Hope Along the Wind: The Life of Harry Hay

A well-crafted, touching biographical portrait, filmmaker Eric Slade's Hope Along the Wind: The Life of Harry Hay is an absorbing social and political document of gay rights struggles throughout the 20th century. Introduced to social activism in the 1930s through his involvement in left-wing theater groups and his relationship with actor Will Geer, Harry Hay was eventually spurred by government crackdowns and the threat of personal prosecution to draw up a controversial call for the end of illegal entrapment of homosexuals in 1948. Submitted as a platform for the failing Henry Wallace Progressive Party presidential campaign, the document was rejected by Wallace supporters due to its controversial content--the first open mention of homosexuals as an oppressed minority--but embraced by like-minded gays from the Los Angeles area, leading to the formation of the first successful gay rights organization in America, the Mattachine Society. Film footage of Hay at book readings and reminiscing with his long-time companion, John Burnside, reveal a sensitive and forthcoming side, while interviews with founding members of the Mattachine Society and archival photographs attest to his complicated emotional and intellectual life. In addition to a failed marriage, Hay would eventually leave the increasingly right-leaning Mattachine Society during the 1950s McCarthy era, before finally finding the acceptance he'd long sought in the “Radical Faeries,” a spiritual group he co-founded during the gay liberation movement of the late 1960s and '70s. Detailed, intimate, and even-handed, this is highly recommended for gay and lesbian collections and would be a real jewel in larger general collections. Aud: C, P. (A. Cantú)