How To Survive a Plague (Through Books)
We have been here before. WSIR #24
On our second year of pandemic-informed living, as we look to the hope and relief that vaccines can provide while we also see the virus wreaking devastation all over the globe right now, it’s well discussed how much this experience has also taken a mental, emotional, and deeply spiritual toll on all of us. I hear this line over and over: “be kind to yourself, you’ve never lived through a global pandemic before.” It’s a lovely and generous thought.
But most of us HAVE lived through a global pandemic before - the AIDS pandemic (which did not peak in global cases until 1998 and which is still the root of hundreds of thousands of deaths each year). Perhaps we were children, or perhaps we did not know affected people firsthand, and perhaps because it was not quite so easily communicable, our families did not have to shelter in our houses or usually change behavior and so for many people, it was only an occasional news story. But that sentiment, that simple erasure of the AIDS plague only a few decades ago, strikes me as both so deeply human, to so easily forget the utter devastation, and so deeply heartbreaking and outrageous, to those who did live through it and lost loved ones who didn’t.
And at the same time, as we all figure out how to cope with today’s circumstances, there’s so much writing we can learn from and reflect on and take comfort from as well. Anytime I read about the world during AIDS, I’m struck by the stark parallels between then and now of the anger and courage, the government inaction, the citizen solutions and community action, the miracles of science and healthcare workers, the dark, defiant, glorious humor, and of course, the ying and yang of grief and hope.
Are you depressed yet? I hope not - I have found such incredible resonance, solace, inspiration, laughs and straight enjoyment from the books below! And as always, absent any external context, they were all books I loved reading - fiction, memoirs, non-fiction - there’s something for everyone.
I hope you will find something you love here as well, and that someday soon we’ll raise a toast to the heroes of that era, and of today as well. Including you - you are doing a great job in a hard time!
OK, onto the books that give us so many different roadmaps for surviving a plague.
Surviving a Plague through: Activism & Science
The book How to Survive a Plague is unusual in that the award-winning documentary by the same name came first and then the filmmaker wrote this even better non-fiction book. It starts earlier in the crisis and fills in more through methodical research, expert narrative storytelling, and personal experience as a gay man living through and documenting the AIDS crisis, especially the rise of the astonishing citizen activism that arose in New York via ACT UP, the Gay Men’s Health Crisis, and so many more everyday people who were literally fighting the government to save their lives. The chapter about the antiretroviral therapy (AKA “the Lazarus drug”) will literally give you chills. I just read it a few weeks ago and I LOVED it. (Also - LOTS of appearances from A dot Fauc.)
Surviving a Plague through: Allyship & Kindness
All the Young Men is the truly astounding memoir of Ruth Coker Burks, a young single mother in Arkansas who, through an initially simple act of kindness and grace, essentially became the uber-ally for every young gay man in Arkansas, at a time when their families, neighbors, and hospitals were actively turning them away. The writing won’t win any awards, I acknowledge - it’s pretty simple - but it’s laugh out loud funny in many places, heartwarming and inspirational, and just a great story about one woman who decided that she would help one person, but ended up helping a generation. Magical.
Surviving a Plague through: Art & Love
I’ve yet to meet another person who’s read the novel Plays Well With Others (TELL me if you have!) but it’s probably top ten in my all-time rereads. Told from the POV of a young, gay, Southern man who moves to New York in the 1980s and falls in with a dazzling community of artists. It’s atmospheric, literary, raunchy, dense, hilarious, heartbreaking - if you can find it, check it out. This and The Great Believers are the absolute best fiction about AIDS I’ve ever read.
When will I stop talking about The Great Believers? Who can say?
Surviving a Plague through: Subversion & Defiance
I picked up Legendary Children as a fan of the authors’ blog and was surprised by its depth and scholarship. With a chatty tone and pop-culture references, this book deep-dives on queer American history and culture. I waffled on including this here as it’s not just about AIDS, of course, but decided to because a/YOLO, and b/ in a genre that routinely centers white gay men, this was a great reminder of the ways that marginalized groups (queer people of color, lesbians, transgender people) made incredible impact culturally and politically with whatever resources they had. Note: you don’t have to be a fan of RuPaul’s Drag Race to like this but … it does probably help.
Surviving a Plague through: Humor & Community
I’ve been craving humorous and delightful reads throughout the past year (well, all years, but ESPECIALLY) and if you’re the same, maybe check out the whole Tales of the City series! This was originally published in serial newspaper format so all of the chapters are short, hilarious, jam-packed cliffhangers about a transplant to San Francisco and the eccentric, colorful cast of characters in her apartment house. This nine-book series spans 1978 - 2014 San Francisco, and as such was one of the first fiction to deal with the AIDS epidemic. But mostly, it’s a fun, fast arc of how the city and this chosen, unconventional family transforms over time. The Netflix series did it no justice IMHO.
A Tiny Little Thank You Note
I started writing this newsletter six months ago as a passion project during an interminable year, and if you’re reading this - thank you for being here! If you’ve found a new book to love in the 100+ books I’ve shared, I am thrilled and grateful and also a little envious that you got to read something great for the first time. I don’t know what this will look like in the next six months (if you have requests and suggestions, lemme know!) But today, I thank you if you’ve even read one newsletter.
Next week will return to my regularly scheduled excuses for why I haven’t read more of the works of Shakespeare even though it’s ALMOST MAY.
N.B. These books are all linked to Bookshop.org, which supports independent bookstores. You can find all past recos on my Bookshop.org page.
And if you like this newsletter, why not share it? That’d be fun!