The Pink Line

CHOSEN AS ONE OF THE GUARDIAN'S and FINANCIAL TIMES' BOOKS OF 2020

'In this masterful recounting of sexuality and identity around the globe, Mark Gevisser achieves an almost shocking empathy...In intimate, often tender prose, he brings to life the complex movement for queer civil rights and the many people on whom it bears. Whether recounting suffering or triumph, he is a clear-sighted, fearless, and generous guide.' - Andrew Solomon

'His book is both enlightening and disturbing in a world where the wish to be understood can become a commodity of domination.' - Sarah Schulman

'A smart and sobering book for our times.' - Susan Stryker, author of Transgender History: The Roots of Today's Revolution

Six years in the making, The Pink Line follows protagonists from nine countries all over the globe to tell the story of how "LGBT Rights" become one of the world's new human rights frontiers in the second decade of the twenty-first century.

From refugees in South Africa to activists in Egypt, transgender women in Russia and transitioning teens in the American Mid-West, The Pink Line folds intimate and deeply affecting stories of individuals, families and communities into a definitive account of how the world has changed, so dramatically, in just a decade.

And in doing so he reveals a troubling new equation that has come in to play: while same-sex marriage and gender transition are now celebrated in some parts of the world, laws to criminalise homosexuality and gender non-conformity have been strengthened in others. In a work of great scope and wonderful storytelling, this is the groundbreaking, definitive account of how issues of sexuality and gender identity divide and unite the world today.