Description:
Writing about events within living memory is one of the hardest tasks for a historian--there is too much information, too many perspectives. The authors of Out for Good, both writers for the New York Times, not only drew on extensive archival records but conducted nearly 700 interviews with the founders and opponents of the early gay rights movement. That they have been able to shape this unruly material into a convincing narrative is impressive enough--yet they have also managed to write one of the most dramatic and beautifully structured histories in recent years. Starting with the almost accidental Stonewall riots in 1969 and shifting between key cities and events, they track what they describe as "the last great struggle for equal rights in American history." For homophile activists of the 1950s and early 1960s, that struggle had been about being left alone by police and politicians, but for those gathering to protest Stonewall, it was about "defining themselves to society as gay men and lesbians." While there are many memoirs and smaller studies of the era, no other book so graciously spans the 30-year period covered here. --Regina Marler
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