Curious about how, where, and when this whole thing started? There's a lot more to gay and lesbian history than Radclyffe Hall and Stonewall -- there's also a lot more than can be included in a simple top ten list, but here's a
selection of important gay and lesbian history books to get you going. It's a fascinating subject, with as many stories as there are people, so there's always something new to discover. Happy reading!
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1. Gay New York by George Chauncey
Based on years of research and access to a rich trove of diaries,
legal records, and other unpublished documents, Chauncey's work shatters the myth that gay life was invented in 1969.
2. Passions Between Women by Emma Donoghue
A groundbreaking work of lesbian scholarship that
presents a revisionist, frankly sexual look at 18th-century lesbian culture.
3. Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers by Lillian Faderman
The compelling story of lesbian life in the 20th century, drawing on journals, unpublished manuscripts, songs, news accounts,
novels, medical literature, and numerous interviews.
4. Pictures and Passions by James Saslow
The first comprehensive survey of gay and lesbian visual expression, with a
panorama of visual images in all media, from across the world and across time.
5. Gay by the Bay by Susan Stryker and Jim Van Buskirk
Celebrates Northern California's gay history in all
its fascinating diversity, beginning with the gender-bending berdache societies of
18th-century Native Americans through Digital Queers.
6. Gertrude and Alice by Diana Souhami
Using letters, memoirs, and published writings, Diana Souhami
reconstructs one of the most solid marriages of the century.
7. Father of Frankenstein by Christopher Bram
A rich, cutting look at fame, mortality, and hidden desire, this fictionalized account of the last days of Frankenstein director James Whale was the basis for the movie Gods and Monsters.
8. The Gay Metropolis by Charles Kaiser
A compelling social and political history of modern gay life in America, focusing on a cast of well-known and unknown characters in New York City.
9. The Men with the Pink Triangle by Heinz Heger and David Fernbach
A firsthand account of gay men in Nazi concentration camps, this is an important
introduction to a long-forgotten chapter of gay history.
10. The Celluloid Closet by Vito Russo
A highly acclaimed landmark work on the portrayal of
homosexuality in film, written with incisive wit and
searing perception.
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