Yes, You Could Be Both Openly Gay and Conservative in the '80s

The Very Heart of It: New York Diaries, 1983–1994, by Thomas Mallon, Knopf, 592 pages, $40

Writing in 1985, arguably the worst year of the AIDS crisis, the leftist columnist Christopher Hitchens attacked closeted gays who preached right-wing politics. Once "out" (or in many cases "outed"), Hitchens argued, these onetime conservatives would "evolve politically" and renounce the Moral Majority and President Ronald Reagan's foreign policy. Opening up about their sex lives meant veering to the left.

But openly gay and right-wing were not always mutually exclusive in this era. Thomas Mallon—acclaimed novelist, prolific essayist, professor of English literature, and self-described "gay neoconservative"—provides a perfect example. On coming out, he didn't evolve politically so much as become more of what he already was.