Larry Kramer

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Larry Kramer (2010)

Laurence David "Larry" Kramer (born June 25, 1935 in Bridgeport , Connecticut , † May 27, 2020 in New York City ) was an American author , playwright and LGBT activist.

He was best known for the controversial novel Faggots (1978), in which he described gay life in New York, and for the play The Normal Heart, which focuses on the effects of the AIDS crisis .

Life

Laurence Kramer was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, the younger of two children. His parents were Rea Wishengrad, who worked and taught in a shoe store, and George Kramer, who had a law degree. His family was of Jewish descent. Kramer graduated from Yale University with a BA in English in 1957 . His father, two of his uncles, and older brother Arthur were Yale graduates. Upon graduation, he became assistant to the President of Columbia Pictures and later the President of United Artists .

As a result of the AIDS crisis , he founded the organization Gay Men's Health Crisis , which became the largest organization of its kind in the United States. He later initiated the Act Up organization and was one of its founders. The Act Up organization achieved a change in public health policy in the United States due to its protest actions and campaigns and significantly influenced the attitude of American society in dealing with HIV and AIDS .

Kramer lived in New York City and Connecticut until his death . He lived with the architect David Webster from 1991, with whom he was married from 2013. Kramer died in May 2020, a month before his 85th birthday.

plant

In 1978 his only novel, Fagots , was published, in which Kramer describes gay life in New York. The book was extremely controversial, but nonetheless became one of the best-selling "gay books" of all time. Thirty-three years after the first publication, a German translation of Fagots appeared for the first time in December 2011 with Schwuchteln . With The Normal Heart , Kramer also wrote one of the first dramas about the AIDS crisis.

Be on the novel Women in Love by DH Lawrence -based script for the feature film Women in Love earned him a nomination in 1971 for the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay one. Kramer was also a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize . He received the Obie Award twice .

Larry Kramer's actions and his artistic work from the 1980s onwards were determined by the fight against political and social AIDS arrogance. In March 1983 he wrote the famous article 1,112 and Counting on the inhuman disinterest that is felt in homosexual men dying of AIDS.

Scripts

novel

  • 1978: Fagots (German Schwuchteln , Bruno Gmünder Verlag, 2011)

Plays

  • 1974: Four Friends
  • 1985: The Normal Heart
  • 1988: Just Say No, A Play about a Farce
  • 1992: The Destiny of Me
  • 2002: A Minor Dark Age

Non-fiction

  • 1989: Reports from the Holocaust: The Story of an AIDS Activist (expanded edition 1994)
  • 2005: The Tragedy of Today's Gays
  • The American People: A history (unpublished manuscript)

Films (as an actor)

Speeches (selection)

  • The tragedy of today's gays , Cooper Union, NYC, November 10, 2004
  • We are not crumps, we must not accept crumbs - Notes to Act Up 20th Annual Meeting , NY Lesbian and Gay Community Center , March 13, 2007

Honors and prizes

Web links

Commons : Larry Kramer  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Daniel Lewis: Larry Kramer, Playwright and Outspoken AIDS Activist, Dies at 84 , nytimes.com, published and accessed May 27, 2020
  2. ^ Daniel Lewis: Larry Kramer, Playwright and Outspoken AIDS Activist, Dies at 84 . In: The New York Times . May 27, 2020, ISSN  0362-4331 ( nytimes.com [accessed May 28, 2020]).
  3. ↑ Explore & Learn The Normal Heart. Retrieved May 28, 2020 (American English).
  4. ↑ Bernd Graff: Obituary - Larry Kramer is dead. Accessed June 3, 2020 .
  5. ↑ Patrick Healy: Larry Kramer Is Married in Hospital Ceremony. In: ArtsBeat. July 25, 2013, Retrieved May 27, 2020 (American English).
  6. ^ The 43rd Academy Awards 1971 - Writing (Screenplay - based on material from another medium) . In: oscars.org, accessed May 28, 2020.
  7. ^ The tragedy of today's gays
  8. ↑ We are not crumps, we must not accept crumbs
  9. ^ A b AIDS Activist Discusses 25-Year Battle , Harry Smith, CBS Sunday Morning , June 26, 2006, accessed April 19, 2007
  10. ^ One Hundred Plays of the Century ( Memento of May 5, 2009 on the Internet Archive ), National Theater online, accessed April 19, 2007.
personal data
SURNAME Kramer, Larry
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kramer, Laurence David
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American author and playwright
DATE OF BIRTH June 25, 1935
PLACE OF BIRTH Bridgeport , Connecticut, United States
DATE OF DEATH May 27, 2020
Place of death New York City