For the people who went through this suffering so I wouldn’t have to.”Ĭongressman Bob Livingston (right) & John Rhodes discuss legislation Photograph: Capital City Press/Georges Media Group, and Baton Rouge, LA. “I feel enormous gratitude for the people who came before. Although Kirchick found that writing the book could be overwhelming as he worked to piece together all of the information he discovered, and while at times he became angry at the historical wrongs he found, his dominant emotion while working on the project was gratitude. At 800 pages, including well over 100 just for notes and sources, the scope of Secret City feels momentous. Starting with the administration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and continuing up through Bill Clinton’s presidency, Kirchick has spent a decade uncovering long-hidden stories that have been lost from history. My being gay informs my ability to say that.” It’s important that we have these stories. “Even liberal straight historians would feel uncomfortable about writing this kind of a book. “It needed a gay person to do this,” he said. As he began working on the massive project, Kirchick started to believe that, as a gay man, he was uniquely equipped to write Secret City. In fact, census data shows that DC has the highest proportion of gay people anywhere in the US.
Kirchick first became intrigued by the idea of a gay history of American power politics in 2007, when he moved to DC and realized that it was suffused with a vivid gay cultural life and history.
It’s not overturning this established narrative, it’s adding to it and complicating it.” “I wanted to bring them together to show they’re connected stories, that they interact and complement each other. “I want to intertwine these two threads – the mainstream thread of history that we all read about, and this gay history that’s been sidelined and sequestered,” he said.