Jeb and Dash: A Diary of Gay Life, 1918-1945

The torment and loneliness of homosexuality in a more repressive era is palpably evoked in this intense diary of Jeb Alexander (1899-1965), the pseudonym for Russell's uncle. Jeb, who was an editor in a government office in Washington, D.C., bequeathed to Russell 50 volumes of diaries from which she distilled this selection. Extending from the WW I armistice to the stock market crash to the defeat of fascism, this gracefully written diary includes myriad impressions of topical events and people like Will Rogers, Pola Negri, Thornton Wilder, Charles Lindbergh and others. But the unifying thread is Jeb's love affairs, including his long time relationship with C. C. Dasham, a state department employee. Readers are privy to Jeb's fears that he may be under police surveillance as a suspected ``deviant'' criminal, and to his distress over an unsympathetic society that allows him little happiness or peace of mind. Photos. (Nov.)