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annaboonana 's review for:
The Stonewall Reader
by Edmund White, The New York Public Library
challenging
informative
medium-paced
Going into the book, I didn’t know too much about Stonewall, I knew the very basics of it, but hadn’t done further research on it so I was really excited to read a book about multiple people’s experiences whether they were in the riots, bystanders or knew friends who were there.
I thought all of the essays were very well structured and I liked that some were from people who were interviewed, some were in essay formats, some were from book passages, there were so many different materials used.
I however did not like the repetitiveness of pinning, specifically, Black people against the LGBTQIA community and ‘who’s oppression is worse’, I think it’s a huge problem in our society, where we pin people‘s oppression against each other, and what ends up happening is that we get so distracted with pinning people against each other that we don’t fix it and fight it.
I also think the book was way too long and I think the turning point for me was everything after Stonewall ended. I don’t think any of those chapters were super necessary, also a lot of them were just weird, very hard to follow along and understand what they were talking about in their experiences. The very last chapter I however, did enjoy because it was a continued from a previous chapter at the beginning. but, I feel like it just kind of fell flat at the end in general.
Overall, I really enjoyed listening to this book. I learned a lot about queer history…..HERstery, and I definitely would love to read more about Stonewall and queer history because there’s just so much to take in.
I thought all of the essays were very well structured and I liked that some were from people who were interviewed, some were in essay formats, some were from book passages, there were so many different materials used.
I however did not like the repetitiveness of pinning, specifically, Black people against the LGBTQIA community and ‘who’s oppression is worse’, I think it’s a huge problem in our society, where we pin people‘s oppression against each other, and what ends up happening is that we get so distracted with pinning people against each other that we don’t fix it and fight it.
I also think the book was way too long and I think the turning point for me was everything after Stonewall ended. I don’t think any of those chapters were super necessary, also a lot of them were just weird, very hard to follow along and understand what they were talking about in their experiences. The very last chapter I however, did enjoy because it was a continued from a previous chapter at the beginning. but, I feel like it just kind of fell flat at the end in general.
Overall, I really enjoyed listening to this book. I learned a lot about queer history…..HERstery, and I definitely would love to read more about Stonewall and queer history because there’s just so much to take in.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Addiction, Drug abuse, Drug use, Hate crime, Homophobia, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Transphobia, Police brutality, Murder, Alcohol, Sexual harassment