements from several, including the latter three.
He collaborated on Anna Madrigal Remembers, a musical work written by Jake Heggie and performed by choir Chanticleer and mezzo-sopranoFrederica von Stade on August 6, 1999, for which Maupin provided a new libretto. He also participated in a concert series with the Seattle Men's Chorus entitled Tunes From Tales (Music for Mouse), which included readings from his books and music from the era.[22]
Maupin wrote two novels, Maybe The Moon and The Night Listener, which are not part of Tales.
Maybe The Moon is a story Maupin describes as "partly autobiographical", despite the main character being a female heterosexual Jewish dwarf. The character was also based on his friend Tamara De Treaux, who played the title character in the 1982 film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.[24][25]
The Night Listener is a roman à clef, inspired by Maupin's experiences concerning the Anthony Godby Johnson hoax.[26][27][28][29] He says he wanted to create a psychological thriller, while being able to put autobiographical elements in it.[11] The issues he addresses include the ending of his relationship with his long-term partner and his relationship with his father. The book very lightly references the Tales world via Gabriel Noone's assistant, who is one of DeDe Halcyon-Day's twins from Tales. It was serialized on the internet, on Salon.com, prior to its print publication.[11]The Night Listener was adapted into a movie that was screened at the Sundance Film Festival in late January 2006 and released by Miramax the following August.[26]
Prior to the 2007 release of Michael Tolliver Lives, Maupin had been quoted on his website as saying that another Tales of the City novel was unlikely.[30] Although Maupin originally stated that this novel was "NOT a sequel to Tales [of the City] and it's certainly not Book 7 in the series,"[31] he later conceded that "I've stopped denying that this is book seven in Tales of the City, as it clearly is ... I suppose I didn't want people to be thrown by the change in the format, as this is a first person novel unlike the third person format of the Tales of the City books and it's about one character who interrelates with other characters. Having said that, it is still very much a continuation of the saga and I think I realised it was very much time for me to come back to this territory."[32]
The novel is written from the first-person perspective of Tales character Michael 'Mouse' Tolliver, now in his fifties and living as an HIV-positive man.[33] It also features appearances by familiar Tales characters, such as Anna Madrigal.[34] Maupin said: "I was interested in pursuing the life of an aging gay man, and Michael was the perfect vehicle ... However, as soon as I started writing, I found that, one by one, all the other characters stepped forward and asked to be present. It felt natural, so I went with it."[18] He calls it "a smaller, more personal novel than I've written in the past."[33] The book was released on June 12, 2007, which was declared 'Michael Tolliver Day' by the mayor of San Francisco.[35][36]
Mary Ann in Autumn was published November 12, 2010 by Harper/HarperCollins, continuing the series. It was reviewed by Joseph Salvatore in the New York Times Sunday Book Reviews on November 14.[37] It was followed in January 2014 by The Days of Anna Madrigal, which Maupin said would be the final novel in the series.[38]
Maupin (left) with husband Christopher Turner in 2013
Maupin said he knew he was gay since childhood,[11][10] but did not have sex until he was 25 and decided to come out in 1974.[8][39][40][18] For 12 years his partner was Terry Anderson, a gay rights activist,[41][42] who co-authored the screenplay for The Night Listener. The couple lived together in San Francisco and New Zealand.[43]
Following his break up with Anderson, Maupin married Christopher Turner, a website producer and photographer. The couple met through a dating website.[26][44] Maupin and Turner were marriedinVancouver, British Columbia, Canada, on February 18, 2007.[19] In 2012, Maupin purchased the home of shoe designers Lynne and Dennis ComeauinTesuque, New Mexico.[45] In 2019, Maupin and Turner moved to London[46] and settled in Clapham.[47] In November 2023, Maupin became a British citizen.[46]
Maupin's life and work are the subject of the documentary The Untold Tales of Armistead Maupin.[48] He is the cousin of English singer Sarah Jane Morris.[11][49]Christopher Isherwood was a mentor, friend, and influence as a writer at the beginning of his career.[50][51] He is an atheist.[52]
28 Barbary Lane: The Tales of the City Books 1--3. New York: Harper Perennial. 2016. ISBN978-0-06-249901-1. Contains Tales of the City, More Tales of the City, and Further Tales of the City.
Back to Barbary Lane: The Tales of the City Books 4--6. New York: Harper Perennial. 2016. ISBN978-0-06-256129-9. Contains Babycakes, Significant Others, and Sure of You.
Goodbye Barbary Lane: The Tales of the City Books 7--9. New York: Harper Perennial. 2016. ISBN978-0-06-256377-4. Contains Michael Tolliver Lives, Mary Ann in Autumn, and The Days of Anna Madrigal.
^ ab"Armisted Maupin Biography". Biography (Great Authors of World Literature, Critical Edition). enotes. Retrieved February 23, 2015.
^Armistead Jones Maupin, Jr., birth date 13 May 1944, Age 24, Military Date 5 May 1969 U.S. Navy, Marine Corps and Reserve Officers, published January 1970, record held in United States Military Registers, 1902–1985. Salem, Oregon: Oregon State Library.
^Pronounced "Mawpin' as read in English, rather than rhyming with the French "Gauguin." "Armistead Maupin" is an anagram of 'Is a Man I Dreamt Up.' (Armistead Maupin Is a Man I Dreamt UpArchived February 13, 2006, at the Wayback Machine was the title of a 1990 BBC documentary on him.) However, neither the name nor Maupin himself were actually invented. He recalls: "One person even wrote: 'I know for a fact that you don't exist. You're really a lesbian collectiveinMarin County.' (Sometimes I feel like a lesbian collective in Marin County, but I'm not.)" See: "Oft Asked Questions". Archived from the original on February 13, 2006. Retrieved April 29, 2015..
^Maupin, Armistead (2017). Logical Family: A Memoir. London, U.K.: Penguin. p. 17. ISBN9780857523518. That's Grandpa Branch. He was a Confederate general who died at Antietam.
^ abc"'Growing up Gay in old Raleigh". Archived from the original on March 6, 2005. Retrieved April 7, 2017.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) – in The Independent of Raleigh, North Carolina, June 1988 – autobiographical memoir
^Maupin, Armistead (2018). Logical family: a memoir. London: Black Swan. ISBN978-1-78416-104-0.
^"My First Glimpse of The City". Archived from the original on May 20, 2005. Retrieved April 7, 2017.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) – in Guest Informant, 1998–1999. Maupin recalls his first experiences of San Francisco.
^He said he had "no sense of it being a gay mecca" and called it "this amazing city that embraced me, that had made me aware of my true self", and "what really floored me was that the straight folks in San Francisco were so civilised about homosexuality." (in the New York Times interview)
^"A Tale of the Seventies". Archived from the original on December 28, 2004. Retrieved April 7, 2017.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)TV Guide, January 1994. Article by Maupin about the difficult process of getting the Tales series into TV production.
^"Behind the scenes: THE OUTSIDER". Archived from the original on March 4, 2006. Retrieved March 4, 2006.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) – San Francisco Focus Magazine], October 1992. Interview with Maupin about his friendship with Tamara De Treaux.
^"Suddenly Home". Archived from the original on February 13, 2006. Retrieved April 7, 2017.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) – a story featuring the fictional characters in Noone at Night
^Armistead Maupin (2007). "Michael Tolliver Lives". Search.barnesandnoble.com. Archived from the original on September 29, 2007. Retrieved December 3, 2013.
^"Letter to Mama". Archived from the original on April 11, 2005. Retrieved April 7, 2017.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) – Michael Tolliver's coming out letter, a response in the book to his parents' participation in Anita Bryant's anti-gaySave Our Children campaign. Maupin used the letter to serve the same purpose for his own parents, who followed the Tales serial.
"Literarybent.com". Archived from the original on May 15, 2006. Retrieved April 7, 2017.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) – Maupin's previous website, archived on the Wayback Machine; most material is not on the new website
