STRAIGHT: A Heterosexual Talks About His Homosexual Past

by William Aaron ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 26, 1972

Although Mr. Aaron begins by saying that one should be Gay-Liberated-ly free to choose one's own sex style, toward the end he admits that homosexuality is often ""a personal tragedy"" and earlier on condemns the scene as ""irresponsible, compulsive and dehumanized."" He also rebukes the notion that there is any particular patterning even though he had a mother who was strongly attached to him and he also preferred to dress up as a girl rather than play ball. He grew up with few friends and actually spent the next 20 years cruising from men's rooms to steam baths; he seems to find the homosexual incapable of long-term relationships, while the shorter ones are filled with instability, violence, aberration and likely to invite disease, harassment and entrapment. Moral by temperament and Christian by practicing affiliation, he eventually abstained (except for an occasional lapse) and through an understanding woman was able to progress from a physical liaison to a settled existence as husband and father. Obviously he believes that others can go ""straight"" and polemicizes toward that end just as he really counters the movement which has been propagandizing for the way of life which he found uncomfortable, ""inconvenient,"" and incomplete. The intention here is surely more than cathartic -- and for the uninvolved outsider, perhaps less involving than sincere.

Pub Date: May 26, 1972

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972

Categories: NONFICTION