Sinclair (Seid): "Wasteland," 1946

A Novel by Ruth Seid

Ruth Seid (using the pseudonym Jo Sinclair) published a novel Wasteland in which a therapist helps a young woman come to terms with her lesbianism and full humanity, and helps her brother come to terms with his Jewishness and humanity. The novel, remarkable for its time, was published in the brief period between the end of World War II and the start of the repressive 1950s. In this period humanitarian values suggested that cultural diversity (including sexual and religious diversity) could be appreciated as part of the human continuum. African American novelist Richard Wright provided a glowing blurb for the jacket of Wasteland (see jacket below).

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Add text from Jonathan Ned Katz, Gay American History: Lesbians and Gay Men in the U.S.A. (NY: Crowell, 1976) or Jonathan Ned Katz, Gay/Lesbian Almanac (NY: Harper & Row, 1983)