In Nobel Prize winner Bellow’s new novel, “Ravelstein” (due out in April), the title character is Bloom in all but name–a popular Chicago professor, a legendary big spender–who lives in a swank apartment building where the “lobby was paneled in mahogany. The elevators were like confession boxes.” And Ravelstein, like Bloom, is gay. Is it fair to out the dead? Bellow admitted in an interview last week that Bloom probably wouldn’t have been happy having his homosexuality publicized. But Bloom wanted a frank memoir from his friend. As Andrew Sullivan, a New York Times Magazine columnist and senior editor at The New Republic who has spoken against outing, says, once Bellow decided to comply with his friend’s wish, he had no choice. “He’d either have to talk about [Bloom’s sexuality] or engage in an extraordinary lie,” says Sullivan, who, like Bloom, is both gay and conservative. Controversy aside, “Ravelstein” is certainly Bellow’s most vigorous novel in years. But that’s not news. What else would you expect from an 84-year-old man who fathered his fourth child last December?