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Summary: Says it isn't so...Randy, say it isn't so...
Review: ............In Stanley Kubrick's 1964 Black Comic masterpiece 'Dr Stranglove...', Peter Seller's character President Merkin Muffley delivers his now classic line to two men who are struggling together on a bench in The War Room... "Gentlemen, you can't fight in here, this is The War Room!" Ironic. Dark. Funny. But also tragic because by the end of movie - Doomsday. While reading Randy Shilts', 'And The Band Played On', a book about the dawn of AIDS, I noted many occasions in which the ignorance was so astounding, the denial so bewildering that I wondered if Stanley Kubrick was waiting in the wings - lights, camera, action! This wasn't the ignorance of Neanderthal man thumping each other on the head so that the species could move on. This was our best and brightest in every community turning their heads or infighting while thousands of people died needlessly. The media, the Reagan administration, professionals and artists in the Gay Community, the FDA (Food and Drug Administration ), The American Red Cross, the NIH( National Institute of Health ) and a host of others - denial, denial, denial. Politics, politics, politics. Oh, and the greed. Plenty of greed; money from the bath houses, money for researches who didn't care about AIDS until they could get funds for their lab and MAYBE look into AIDS - and who wins the Nobel prize while thousands are dying? USA or France? Let's fight over it and waste more time. It's all here. Maybe we were Neanderthal man only a little more educated. Maybe we were refusing to react in a kinder, more civilized manner because we didn't know any better. Maybe we needed to learn a lesson before the species moved on. That lesson is laid bare in Shilts', And The Band Played On, in the nearly 600 pages of devoted to the AIDS epidemic. From it's first known case in 1976-77 to 1986 when one of the hero's of this tragic story, dies, it reads like a nightmare. This book is about the time BEFORE the really big numbers. This book defines WHY there were big numbers in the years to come. This book is about the time before you and I most likely knew about the disease or, at least, recognized it as a problem that could effect our lives. Heterosexual people? Us? We don't get AIDS, that's what they say. There was a good reason for our lack of awareness. No one cared. The media went to sleep or would print only the 'hype' that caused unnecessary hysteria or anything related to non-gays. It was a Gay Disease they wrote, yeah, that's what they're saying. The Reagan administration said AIDS was the NUMBER ONE health issue (after three years and hundreds of deaths) but allocated only peanuts of the national health budget to the over-worked and under funded CDC ( Center for Disease Control ). The Gay community, especially in New York, denied there was a problem so they it could retain their right to bath houses, though they claimed ALL of their rights were being infringed upon. Infighting had many of the Gay leaders condemning it's own hero's of the past, those who had fought desperately to win homosexual rights from a homophobic society coming out of the 1950's, because those Gay leaders of the past threatened their bath houses claiming that those bath houses were places where infection could be spread more easily. What nonsense?! Or was it? Don't close the bath houses, we will wait and see... But there were hero's; from the Gay Community, from medicine and science, from ordinary citizens - one who walked into an AIDS meeting one day after being diagnosed by his doctor and asked " what was AIDS and how did he get it? " - THREE YEARS AFTER the disease was discovered. Why? No one was talking, no one cared. Read this book. This wasn't thousands of years ago in a cave. This was yesterday. The people who ignored, who covered up, who fought among themselves while thousands died are still your administrators, public officials and decisions makers. As I read this book I wrote down the names of the people, the hero's, who fought an uphill, no MOUNTAIN! battle to bring this disease to the public's attention and slow the death rate. I looked them up on the Internet. They are still working, still fighting. They are also your administrators, public officials and decisions makers. Thank God. I knew the basics about AIDS before I read this book. Now I know more about US. NOTE - FACT: When Ronald Reagan first entered The White House with an administration who would turn a blind eye to a virus that would kill tens of thousands of people and infect millions worldwide, he asked an aid 'where The War Room was?". The aid said that there was no REAL war room. Reagan responded, "Sure there is, I saw it in that movie, Dr Strangelove something..." Ironic. Dark. Funny.
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Summary: A Realistically Scary View of the Evolution of AIDS
Review: After studying media surrounding AIDS and its evolution as an epedemic of the 1980's-1990's, "And the Band Played On" comes closest to the reality of AIDS and the politics of disease, power and sexuality. The book itself is a dramatization of the various players in politics and science and their struggle to explore, expose and control the AIDS epidemic. Its also a tragic tale of the lives that were lost as a cost of a government's reluctance to recognize the disease and the effects it was having on a discrete minority. For those who want a realistic portrayal not only of the AIDS virus and how it affected communities, where it reared its head and the process of unveiling a disease, pick up this book. And for those who are looking for the politics surrounding sexuality and power, pick up this book. It will become known as a book which shows the underbelly of our society and politics which fails to respond to the demands of thier citizens because of thier sexuality.
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Summary: AIDS epidemic
Review: Aids epidemic is problem, so need to soving
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Summary: The guide to AIDS during the early years
Review: And The Band Played On is in my humble opinion the most comprehensive writing on the AIDS epidemic that has ever seen the printed page. It not only deals with the social aspects of the disease but also the medical and political aspects as well. By the time the reader finishes the book they will be most likely repulsed by the way that the disease was treated in the early years because it happened to surface in the gay community first. For everyone who has read the book then I recommend watching the HBO movies that was made by the same name. If you have watched the movies and not read the book then I must tell you that you are doing yourself a great injustice. Talk to you guys later.
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Summary: Close look at politics and medicine
Review: And The Band Played On tells the history of AIDS in the US during the 1980's. Shilts was a reporter in San Francisco who had covered many of the events as they happened and so had a unique insider perspective on events. He writes in a semi-fictional style in which he tries to show personalities of the people involved and "get inside their heads" by telling their thoughts and feelings. This makes the book highly readable (it is phone book thick so readability is a good thing). But the style also makes things even more grim (many of the people end up dead from AIDS) and is potentially misleading because Shilts is interpreting the inner lives of real people, some of whom he had never even met.
As far as AIDS goes And the Band Played On is a bit out of date now that it has been more than 10 years since its publication. (A more recent book with similar focus and maybe for similar audience is Big Shot by Patricia Thomas.) As far as politics goes As The Band Played On is one huge case study of beurocracy and disease. Seeing how people's personal desire for professional recognition kept information from flowing freely, and the extent to which politics drove medicine was a big shock. I'm pretty sure the politics haven't gone out of date and won't soon. *sigh* So to see the interaction of medicine and many unsavory social phenomena (politicians - not gays) is a good reason to read this book.
For me And The Band Played On is an excellent study of politics interacting with medicine as well as early history of AIDS cases in the US. It is very readable so don't let the length put you off.
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Summary: it was a decent book
Review: And the band played on was a decent book. it gave a horrifying look at how homophobia affected the future outcome of the disease AIDS. It was extremely long and that was the one thing i didnt like about it. it was kind of slow paced, but was interesting enough to read all the way through. it was sad how some people were totally alienated because of the fact they had the disease.
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Summary: It was a decent book
Review: And the band played on was a good book. Some of the topics were scary but it was all realistic and that is what we need today: a realistic perspective of the world.
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Summary: Took a while, but a stellar read!!
Review: And the Band Played On was a great book, but surely not of the category for "books that you love". Chapter to chapter, page to page, it carried sadness after sadness, tragedy after tragedy. Despite glimpses of hope and examples of praiseworthy individuals rising against the tide of the time, the author kept a check on the grimness by updating the death stats at the end of each chapter. As the number started out in the single digits, and eventually rose to the size of small cities, I could not help but feel depressed. Still, I was sucked in. Meticulously researched, the author establishes himself as an expert on the rise of the AIDS epidemic by the myriad research and interviews he compiled to write the book. Some may feel overwhelmed by the amount of statistics and data in the book. Much of it is about the science field, and American programs such as the Centers for Disease Control, and the National Cancer Institute. Different scientists play integral roles in the plot, and much writing is devoted to subjects such as immunonology and virology, to which the author goes into much detail. I, for one, never minded. I soaked up everything, very eager to learn about AIDS. I thought that I had known a decent amount about the subject prior to reading the book, but now realize how clueless I was really was. The books paints no pretty pictures. You will face death, over and over again, and be heartbroken by the inaction that the Reagan administration took to the epidemic. I feel that I have a somewhat greater grasp of gay political rights now, or the rights that they are routinely denied anyway. The book is highly informative, but just a captivating read. I am in school, so it was difficult at times to find time to read this lengthy tome, but each time, I could not put it down. It wove a human tale of tragedy with a reporter-style analysis of the government's failure to help slow down the spread of AIDS. The book saddened and enraged me, reaching to all of my emotions. I would recommend it to anyone.
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Summary: circles of hell
Review: As I read this book I kept thinking of Dante Alighieri wandering through the circles of hell and chronicling, without glee, but without remorse, who he found and why they were there. Like Dante's Inferno, Shilt's San Francisco, New York, and Washington are filled with those who fully deserve Shilt's scorn. Would I have done better in their shoes? I hope so, but I don't know. I do know that after reading this book it'll be harder for me to look the other way in the future.
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Summary: One of the most important books you will ever read.
Review: Being born in 1979, I knew little about the beginnings AIDS epiodemic in the US. When I was in 9th grade (early 90's), education about AIDS and HIV were well into effect. Being home sick one weekend, I watched "Angels in America" on HBO and realized that the AIDS epidemic in the 1980's was very scary to say the least, and it I wanted to learn more about what it was like then.
There is no happy ending to this book, and there is no doubt that you will read about how horrible this disease is and how it basically mangles the human body. People's ignorance towards it are just as disgusting as those parts- even most gay people did not want to believe that this was happening and telling them how to have sex was a "violation" of their rights, rather than saving them.
Randy Shilts day-by-day almost tells the beginnings of AIDS in America, and how all the early fighters against it eventually end up dying from it. Read this book, as everyone knows non-fiction like this is more powerful than anything someone could make up.
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