We Both Laughed in Pleasure by Lou Sullivan

But if you derive your sense of trans worlds from academic writing and/or popular culture, this would be easy enough to not know, fixated as these genres tend to be on the dramas of trans people negotiating cis worlds of sense. Zoey, in Torrey Peter's Infect Your Friends and Loved OnesĪnecdotally, many of us are (and have been) t4t. Through the books and archives, Ozma said, people are experiencing bittersweetness, as Sullivan 'is not physically with us, as many people in that generation would have been so valuable to know' and holding the sweetness Sullivan prepared for them in leaving 'an immensely generous way to know him.'įor more information on the book, visit.

'It is an important HIV/AIDS history as well as important as a gay and trans history,' Ozma said. He added that the response to the book from people who are unlike Sullivan has been amazing. Ozma said Sullivan was 'a model of a possible life.' While there are more gay trans men now than when Sullivan was alive, it still is an incredibly rare experience to read in so much detail 'someone else's experience of moving through the world from that particular subject position of combined gender and sexuality,' Ozma said.

He wanted his female-to-male information in public libraries. That same year, Sullivan was diagnosed with HIV. Six years later, he organized FTM, the first peer support group for trans men. In 1980, Sullivan published his first edition of 'Information for the FTM,' a practical guidebook. He admired Sullivan's ability to live in those experiences and not 'project into the future.' Martin was impressed by how Sullivan was able to process his day-to-day experiences. 'It was emotional and special to me to encounter him (Sullivan) to be a fully fleshed out real person, in this incredibly intimate text that he left,' Ozma said.

Ozma was surprised by the ways Sullivan's diaries brought him to life, complete with normal missteps and 'deeply uncomfortable moments.' Ozma said themes and threads in their book include 'his long-term romantic relationships and casual intimate encounters, engagement with medicine, domestic and city spaces and how the diaries were relevant to those threads.' Martin and Ozma decided to focus on Sullivan's personal day-to-day life. Smith’s biography “Lou Sullivan: Daring to be a Man Among Men,” dealt with Sullivan's activist work and engagement with the larger community. Martin said Sullivan had 'attention for publishing' and was highly organized.īrice D.

We Both Laughed in Pleasure by Lou Sullivan