the reading agenda - gay may edition

© Emery Azure

"My Queer War" by James Lord

"The Men with the Pink Triangle" by Heinz Heger

I have an obsession with history. Particularly American history. World War II especially. As a member of the LGBT community and someone fascinated by the history that came before, I am enamored by most any medium that fuse the two. Therefore I recommend the following works.

"The Men with the Pink Triangle" is a haunting work that brings to light the erasure of certain victims after the holocaust who endured some of the worst in an unforgettable atrocity: homosexuals. This retelling of one man's journey, from experiencing once-in-a-lifetime love with the son of a Nazi official to the notorious concentration camps, is gripping, sickening and eye-opening. I read this work in under twenty-four hours, it may be a short read but is by no means an easy one.

James Lord's autobiography, "My Queer War" is an interesting take on the old tale of coming of age and into one's own skin - in the midst of possibly the greatest conflict man has ever witnessed. The prose however is lengthy and droning on occasion. It's dense vocabulary is less of an ode to the author's favorite writers and more a pushy and cheap rendition of them. Nonetheless it is unique story for an unusual time in history. A time when 'queer' was an ambivalent word, either meaning odd, strange or a strictly derogatory term for a certain affinity. A time when 'gay' was merely a term used to express happiness. In secret however, it was a little known double entendre whispered as a coded language all it's own that would come to define a movement and a people decades later.