It also made me wonder what their future past the pandemic really looks like.Įxceptionally well-crafted, Gay Bar is both a book about Atherton Lin's life and the gay bars each chapter focuses on (it jumps from London to Los Angeles to San Francisco). But instead I became reminded of what a complicated, varied, often disappointing but equally necessary experience gay bars have always been for me. Released in February 2021, I initially purchased the book thinking it might fill a void left by its subject's non-existence in my life since March 2020.
That's a core question in Jeremy Atherton Lin's vibrant debut book Gay Bar: Why We Went Out, a mix of memoir and historical document that explores the complex relationship both Atherton Lin and gay culture has had with the increasingly endangered habitat that is the gay bar. But for a lot of us, I suspect it's also left us wondering: what role did gay bars really play in our lives all that time anyway? For many of us living in places where we've been privileged enough to have gay bars be an integral - if complicated - part of our culture since we were brave enough or old enough to get in, the past year and counting has been a big departure from a routine in our social lives. Queeries is a weekly column by CBC Arts producer Peter Knegt that queries LGBTQ art, culture and/or identity through a personal lens.īefore the pandemic, the last time I went this long without going to a gay bar was before I was legal drinking age. And I know I'm not alone. (Courtesy of ONE Archives at the USC Libraries, Los Angeles, and the estate of Pat Rocco)
The night crowd at the re-opening of Studio One in Los Angeles, 1977.