We Walk Alone

The 1950s queer-life groundbreaker by "e;a literary pioneer . . . [who] forever changed perceptions of same-sex love and desire"e; (Advocate.com). Ann Aldrich flung a provocative assertion at her readers in 1955 when she opened her landmark account of lesbian life in New York City by saying this book was the "e;result of fifteen years of participation in society as a female homosexual."e; After the release of We Walk Alone, Aldrich became both a heroine and a scapegoat in some of the period's most contentious public debates over what exactly "e;lesbian culture"e; was. Her non-fiction pulp literally transformed the landscape overnight, and "e;the effect on women was electric. From every corner of creation, they wrote wrenching letters of relief and gratitude"e; (Ann Bannon, author of The Beebo Brinker Chronicles). Part Kinsey-esque portraits of real people, part you-are-there reports on the scene in bars and offices and at clubs and house parties, We Walk Alone is revealing and compelling composite of an alienated yet amazingly self-aware community one that Aldrich would revisit three years later in We, Too, Must Love. Today, "e;these essential cultural artifacts"e; (UTNE Magazine), as Stephanie Foote explains in her afterword, are "e;as rich and conflicted a look at the formation of lesbian urban culture as that of any contemporary queer historian."e;