100 Heroes: Paul Monette

Paul Monette was an author, poet, and activist.

Life and career

Born in Massachusetts in 1945, described his childhood as suffocating and alienating - being raised in a very religious household left him no alternative but to lead a closeted life as he navigated his sexuality.

Monette described his closeted existence as hindering his personal development as a child - forced to deny a part of his identity that was seen as sinful by everyone around him. He described his youth in the closet as an ‘internal exile', an ‘imprisonment', and claimed that closeted life equates to ‘the gutting of all our passions till we are a bunch of eunuchs.'

Leaving home, Monette moved to Boston where he taught writing and literature until 1978 when he moved to Los Angeles with his lover, Roger Horwitz.

It was during this period that Monette began publishing his writing - works of fiction that featured gay protagonists.

One of Monette's most notable works is Borrowed Time: An AIDS Memoir, published in 1988.

The memoir chronicles Horwitz's illness and death from AIDS-related causes - beginning with the day that he was diagnosed through until his death, a period of 19 months. Monette chronicles the loneliness and isolation of that experience.

Monette's subsequent memoir, Becoming a Man: Half a Life Story, was published in 1992 and tells of his life in the closet before coming out, culminating with his meeting Horwitz in 1974.

Fictional writing by Monette also centred people living with AIDS and the experiences of their families.

After the death of Horwitz, Monette began a relationship with Stephen Kolzak. Kolzak died of AIDS-related causes in 1990.

Monette died in 1995 of AIDS-related causes. He was survived by his then partner, Winston Wilde.