In the early 1980s, a little understood disease called AIDS was stigmatized as society turned its head away from the hundreds of gay men it was killing. But then Larry Kramer published his essay “1,112 and Counting.”
In the early 1980s, a little understood disease called AIDS was stigmatized as society turned its head away from the hundreds of gay men it was killing. But then Larry Kramer published his essay “1,112 and Counting.”
“If this article doesn’t rouse you to anger, fury, rage and action, gay men have no future on this earth,” Kramer wrote. “Unless we fight for our lives we shall die.”
With that one essay, Kramer helped shift the nation’s attention to the spread of HIV, and his continued activism, while often divisive, helped propel the US to respond to the crisis in the way it did.
That game changer, who many credit as saving thousands of lives affected by HIV and AIDS, died Wednesday in New York.
He was 84.
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Kramer died from pneumonia, his close friend and literary executor, William Schwalbe, told CNN.
“Larry made a huge contribution to our world as an activist but also as a writer,” said Schwalbe, who had known Kramer for 57 years. “I believe that his plays and novels, from ‘The Normal Heart’ to ‘The American People’ will more than stand the test of time.”
He brought AIDS to the forefront
Kramer, an Oscar-nominated screenwriter, further brought the AIDS epidemic to the public eye with his semi-autobiographical play “The Normal Heart,” which focused on the rise of the AIDS crisis in New York and was later adapted into an HBO film in 2014.
