[BERKOWITZ, Richard (b.1955), and CALLEN, Michael (1955–1993)]

How to Have Sex in an Epidemic: One Approach

New York: Tower Press/News From The Front Publications, May 1983 [first printing]

Stapled pamphlet, 214 x 138mm; pp. [4], 40.

[WITH:]

[CAMPBELL, Bobbi (1952–1984), et al.]

Play Fair!

San Francisco: The San Francisco Order of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, 1982

Folded leaflet, 90 × 145mm, opening to 533 × 145mm; 11 panels of text and duotone illustrations

A landmark in the history of safe sex: two of the earliest guides to the prevention of the spread of HIV/AIDS – with ‘acquired immunodeficiency syndrome’ (AIDS) having been named only in July 1982 – the year Play Fair! was issued – and ‘human immunodeficiency virus’ (HIV) having been isolated and named only in May 1983, the same month as How to Have Sex in an Epidemic was published.

Play Fair! was the work of the ‘Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence’, a group that debuted on Easter weekend in 1979, when Ken Bunch, Fred Brungard, and Baruch Golden wore nun's habits and walked around San Francisco's Castro district and a nearby nude beach.

By 1982 the high incidence of the rare Kaposi’s sarcoma – later known as an indicator of HIV/AIDS – had made clear that a serious public health crisis was developing. As was to become a pattern, the gay community felt that self organization was a matter of survival, and the Sisters decided to issue a sex-positive guide to safe sex, in support of the LGBTQ community. Among the group was Sister Florence Nightmare, RN (Bobbi Campbell), a public health nurse who in 1981 had written a powerful piece of proto-AIDS activist writing entitled ‘I Will Survive’ – the first such public announcement.

Play Fair! is a striking in its use of humour and absurd visuals – but the message was deadly serious, with the introductory panel concluding:

We are giving these diseases to ourselves and each other through selfishness and ignorance. We are destroying ourselves. Please read this pamphlet, and become aware, become responsible, and share the knowledge with your friends.‍

How to Have Sex in an Epidemic an important counterpart to Play Fair! – the two of them often described as the beginning of the safe sex movement.

The authors of How to Have Sex, Richard Berkowitz and Michael Callen, were both gay activists living in New York, and both had been diagnosed with AIDS when they decided to write this guide to safe sex. At the time, uncertainty over the cause of AIDS was high, and in fact Berkowitz and Callen argue for the so-called ‘multifactorial theory’, which was in the process of being disproved when they were writing. Moreover, both authors were aware that they were writing on a hugely controversial topic: the nascent AIDS crisis was already being used as a means to undermine the gains of gay rights activists of the previous decades, and some saw the advocacy of safe sex as an implicit critique of the gay community. How to Have Sex is therefore predominantly sex-positive, in particular in arguing for safe sex over any attempt to put a limit on frequency or number of partners.

How to Have Sex in near fine condition: staples beginning to rust but not affecting the paper; covers clean and almost entirely unmarked; internally fine. Retaining the original ‘News From The Front’ insert, explaining that net profits from the sale of this first printing will be donated to the AIDS Medical Research Foundation.

Play Fair! in very good condition, with very light surface wear and a little offsetting to the rear panel.