“I was lucky to find a teacher, a guide — Rabbi Joseph Singer, 62, born in Poland to a family of rabbis, the 10th-generation descendent of Gershon Kitover, who was the brother-in-law of Baal Shem Tov, founder of the hasidic movement.”
Originally published April 24, 1978
"Legs, you asshole," I said. "I am not doing this story on you. I am not taking the responsibility for making you famous."
Originally published August 7, 1978
“Without a doubt, Armstrong was the greatest trumpet player of the century — the most powerful, the most touching, the most varied”
Originally published August 14, 1978
“Once gay power was a joyous cry in this town. Then the thrust toward radicalism died. The stuffed-shirt gay politico appeared. Lethargy set in”
Originally published December 11, 1978
Voice writers Karen Durbin, Richard Goldstein, Mark Jacobson, James Wolcott, Tom Allen, Terry Curtis Fox, and J. Hoberman weigh in on the 1978 film
Originally published January 30, 1978
"In America, people sometimes hope New York will die before the close of the century. And so the spectre of another Yankee Frankenstein rising from the ash of urban blight is enough to turn stomachs from Shawnee Mission to Walla Walla"
Originally published October 30, 1978
“I cannot go out a loser, Jack Johnson went out a loser. Sugar Ray went out a loser. Joe Louis went out a loser… I got to be that black man who gets out on top.”
Originally published October 16, 1978
“When I actually made myself look at Harlem, what I saw was so bizarre that, even with the help of those homicide detectives, I found it bewildering — another country, another planet.”
Originally published December 25, 1978
“Don’t wait for a critical consensus to form around a film before you deign to see it. Rush off on your own, and maybe you can start your own cult.”
Originally published December 18, 1978
“The nation’s only openly gay city official had been shot dead, allegedly by the city’s most anti-gay official.”
Originally published December 4, 1978