To be queer and communist at a time when the Communist Party in the U.S. banned LGBT people was tricky and often perilous. In her new book Bettina Aptheker profiles Lorraine Hansberry (who famously penned the play “A Raisin in the Sun”), Harry Hay (best known for founding the Mattachine Society), and other figures with radical sensibilities and closeted sexualities. (Encore presentation.)
Bettina Aptheker, Communists in Closets: Queering the History 1930s-1990s Routledge, 2023