We Must Love One Another or Die: The Life and Legacies of Larry Kramer

Maas, Lawrence D. "We Must Love One Another or Die: The Life and Legacies of Larry Kramer", Palgrave Macmillan, 1999. Evaluating Larry Kramer Amos Lassen Those of us who lived through the AIDS epidemic know who Larry Kramer is and he is a man of many talents. He won an Academy Award for his screenplay of D.H. Lawrence's "Women in Love", he is a novelist who wrote "Faggots" and a playwright who wrote "The Normal Heart" and "The Destiny of Me" and he is a pioneer AIDS activist; he was co-founder of the Gay Men's Health Crisis and founder of ACT-UP. Above everything else Larry Kramer is controversial. Lawrence Maas who is also a founder of GMHC gives us an anthology of essays written by 23 writers who look at Kramer's life, politics and literary achievements, The essays are by some of the foremost voices in gay life--Andrew Holleran, Tony Kushner, Christopher Bram, John D'Emilio, Arnie Kantrowitz, Maxine Wolfe and Calvin Trillin to name a few. The essays concern the major issues in gay life and is an important resource for anyone studying the history of the American gay movement. The tone of the essays vary and these reflect the themes of Kramer's own life. The best of them look at Kramer's life and work and Kramer himself gets to say something as well. By some Kramer has been regarded as a prophet and by others as a noisy antagonist but his influence cannot be denied. Larry Kramer is the embodiment of what "the personal is political" means. He is a genius and he is provocative, a pioneer and a vicious activist and he has forced many into action for our behalf. The book is a virtual who's who of the gay movement. This is such an important book that I am afraid has been overlooked which is too bad because it is so enlightening.