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Ebook201 pages
Visions and Revisions: Coming of Age in the Age of AIDs
By Dale Peck
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
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About this ebook
“A coming-of-age tale for both the gay community at large and a nation coming to terms with that community’s place in American society” (The Boston Globe).
Part memoir, part extended essay, Visions and Revisions is a foray into the period between 1987, when the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) was founded, and 1996, when medical advances transformed AIDS from a virtual death sentence into a chronic manageable illness.
Offering a sweeping, collage-style portrait of a tumultuous era, this book takes readers from the serial killings of gay men in New York, London, and Milwaukee, through Dale Peck’s first loves upon coming out of the closet, to the transformation of LGBT people from marginal, idealistic fighters to their present place in a world of widespread, if fraught, mainstream acceptance.
Named as one of 2015’s best nonfiction books by Flavorwire, the narrative pays particular attention to the words and deeds of AIDS activists, offering a street-level portrait of ACT UP and considerations of AIDS-centered fiction and criticism of the time—as well as intimate, sometimes elegiac portraits of artists, activists, and HIV-positive people Peck knew. Peck’s fiery rhetoric against a government that sat on its hands for the first several years of the epidemic is tinged with the idealism of a young gay man discovering his political, artistic, and sexual identity. The result is “a flinty-eyed look into the heart of the H.I.V. epidemic, from the late 1980s until the development of protease inhibitors and combination therapies in the mid-1990s [and] a compelling snapshot of the social activism that defined the era” (The New York Times Book Review).
Part memoir, part extended essay, Visions and Revisions is a foray into the period between 1987, when the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) was founded, and 1996, when medical advances transformed AIDS from a virtual death sentence into a chronic manageable illness.
Offering a sweeping, collage-style portrait of a tumultuous era, this book takes readers from the serial killings of gay men in New York, London, and Milwaukee, through Dale Peck’s first loves upon coming out of the closet, to the transformation of LGBT people from marginal, idealistic fighters to their present place in a world of widespread, if fraught, mainstream acceptance.
Named as one of 2015’s best nonfiction books by Flavorwire, the narrative pays particular attention to the words and deeds of AIDS activists, offering a street-level portrait of ACT UP and considerations of AIDS-centered fiction and criticism of the time—as well as intimate, sometimes elegiac portraits of artists, activists, and HIV-positive people Peck knew. Peck’s fiery rhetoric against a government that sat on its hands for the first several years of the epidemic is tinged with the idealism of a young gay man discovering his political, artistic, and sexual identity. The result is “a flinty-eyed look into the heart of the H.I.V. epidemic, from the late 1980s until the development of protease inhibitors and combination therapies in the mid-1990s [and] a compelling snapshot of the social activism that defined the era” (The New York Times Book Review).
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Author
Dale Peck
Dale Peck is the author of twelve books in a variety of genres, including Martin and John, Hatchet Jobs, and Sprout. His fiction and criticism have earned him two O. Henry Awards, a Pushcart Prize, a Lambda Literary Award, and a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship. He lives in New York City, where he teaches in the New School’s Graduate Writing Program.
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Reviews for Visions and Revisions
Rating: 3.857142857142857 out of 5 stars
4/5
7 ratings2 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Dale Peck's Visions and Revisions is part memoir and part historical and cultural analysis written in a fierce, tight and poetic style that brought me right back to those horrible and life-changing days before protease inhibitors. While not a full history of ACT UP it gives an excellent sense of what it was like to organize when it was a matter of life and death and there was nothing to lose. While sometimes it seems as if it was so long ago and that the communities that was created, especially in large cities, have moved on, I still see remnants of it in #BlackLivesMatter or in Occupy Wall Street (and of course the biggest debt also goes to the Civil Rights movement) or in the organizing in the Trans community. I love Peck's bold style and his ability to write about his sexuality in a raw and unapologetic manner and his rage at a government that did not care whether gay people lived or died. The last part of the book "13 Ecstasies of the Soul" knocked me flat out (and I agree with the reviewer who said it reminded him of "Love Alone: Eighteen Elegies for Rog) and I confess I wept and then began reading the book again. Thank you Edelweiss for allowing me to review this book for an honest opinion.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Every few years a memoir comes out that tends to sneak by everyone no matter how good the reviews. There are some great ones like “H is for Hawk” and “A Shepherd’s Life” that, for good reason, stay and stay on the best seller list. The one you shouldn’t ignore is “Vision and Revisions: Coming of Age in the Age of AIDS” by Dale Peck. It’s received so much good press all over NPR and the New York Times that I knew I had to read it.It has landed on my top 5 list for best memoirs -- ever. I kept thinking of (being reminded of) Joan Didion while reading the book and she’s the gold standard by which I judge every memoir and literate, intelligent writing.“Visions and Revisions” is not for the squeamish or the prudish. There are gay sex scenes and acts described throughout. Don’t let that deter you. The primary framework for the book is the war on AIDS and AIDS’ war on gay culture and how those wars were won or lost.. In the end it’s as much about a culture lost on the slippery slope of assimilation into the mainstream. Not an especially good thing according to Peck. Or to me either. In case you’re wondering my other all time best memoirs are:“Where I Was From” by Joan Didion“Fun Home” by Allison Bechdel“The Tender Bar” by J. R. Moehringer