Hold Tight Gently (55 page)

4
. JB to “Ken,” January 31, 1984; JB to Barbara Smith, August 8, 1984; Smith to JB, November 10, 1984, all JBSC; interview with Michelle Parkerson, May 1, 2009;
Murder on Glass
announcement and program courtesy MP. In most cases, the admiration was mutual. To give one example, in an interview Audre Lorde said, “When I read a poet like Essex Hemphill, my heart just comes up in my mouth and does an African-American folk-dance on the back of my throat. I think, yea that’s what the brother is doing—he’s making something that has never been made or said before. He gives me hope and strength” (Charles H. Rowell 1990 interview with Lorde in
Conversations with Audre Lorde
, ed. John Wylie Hall, University Press of Mississippi, 2004).

5
. EH,
Ceremonies
(Cleis, 1992), 158–59; EH, “Say, Brother,”
Essence
, November 1983; Johnson,
The Lavender Scare
, 193–94 (Mattachine); GLBPOC “Tribute,” February 16, 2005, and Wayson Jones, commentary on this manuscript, April 15, 2013 (d.c. space). JB’s editorial skill in producing the anthology, as well as his difficulties with some of the contributors, can be traced in JB to Isaac Jackson, June 24, 1985; JB to Daniel Garrett, June 8, July 31, 1985; Garrett to JB, July 29, 1985; JB to A. Billy S. Jones, June 7, 1985, all JBSC.

6
. Craig G. Harris, “Black, Gay, and Proud,”
New York Native
, March 11–24, 1985; “Jacks of Color: An Oral History” (Benjamin Shepard Interviews Liddell Jackson), in
From Act Up to the WTO
, ed. Benjamin Shepard and Ronald Hayduk (Verso, 2002); JB to “Dear Friends,” November 18, 1985, JBSC; “Waking Up to AIDS,”
Rainbow History Project
,
rainbowhistory.org/html/AidsChronology.html
; Renee McCoy to Julie Enszer, February 22, 2013, courtesy Enszer; EH’s poems “Family Jewels” and “Cordon Negro” are from EH,
Ceremonies
; EH to JB, December 5, 1985; JB to EH, December 14, 1985, both JBSC. The Lost & Found and Whitman-Walker quotes are from EH’s unpublished novel, “Standing in the Gap,” FGAF.

7
. David Roman,
Acts of Intervention: Performance, Gay Culture, and AIDS
(Indiana University Press, 1998), 33–34; Reginald Glenn Blaxton, “ ‘Jesus Wept’: Reflections on HIV Dis-ease and the Churches of Black Folk,” in
Dangerous Liaisons: Blacks, Gays, and the Struggle for Equality
, ed. Eric Brandt (The New Press, 1999); Elinor Burkett,
The Gravest Show on Earth: America in the Age of AIDS
(Houghton Mifflin, 1995), 148–52, 184 (quotes from Wilson and Owens); Cathy J. Cohen,
The Boundaries
of Blackness: AIDS and the Breakdown of Black Politics
(University of Chicago Press, 1999), 345, chap. 4. For a thoughtful update on the racial divisions in the gay movement, see Keith O. Boykin, “Where Rhetoric Meets Reality: The Role of Black Lesbians and Gays in ‘Queer’ Politics,” in
The Politics of Gay Rights,
eds. Craig A. Rimmerman, Kenneth D. Wald, and Clyde Wilcox, 79–95 (University of Chicago Press, 2000).

8
. James S. Tinney, “Why a Black Gay Church?” in
In The Life: A Black Gay Anthology
, ed. JB, 46–86 (Alyson, 1986). For the reevaluation of black homophobia, see the introduction and the essays by Cheryl Clarke, Keith Boykin, Cathy J. Cohen, and Tamara Jones in Eric Brandt,
Dangerous Liaisons: Blacks, Gays, and the Struggle for Equality
, The New Press, 1999; Gil Gerald, “The Trouble I’ve Seen (1987), in
Freedom in This Village: Twenty-Five Years of Black Gay Men’s Writing
, ed. E. Lynn Harris, 67–82 (Carroll and Graf, 2005).

9
. Undated transcripts of MC/RB taped phone conversations, MCP; MC,
Surviving AIDS
(HarperCollins, 1990), 7; John-Manuel Andriote,
Victory Deferred
, rev. ed. (2011); Ann Silversides,
AIDS Activist: Michael Lynch and the Politics of Community
(Between the Lines, 2003), 43–44; Jennifer Brier,
Infectious Ideas: U.S. Political Responses to the AIDS Crisis
(University of North Carolina Press, 2009), chap. 1.

10
. Undated transcripts of MC/RB taped phone conversations, MCP; Brier,
Infectious Ideas
, 40–42.

11
. MC, “Mike Goes to the Baths,” 13-p. transcript, RDP; see also Susan M. Chambré,
Fighting for Our Lives: New York’s AIDS Community and the Politics of Disease
(Rutgers University Press, 2006), 54–56; Douglas Crimp, “How to Have Promiscuity in an Epidemic,” in
Melancholia and Moralism
(MIT Press, 2004); RB, written comments on this manuscript, April 1, 2013; RB,
Stayin’ Alive: The Invention of Safe Sex
(Westview, 2003); JS to me, February 19, April 1, 2013.

That AIDS is primarily a heterosexual disease in Africa has caused a significant debate among specialists that is still in progress, and which I’m unqualified to join. JS is among the experts who dismiss the early theorizing that the lack of circumcision among men and the prevalence of “concurrent partnerships” in Africa are primarily responsible. Circumcision is hardly universal in the United States and Europe, and as for “concurrent partnerships,” Africa is a large continent with diverse sexual customs (the assumption that Africa is uniform smacks of more than a little racism). JS, among others, agrees that a growing literature is rightly concentrating on AIDS in Africa as a problem of “blood-borne transmission.”

12
. Ronald Bayer and Gerald M. Oppenheimer,
AIDS Doctors
(Oxford University Press, 2000), 153–55; Deborah B. Gould,
Moving Politics: Emotion and ACT UP’s Fight Against AIDS
(University of Chicago Press, 2009), 77. On the bathhouse issue: MC, “The Case for the Temporary Closure of Commercial Sex Establishments During the AIDS Crisis,” 14-p. ms., RDP. Mike had a late (1993) rapprochement with GMHC after the much-admired Jeff Richardson became its executive director.

13
. JS, Sean Strub, RB, MD, and Walter Armstrong, discussion January 27, 2013; Gallo and Fauci as quoted in Anne-Christine D’Adesky, “The Man Who Invented Safer Sex Returns,”
Out
, Summer 1992; Sean Strub, “The Good Doctor,”
POZ
, July 1998; MC,
Surviving AIDS
; MC, “A ‘Dangerous’ Interview With Dr. Joseph Sonnabend,” 18-p. transcript, MCP; MC, “Why I Do Not Believe That HIV Is the Cause of AIDS,” PWA
Newsline
, December 1984; MC, “AIDS: The Linguistic Battlefield,”
in
The State of the Language
, ed. Christopher Ricks and Leonard Michaels (University of California Press, 1990); MC to Neville Hodgkinson, July 17, 1993; MC to Pam Brandt and Lindsy van Gelder, July 5, 1993; MC to Celia Farber, September 1, 1993, all MCP; Sean Strub to me, October 27, 2012 (constellation of factors).

The controversy over the relationship between HIV and AIDS continues to have a long life. The literature is vast; a good sample exchange is Celia Farber, “Out of Control,”
Harper’s
, March 2006, vs. Robert Gallo et al., “Errors in Celia Farber’s March 2006 article in
Harper’s
Magazine,” March 2006,
http://www.tac.org.za/documents/ErrorsInFarberArticle.pdf
.

14
. JS, Strub, RB, MD, and Armstrong discussion, January 27, 2013; some half dozen DVDs from the 1980s that feature JS, RDP;
Sonnabend Interview with Brent Leung
, December 30, 2011, DVD, RDP. For more on Duesberg and his theories and followers, see Seth Kalichman,
Denying AIDS: Conspiracy Theories, Pseudoscience, and Human Tragedy
(Springer, 2009), esp. chap. 2.

15
. The handwritten diary Mike kept off and on during the trip is in MCP.

Chapter 4: The Mideighties

1
. JB to Barbara Smith, June 16, 1985; JB to Isaac Jackson, July 19, 1985; JB to Audre Lorde, August 14, 1984, all JBSC.

2
. JB to Jackson, July 19, 1985; JB to Smith, June 16, 1985; JB to EH, August 11, November 2, 1985; EH to JB, March 9, 1985, all JBSC; Hizkias Assefa and Paul Wahrhaftig,
The MOVE Crisis
(University of Pittsburgh Press, 1990); Robin Wagner-Pacifici,
Discourse and Destruction: The City of Philadelphia Versus MOVE
(University of California Press, 1994);
Philadelphia Inquirer
, December 4, 1987.

3
. JB to Steve [Stephan Lee Dais, an undergraduate at Temple University?], June 8, 1985; EH to JB, December 5, 1985; JB to EH, November 2, 1985, April 29, 1986, all JBSC; EH, “The Tomb of Sorrow,” in
Ceremonies
(Cleis, 1992), 94–95; interviews with Ron Simmons and Chris Prince, May 2009.

4
. Dorothy Beam to JB, [1985?]; JB to EH, December 14, 1985, both JBSC; JB to Ray [Melrose?], June 24, 1982; JB, “Brother to Brother: Words from the Heart,” in
In The Life: A Black Gay Anthology
, ed. JB, 234 (Alyson, 1986).

5
. EH, “Untied Inspiration,”
Network
1, no. 3 (December 1990); EH to Alexis De Veaux, September 29, 1985, AVSC; JB to EH, August 11, 1985; EH to JB, December 5, 1985, February 18, [1986?]; JB to “Dear Friends,” December 17, 1985; JB to Mosmiller, March 19, 1986; JB to his parents, March 1, 1986, all JBSC. For
Black-heart
, see Charles Michael Smith’s blog:
http://urbanbookmaven.blogspot.com/2013/01/hed-tk_9.html
. The NCBLG Statement of Purpose is printed in
Black/Out
1, nos. 3–4 (1987).

6
. Abby Tallmer to me, March 26, 2013; Guy Weston, “AIDS in the Black Community,”
Black/Out,
Fall 1986 (reprinted from
Au Courant
); PBS Timeline: 30 Years of AIDS in Black America, July 10, 2012,
pbs.org
; EH, “O Tell Me, Brutus,” in
Ceremonies
, 168, originally published in EH,
Conditions
(1986); Charles Henry Fuller, “With Our Heads Held High,” JBSC; Larry Duplechan, “Voices of Black Pain,”
The Advocate
, November 25, 1986. Wendell Ricketts recalls a symposium he organized in
mid-1993 when Essex appeared on a panel, “AIDS: Images and Analysis in the Arts and Media,” along with Bill T. Jones, John Greyson, and Robert Atkins, during which he spoke eloquently about his own condition (
[email protected]
, November 7, 1995), in the Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual People of Color list GLBPOC “Tribute.” Craig G. Harris, who died of AIDS in 1991, wrote movingly of the difficulties black gay men had in gaining access to treatment in “I’m Going Out Like a Fucking Meteor,” in
Freedom in This Village: Twenty-Five Years of Black Gay Men’s Writing
, ed. E. Lynn Harris, 137–50 (Carroll and Graf, 2005).

7
. JB to his parents, March 1, 1986; JB to Isaac Julien, December 29, 1986; JB to Kriss Worthington, December 30, 1986; Barbara Smith to JB, August 14, 1986; JB to Michael Denneny, October 2, 1987, all JBSC;
Thing
, May–June 1991. A flyer for Be Bop Books is in JBSC; Giovanni’s Room distributed the books.

8
. Wyatt O’Brian Evans, “Essex Hemphill: The Force Remains with Us,”
wyattobrianevans.com/online/node49
; Brinkley to Harris, March 5, 1986; Colin Robinson to the editor,
New York Native
, March 24, 1986, both JBSC; Kara Swisher, “The Storm over a Stanza,”
Washington Post
, September 28, 1987; the Manchester episode and other tributes to EH’s growing influence can be found online at GLBPOC “Tribute”; EH to JB, February 18, [1988?]; EH to Assotto Saint, March 2, 1987, ASSC;
Outweek
, August 8, 1990. I haven’t come across any evidence that Essex actually marched in the 1987 gay rights demonstration in Washington, but he did participate, along with Michelle, Wayson, and Joe Beam, in “Culturally Yours,” an evening of readings and performances held at George Washington University in conjunction with the march; program courtesy MP.

9
. “Waking Up to AIDS,”
Rainbow History Project
,
www.rainbowhistory.org/html/AidsChronology.html
; Cathy J. Cohen,
The Boundaries of Blackness: AIDS and the Breakdown of Black Politics
(University of Chicago Press, 1999), 95–99.

10
. Aside from MC’s own
Surviving AIDS
(HarperCollins, 1990), the best account of PWAC by far—and one on which I’ve heavily relied—is Susan M. Chambré,
Fighting for Our Lives: New York’s AIDS Community and the Politics of Disease
(Rutgers University Press, 2006), esp. chap. 2.

11
. Duberman diary, November 10, 1985, in Martin Duberman,
Waiting to Land: A (Mostly) Political Memoir, 1985–2008
(The New Press, 2009), 10; Dudley Clendinen and Adam Nagourney,
Out for Good: The Struggle to Build a Gay Rights Movement in America
(Simon and Schuster, 1999), 514–21. JS himself felt “mortified to see dying people called depraved and dissolute” (JS to Sharon Feinstein, February 3, 1986, JSNYPL). Except for the few excerpts I’ve published in several of my books, my diary remains in my possession; it will ultimately become part of my papers at the New York Public Library.

12
. Clendinen and Nagourney,
Out for Good
, 531–39; MC, “How Should We Presume,” 11-p. ms., October 15, 1987, MCP.

13
. Duberman diary, May 15, June 6, July 18, August 27, 1985, in Duberman,
Waiting
, 5–9; “Remarks of Michael Callen, American Public Health Association, Annual Meeting, Las Vegas, Nevada, 1986,” typescript in MCP; the speech is partly reprinted in Douglas Crimp, ed.,
AIDS: Cultural Analysis, Cultural Activism
(MIT Press, 1987).

14
. For the original AZT trial, see “AZT: The Clinical Trial That Led to Its Approval,”
AIDS Perspective
, January 28, 2011,
http://aidsperspective.net/blog/?p=749
& preview=true; JS, Sean Strub, MD, RB, and Walter Armstrong, discussion, January
27, 2013; JS, interviews with Sean Strub, [2009?], SSJS; JS to Louis Aledort, April 11, 1983, JSNYPL; Rex Wockner, “Luck, Coke, and the Love of a Good Man,”
New York Native
, July 11, 1988; MC,
Surviving AIDS
, 8, 13–14, 51, 193, 198, 203–26; Chambré,
Fighting for Our Lives
, 38–39; MC, “Not Everyone Dies of AIDS,”
Village Voice
, May 3, 1988 (MC complained that the
Voice
had gutted his article, removing most of his explanation for remaining a “multifactorialist”); MC, “Farewell to Smarm,” 17-p. typescript of a speech delivered April 25, 1991, MCP (there is a second MC piece, 13-p. typescript, entitled “A Farewell to Smarm,” in MCP, which is
not
a duplicate of the 1991 one); Sean Straub,
Body Counts
, Scribners: 2014.