Throughout his writing career, even as a screenwriter, Larry Kramer focused on matters relating to homosexuality. His screenplay of Lawrence’s Women in Love emphasized Lawrence’s thinly veiled dealings with homosexuality in that novel. Kramer emphasized this in his film version. His gay novel, Faggots, although it cannot legitimately be called a critical or artistic success, has stayed in print almost continuously since its publication in 1978 and is said to have sold close to half a million copies. In it, as in his unhappy experience with the bureaucracy of the Gay Men’s Health Crisis, are found intimations of themes explored in his two most strident plays, The Normal Heart, which has evoked comparisons to Henrik Ibsen’s En folkefiende (pb. 1882; An Enemy of the People, 1890), and The Destiny of Me. Kramer’s nonfiction also emphasizes the inroads that AIDS has made on the lives of all Americans.

The Normal Heart

The Normal Heart is transparently autobiographical. Ned Weeks, the protagonist, devotes himself to arousing the public about the dangers of AIDS. As the play progresses, Kramer, as playwright, becomes increasingly angry, finally erupting into an unequivocal rage against the government, the medical profession, the press, and the gay community for their reluctance to deal with the crisis and to work toward eliminating it.

The play takes place in the early years of AIDS, the years in which Kramer was deeply involved in the Gay Men’s Health Crisis. He wrote the play shortly after his unhappy departure from that organization. He attacks gay leaders who lack the courage to deal effectively with the situation, focusing on the feeling of many of them that they cannot condemn promiscuous sex, as Kramer did in Faggots, because they have been chanting the mantra of sexual liberation for so long.

Ned Weeks joins an organization that seeks to assist people with AIDS but—more important—to promote safe sex among gays. Ned becomes so abrasive in his fanatical demands that promiscuity cease that he is expelled from the organization, as Kramer was from the Gay Men’s Health Crisis. Ned’s lover subsequently dies of AIDS, which intensifies Ned’s zeal. He castigates The New York Times for not using its clout to draw attention to the crisis. He blames New York City mayor Ed Koch for not caring about the plight of AIDS patients, and he accuses the gay community of failing to deal realistically with the disease through the practice of safe sex.

The Normal Heart had a highly successful and prolonged run in New York. It garnered several prizes for its author, but its chief contribution was that it exposed a seemingly complacent public to a situation it could not ignore for much longer.

Just Say No

Just Say No is a farce that attacks the hypocrisy of those who control society, those who determine what is right and attempt to impose this determination on everyone else. The play is set in Georgetown in the fictional nation of New Columbia. The leading characters are Mrs. Potentate, the wife of the Potentate-in-Chief; Junior, their gay son; and the gay mayor of Appleberg, the country’s largest northeastern city. Kramer admitted that the play was very controversial and did not hold great hope for its success. It was produced Off-Broadway by the WPA Theater for a limited run. It was generally considered a failure.

The Destiny of Me

This sequel to The Normal Heart again has Ned Weeks as its protagonist, but in this play, Ned is dying of AIDS. The action takes place in his hospital room. Ned has developed full-blown AIDS and is...