Hold Tight Gently: Michael Callen, Essex Hemphill, and the Battlefield of AIDS
*Starred Review* In an unusual way to approach the topic of AIDs, acclaimed author and historian Duberman offers a dual biography of two very different gay men battling a mysterious illness during the early days of the AIDS epidemic. Singer and activist Michael Callen was a white Ohioan who moved to New York and became a pioneering figure in the movement to increase AIDS awareness during the Reagan years. Essex Hemphill was an African American poet who contributed to the black gay and lesbian cultural scene in Washington, DC. Duberman sees their stories as opposite sides of the same coin; although they never met, they were both “undersung” and inadvertent heroes. The book is being released as public concern in the U.S. about AIDS continues to decline, “even as the disease continues to spread.” One reason for this turn of events, Duberman maintains, is that AIDS has become less a white disease and more a disease associated with people of color, both in the U.S. and globally. (Although black men make up 12 percent of the U.S. population, they account for 45 percent of new AIDs diagnoses.) An important and, unfortunately, still timely book. --June Sawyers