GLR January-February 2025

the lives of others. “People will say whatever they want,” Patric replies when I ask how he hopes his archive is engaged. He’s not interested in controlling the narratives associated with the photographs, though he’s aware of the archive’s potential to expand and generate more nuanced discussion among gay men, especially Black men. “They spoke of themselves using verbs; they didn’t use nouns,” he remarks, complicating the fixation on correlating one’s sexual acts and desires with an identity. While there was less open dis cussion of sexuality among men in the 1980s, he stresses a cer tain freedom that came from exploring what one enjoyed sexually without having to categorize it as a distinct identity. In a conversation with cultural critic Anita Naoko Pilgrim, Ajamu X expresses similar frustrations with the overdetermina tion of identity politics and the self-imposed boundaries they can construct around sex and pleasure. Rather than be dictated by identity categories, he describes his practice as delving into the gray area that defies definition: “My aim was to side-step some of these discourses, and to rethink the space in between, the mul tiplicity of the in betweenness.” This affirmation of multiplicity is resonant in Patric’s claim that there is much unspoken in the images: “You can’t imagine, looking at these pictures, who these men were.” Each photograph is simply a moment, not a signifi

T HE W ORLDOFTHE A RCHIVE V OICES SPILL OUT from different rooms of Patric’s apartment, each space carefully assembled with art. His Sunday brunches bring together friends, many of whom have known each other for decades. I feel fortunate to spend time with them, listening to their thoughts on the current state of things in Chicago, recount ing new and old gossip, and sharing life updates. Intermingling scents of food waft from the kitchen, as those confident enough to cook a dish for serious critics describe what they made. On a few occasions, the conversation references Patric’s photographs, and one of the binders is brought out to go through. Varying memories emerge in those moments, as friends share their recol lections of people pictured or their own experiences of that time. Invoking the names of some of the men in the archive brings their presence into the room, bending temporal boundaries between past and present. The binders of photographs constitute what fem inist scholar Ann Cvetkovich called an “archive of feelings … cultural texts as repositories of feelings and emotions, which are encoded not only in the content of the texts themselves but in the practices that surround their production and reception.” The im ages extend beyond what is seen in the frame, becoming sites of projection for the viewer’s own experiences and the memories of

Alice Morgan Wright: Suffragist, Sculptor HISTORY MEMO

W ENDY L. R OUSE W HEN I BEGAN researching my book Public Faces, Secret Lives: A Queer History of the Women’s Suffrage Movement , people warned me that I wouldn’t find much, and they weren’t en tirely wrong. These women who had fought so publicly for the right to vote tended to live very private lives. Publicly, they dedicated themselves to reform, giving speeches and writing letters and articles to promote social change. Privately, many suffragists had pas sionate queer love affairs, creating their own chosen families to support each other. Alice Morgan Wright was one of these suffragists. She grew up in Albany, New York, and went on to become a sculptor, an advocate for women’s rights, and a leader of the animal rights movement. Biographers frequently noted that Edith J. Goode was her closest friend and constant companion. In searching for more about their relation ship, I scoured Wright’s extensive collection of materials. On the surface, there wasn’t much. There were no letters between them. There was no hard evidence to indicate little more than a friendship. This only made me more curious. Wright’s collection included a large cache of letters that she had written to family and friends. If Goode were such a close friend, why was there no correspon dence between them? A careful reading of all of Wright’s corre

spondence turned up a hint in a single line of a letter between Goode and a friend. Wright had fallen ill and, fearing that she didn’t have long to live, Goode wrote: “I want to read every scrap of Wright’s memo randa I have assembled as well as her corre spondence with me over the years.” This was proof that they had exchanged letters, whether they had survived or not. Although this finding offered no definitive answer about their relationship, the archival silence seemed to speak volumes. Goode’s choice to remove the letters was an important clue. For most suffragists, living their lives openly was not possible. Some, especially those who lived into the virulently homo phobic post-World War II era, chose to de stroy evidence of their queer lives by burning their personal letters and diaries. In other cases, relatives, descendants, or biog raphers erased aspects of a suffragist’s queerness, fearing that these facts would tarnish their reputation. Perhaps that is what Goode chose to do. However, I wasn’t ready to give up on the story of Wright and Goode. The more I searched, the more I found. I read through Wright’s tattered school notebooks and ex amined drafts of creative writings in her journals. Individually, they weren’t much, but collectively, they revealed a very queer life. I found poems from her college days that she had spent at Smith with Goode. One

seemed especially revelatory of Wright’s dreams: There is a land where duties cease, Where life is but a fairy song, Where zephyrs breath, the whole day long The harmony of perfect peace. ... For there the king am I, and thou The queen of all that realm as fair. Our feathered minstrels of the air Sing odes to us from branch and bough. ... And side by side, thy hand in mine, We wander through the poppy field. The rainbow cliffs above us yield The splendours of their glowing line. But soon grows dim that mystic light And dies the rosy gleam so sweet, For on the ground beneath our feet I see our shadows still and white. The blue lake sinks beside the lea, The poppies turn from red to gray, The rainbow mountains fade away, I see dissolve the endless sea. And now, my strange short reign has ceased In vain my heart to thine still cries The love-light dies within thine eyes As comes the day up from the east. The world of things that are appears, As fades the world of things that seem. But sweet the memory of my dream You with me through the waking years.

TheG & LR

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