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When Porter first came to London in 1992, that spectre felt close.
Photo: Sarah M Lee
Nineteen-year-old Johnny lands in London and falls for 45-year-old Jerry, who is HIV-positive.
What am I to do with this anger?
Jerry asks, before dying in 1995.
“Scott”—one of the quilt patches that appear inNova Scotia House.
How can we live life as fully, optimistically, and queerly as possible?
Vogue:Bring No ClothesandWhat Artists Wearare both so thoroughly researched and emotionally astute.
They feel like historical documents, but also radical emotive arcs.
“Chris”—one of the quilt patches that appear inNova Scotia House.
How does your nonfiction practice differ from your fiction?
I was writing this in a very different way, though.
My nonfiction books are very research-based.
“Malcolm”–one of the quilt patches that appear inNova Scotia House.
They happen during a days work in the British Library.
Theyre physically different as well.Bring No Clotheswas laptop-based.
I did all the image research, and that happensasIm writing.
My fiction is all handwritten in capital lettersthat was just because my handwriting is terrible.
We talk and think in ways that can be unclearwriting in capitals helps me to steer through that.
It was a thrill to have the opportunity to explore and really interrogate them without any sense of fandom.
Fiction writing, for me, is instead about letting people live.
My hope is that the reader can feel thatwhats happening on the page is just happening.
A lot of writers work with storyboards but, to me, that could become very stilted.
I let them walk around, I let them go to a party, see what happens.
Its an attempt to mimic an experience of living which doesnt believe in predestination.
Did you look to other AIDS crisis-related art or media?
I very much didnt seek it out during the writing process.
WhenIts a Sinbroadcast in 2021, I actively didnt watch it.
I knew that it was a different story to mine, different intention and era.
I just watched it for the first time last weekend, and I was completely broken by it.
Before that, it was important to keep the world I was making watertight.
But theres a generation lost to the AIDS crisis whose inner worlds we can no longer access.
How did you go about envisioning them?
My nonfiction relies on letters, diaries, archives.
Its also often the case that narratives around AIDS become very elegiacal.
The purpose is to reconnect with experimental living from before the AIDS crisis.
I could do that through language, making it as intimate as possible.
I guess what Im doing is inventing primary sources in the text.
Scottone of the quilt patches that appear inNova Scotia House.
Chrisone of the quilt patches that appear inNova Scotia House.
They open up new ideas for life.
How did you come to this powerful visual epiphany?
Thats one real moment in the book.
I was deep into the book, but I didnt know this would be a part of it.
In the States, they have theNAMES Project Aids Memorial Quilt.
Its a well-established charity organization.
The quilt is preserved and it can go out for loan.
Theres an offshoot quilt in the UKits a smaller operation that has never been formalized.
Its in storageas in, a lock-up.
In the mid-2010s, a collective of workers from HIV charities formed a partnership to save it.
Theyre incredible people working to get this hugely important social document in the public eye.
I like disappearing in books.
I like allowing the book itself to pivot the narrative.
My uncle died of AIDS-related illnesses in 1993.
That ephemera was very important to her to hold onto.
Im lucky to have even such small touch points with him.
I hope its cathartic for some.
You first came to London around the time of the books arc.
Did your experience inflect the book?
I came to London in 92.
With the book, I was interested in who I wasnt.
See, I couldnt even approach a guy.
Heres Johnny, someone who can speak up for what they want.
When I did start sleeping with men, there were times I wasnt able to voice my own feelings.
InBring No Clothes, I wrote about the fact I didnt sleep with anyone until I was 27.
It was important to do so to express how that reflected in the life of E.M. Forster.
It was liberating for me to write that.
With this book, I can really understand my desire to form this character.
They very naturally augment the narrative without feeling forced.
I wanted the book to be super hot.
Id never written like this before, even though Ive been writing fiction since about 2008.
I find that more hot than some euphemism-heavy description of sex thats supposed to change everyones lives.
I wanted sex to be a physical activity like all others we engage inlike walking or cooking.
Its just the hot one!
I didnt want queer sex to be treated as this secret world.
Malcolmone of the quilt patches that appear inNova Scotia House.
Jerry and Johnny meet by volunteering at a local park.
I wanted that energy of volunteering in a community.
Growing to eat and growing to live is super important.
Its what they have to do in this small council-flat gardenthose roots grow through the book.
Gardening is both so outside of time and within time.
But its also outside of time because, well, plants dont know that its the 90s!
Theyre outside of our need to define by time.
Thats what I wanted to do in the book as wellmove away from the obsession with time definition.
The 70s are never described in the usual way the 70s are described.
Its described in terms of a philosophy of living, rather than basic cliche and imagery.
Same with the 90s and the present day.
Their gardening is the same through each era.
Thats the worst month to be away from your garden.
I have volunteered in a public garden every Friday since 2019.
Its been so informative to my writing, thinking processes, and the rhythms of living.
Often writing happens while I garden.
The book ends on an optimistic note.
How important was it to articulate both peoples pain and resistance, as well as queer joy?
To reconnect with these losses and threatened ways of thinking and philosophies.
To feel it is possible to regrowbut its important that its not about recreating what once was.
I mean, you cant go live in a warehouse for free like they used to.
Theyve all been destroyed or converted into luxury flats.
The book is anti-nostalgia.
Theres so many future elders that were lost who cant pass on their knowledge.
Im really trying to bring those voices and ways of thinking to life.
I want the book to be encouraging, enabling, activating.
We must never forget what happened.
