Queer Nottingham 1960-1990

by C.J. DeBarra

Notts Queer History Archive volume 1
Both a historical record and a celebration of unique stories, people and places, Queer Nottingham 1960-1990 gives us a powerful glimpse into the lives of LGBTQ+ individuals in and around Nottingham over three pivotal decades of the last century.

170 interviews, combined with archive materials and research, take us from the underground queer spaces of the Swinging Sixties through the fights for LGBT+ liberation in the Seventies to the heartbreaking years of AIDS fear and activism. The stories told reveal the struggles, queer joys and activism that defined the community, and shed light on the fight for recognition and equality during a time when being queer often meant living in the shadows.

CJ DeBarra is an Irish author and journalist based in Nottingham. They founded the Notts Queer History Archive in 2022 as an oral history project to capture LGBT+ stories. The archive has created two books, an exhibition, two permanent archives, and has enabled part of the UK AIDS quilt to be displayed in Nottingham. DeBarra's first book, , was published by Global Words Press in 2023.

188 pages, Paperback

First published July 18, 2025

Reviews

[Simon Smalley · Rating 5 out of 5]

CJ DeBarra is an astonishing social researcher whose devotion to the subject in question is impressive and incomparable.

It is imperative to correctly record testimony from those who lived in a defined era or who took part in a certain activity, to log their authentic voices before it is too late. The Internet can be a wonderful resource, but truth is easily distorted by those who weren’t there. Such misinformation is granted credence and becomes established as the authoritative new truth.

This is why such an exhaustive work as the two volumes of Queer Nottingham are undoubtedly important.

It is no easy task for me to illustrate specifics as the books are laden with often startling instances of our collective queer Nottingham history, but here, celebrity characters as diverse as Vesta Tilley and Justin Fashanu sit alongside those of more minor local legend.

As one of the interviewees, I spent many hours with CJ who serves as an intuitive conduit from the past to the present, and has has the ability to write with a casual ease that makes the content extremely readable and engaging.

This is no work of stuffy academia. On the contrary, it is comprehensively addictive, and I believe destined to be a crucial source of reference for future generations long after those who were fortunate enough to be interviewed are memories themselves.

The publication of Queer Nottingham has been eagerly awaited, and I’m sure that ‘best seller’ is not too lofty an accolade to already bestow upon it.

Highly recommended.

[Oscar Power · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m a fairly recent transplant to Nottingham, within the past couple of years. Moving from a series of smaller towns to what is (comparatively) the big city has been something of a joy for me, especially to find a place with such a vibrant literary, cultural, and queer scene. This book, in that regard, serves to cement that joy. It is an eminently readable account of the queer history of not just Nottingham, but also serves a valuable social record of the changing attitudes of both British society (the excerpts of newspaper letters quoted are certainly eye opening) and of the queer community itself (the oral history interviews are very valuable in this regard).
I very much can’t wait for the second volume, though I’m going to have to buy another copy as a few pages from the end I accidentally left it on a bus! I don’t mind much though as I enjoyed it that much.

[Sam R · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book, well researched and extremely interesting.