In Gay Liberation after May '68, first published in France in
1974 and appearing here in English for the first time, Guy
Hocquenghem details the rise of the militant gay liberation movement
alongside the women's movement and other revolutionary organizing.
Writing after the apparent failure and eventual selling out of the
revolutionary dream of May 1968, Hocquenghem situates his theories of
homosexual desire in the realm of revolutionary practice, arguing
that revolutionary movements must be rethought through ideas of
desire and sexuality that undo stable gender and sexual identities.
Throughout, he persists in a radical vision of the world framed
through a queerness that can dismantle the oppressions of capitalism
and empire, the family, institutions, and, ultimately, civilization.
The articles, communiques, and manifestos that compose the book give
an archival glimpse at the issues queer revolutionaries faced while
also speaking to today's radical queers as they look to transform
their world.