Midlife Queer: Autobiography of a Decade (Living Out: Gay and Lesbian Autobiog) [Paperback]

Martin Duberman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 17, 1998 | ISBN-10: 0299160246 | ISBN-13: 978-0299160241

With searing self-appraisal and a keen sense of the world around him, acclaimed writer and gay activist Martin Duberman examines a wide range of issues in his personal and professional life and in the politics of the time from 1971 to 1981—from the early years of gay liberation to the first public reports of AIDS.
    Duberman moves from the internecine battles in the academic world and within the budding gay rights movement to his own heart attack, sexual and romantic adventures, and search for fulfillment through new therapies and the world of theater. Peppered with gossip, wit, and tart observations of the New York theater and literary worlds, Midlife Queer stands as both a fascinating memoir and a record of an era.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

For historian, gay activist and playwright Duberman, the 1970s was not the complacent Me decade. In this searching, refreshingly optimistic memoir, he revisits his participation in gay rights struggles as well as in internal disputes with a movement he saw as too insular in its relative disregard of nonwhites, the poor and lesbians. He analyzes his relationship with his intrusive yet loving mother, whose protracted death from a malignant melanoma in 1977 had a deep, lingering impact. Duberman tried experimental LSD therapy, which proved disorienting, yielding only scattered insights. Another alternative psychotherapy, bioenergetics, unleashed floods of rage, tears and tenderness. His career as a dramatist was stalemated during the 1970s, which he blames partly on a cowardly producers' fraternity and partly on timid, anesthetized American audiences. After a major heart attack in 1979, at 49, Duberman spent a year recovering, moving beyond despair and self-recrimination to re-immersion in the gay rights movement. His relentless self-scrutiny reflects a continual search for ways to link the personal with the political.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Historian/activist/playwright Duberman picks up approximately where he left off in Cures: A Gay Man's Odyssey (LJ 2/15/91), which chronicled his life from 1950 to 1970. Here, relying on excerpts from diary entries, he relates the ups and downs of his personal and professional activities: comically frustrated forays into LSD therapy and bioenergetics; a rocky reentry into the world of theater with his play Visions of Kerouac; battles with the Organization of American Historians and the American Historical Association, which refused to take seriously the study of sexuality, much less of homosexuality; disenchantment with sexism in the Gay Academic Union (which he helped found) and the National Gay Task Force (on whose founding board he served); and lessons learned from his heart attack at age 49. This poignant memoir's lapses into self-indulgence are offset by the author's sincere attempts to understand his place in a pivotal period of queer history. For larger biography collections.?James E. Van Buskirk, San Francisco P.L.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press (July 17, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0299160246
• ISBN-13: 978-0299160241
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,498,640 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Tedious, very disappointing., December 30, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Midlife Queer: Autobiography of a Decade (Living Out: Gay and Lesbian Autobiog) (Paperback)

I have tremendous respect for Martin Duberman as a writer and as a gay rights activist. CURES is a seminal account of one gay man's attempt during the 50s and 60s to use therapy to "cure" himself of his homosexuality. It's a telling account of the times, offering younger readers like myself the opportunity to see just how intolerant and oppressive our society was of homosexuality. It's insightful memoir at its best. Instead, this book is self-involved and tedious, a whiney account of various squabbles between academics during the 70s on how best to achieve gay liberation and acceptance. It fails to offer insightful commentary on larger issues, and is therefore meaningless for most readers. Martin Duberman has done gay history and all of us a great service by writing such brilliant works as CURES and STONEWALL. I only wish he would return to chronicling the larger history of gay people so eloquently.

2 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Honest, Amusing and Interesting, June 3, 1998

By 

Richard Zimler (Portugal) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: MIDLIFE QUEER: Autobiography of a Decade 1971-1981 (Hardcover)

I completely disagree with the Kirkus review. This is an extremely honest, enjoyable and absorbing memoir. It's for anyone interested in the author himself; psychological development; the search for self-realization; or gay rights. Some of the chapters are both moving and funny--not a small accomplishment. The final chapter, about the author's heart attack and recovery, is particularly excellent. Forget the nasty reviews and read a memoir by someone searching for himself and fighting tirelessly for what he believes in.

1 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars when all is said and done...., April 3, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: MIDLIFE QUEER: Autobiography of a Decade 1971-1981 (Hardcover)

I'm afraid that Martin Duberman has a few problems with himself, in spite of being 'good looking'and busy with a therapist. Mr. Duberman has demonstrated that he is both a challenge to heterosexist white male ideology and yet a servant to it. There has been a curious lack of radicalism in his writing for the Nation, and I suspect he has simply become another academic worshipper at the Western Civ. fount of double-talk. While some of us continue to challenge these offensive paradigms, Duberman is more interested in retailing startlingly dull stories about academics who are not on the cutting edge of radicalism. As a feminist and lesbian activist, I expect more courage (and more interest!) in a book by Duberman, who has written well in the past. Not this time; perhaps he will finally move aside, and allow those of us who challenge the white male agenda of hatred on all fronts to come to the fore. I certainly hope so.