Girls, Visions and Everything

by Sarah Schulman

This reissued novel takes readers on a "wry and playful" (Out!) tour of lesbian sex, politics, and art in New York City. The city's sizzling -- especially at the Kitsch-Inn, where the girls are mounting an all-female production of A Streetcar Named Desire.

Genres: Fiction, Queer, LGBT, Lesbian, Novels, New York, Contemporary

178 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1986

About the author

Sarah Schulman is a longtime AIDS and queer activist, and a cofounder of the MIX Festival and the ACT UP Oral History Project. She is a playwright and the author of seventeen books, including the novels The Mere Future, Shimmer, Rat Bohemia, After Delores, and People in Trouble, as well as nonfiction works such as The Gentrification of the Mind: Witness to a Lost Imagination, My American History: Lesbian and Gay Life during the Reagan/Bush Years, Ties That Bind: Familial Homophobia and Its Consequences, and Stagestruck: Theater, AIDS, and the Marketing of Gay America. She is Distinguished Professor of the Humanities at The City University of New York, College of Staten Island.

Reviews

[anna marie · Rating 5 out of 5]

hot queer shit !!!!

[Sian Lile-Pastore · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some thoughts...

I enjoyed this a lot. It's more of a series of encounters and experiences rather than a plot-driven story, which I'm fine with, but it means that it's a bit more of a challenging read. The main character talks a lot about(and reads) 'On the Road' and there is a similarity of style between the beat classic and 'Girls, Visions and Everything', except, notably there's no road, there's just New York City in the early 80s and gentrification and a slice of real life and times. Schulman writes in the introduction that she wrote it in response to Jack Kerouac:

'I was insisting on the experience of community in the trajectory of popular American heroism and therefore asserting that fiction with primary lesbian content should be recognized as an integral part of American literature. If I could stretch to universalize to Jack Kerouac, then the dominant-culture reader must be able to reciprocate by universalizing me. This last goal has not yet been realized.'

which is great and also really interesting...

So. I guess it's a sort of lesbian Kerouac (actually, thinking about it it's reminiscent of Jan Kerouac's style in Baby Driver: A Story About Myself which I'm a huge fan of and was written in the early 80s too) and a precursor to some of the writers I love, like Michelle Tea and Eileen Myles.


couple of quotes I liked -

'I'm not falling in love until 1990. I refuse to be romantic during the Reagan era.'

and

'They tried out a few creative slogans, since slogan writing is second nature to urban lesbians.
"Cruise People, Not Missiles"
"More Dykes, No Nukes."'

and
'Do you think gay people will ever be safe? Emily asked.'

[Morgan M. Page · Rating 4 out of 5]

"[...] Since gay people as a group change very quickly and things become dated, then nostalgic, then historic, in a matter of months. As Helen Hayes had put it, 'Today's kitsch is tomorrow's collectible.'"

Sarah Schulman's early novel Girls, Visions, and Everything is in retrospect a nostalgic and historic romp through the early gentrification of the East Village, seen through the eyes of a small group of lesbian writers and artists at The Kitsch-Inn. Schulman makes you long for a New York that no longer exists, even as she underscores the precarity with which the marginalized denizens of the then already-disappearing era lived. In conversation with her novels that followed - After Delores, People in Trouble, Empathy, Rat Bohemia - Schulman has written an essential history of the creeping destruction wrought by gentrification through the 1980s and 1990s leading to the current playground for rich kids that Manhattan has become.

[Bien]

woooooow oké ik moet even men gedachten kwijt

- Sarah Schulman's schrijfstijl doet mijn hoofd echt goed! soort van fragmentarisch maar toch brengt ze het allemaal weer samen op een manier. en zo heerlijk eerlijk!! erotiek in haar naakte schoonheid joepie! (eigenlijk wist ik dit al maar in de 2 jaar sinds mijn laatste encounter met Schulman was ik het alweer vergeten)

- I'm a sucker voor queer New-York en mijn liefde voor dit boek bevestigt en hernieuwd dat weer hihi

- De manier waarop lesbian constellations en community tot leven komen, maakt me warm en in some ways voelt het alsof ik er bij hoor ofzo? Want ookal vindt dit verhaal plaats in de jaren 80 in een totaal andere situatie, toch voelen veel van de emoties heel dichtbij. Zo de liefde voor je community maar ook de dagelijkse realiteit ervan. Ook: heel dit boek is lesbians die een beetje de straten en de art-spaces in de stad ronddwalen en elkaar tegenkomen en een beetje chillen en affaires hebben enzo en dat is gewoon alles wat ik wil

- maar deze ronddwalingen zijn verweven met de harde realiteit van een veranderende, gentrificerende stad en dat maakt dit boek veel meer dan een luchtig schrijfseltje.

- They watched [A Streetcar Named Desire] and both agreed that the message was too sad. It said that life is a trap and anyone who tries to create their own magic will be destroyed. [...] Even when life is sad, people still have a good time. That's what these women and all their friends were trying to say everyday, in their different ways."

- als ik sterren moet geven misschien 4,5 ofzo maar ja wat zijn sterren

[Imogen · Rating 4 out of 5]

really crumbs away from 5 stars. this book makes me want to live in nyc. and be a lesbian? cool read.

[Adele · Rating 5 out of 5]

Weird, wonderful, funny, sad. Full of LOVE for community and place.

[Zain · Rating 5 out of 5]

Challenges the perception that existing and thriving are mutually exclusive.

[Madeleine · Rating 5 out of 5]

sexy smart interesting strange… i look at lila’s dilettantism and crushes and see a refraction of my own life in new york over the past decade, even as the neighborhood it documents has been so decimated

[Maddy · Rating 5 out of 5]

A new favorite. It’s hard to find novel that nails the romance and the realism. Maybe what it is: the sharp wit and delicately conveyed beauty sparkle brighter in a doomed world. LOVED!!!

[Willow · Rating 5 out of 5]

my favorite sarah schulman yet, and will probably become one of my favorite novels ever. a very life affirming novel, for us girls without a context.

[Nairne Holtz · Rating 5 out of 5]

In Girls, Visions, and Everything, we meet protagonist Lila Futuransky, an aspiring writer and Jack Kerouac fan, who ponders, as the novel itself does, what freedom and being an outlaw mean. Does the outlaw sensibility and freedom from conventional life espoused by the Beats translate to a group of art dykes living in New York’s gentrifying East Village in the 1980s? The answer, of course, is both yes and no. Mostly no, because these women are more about community obligation, and their freedom is constrained by discrimination and harassment. Lila’s world is not the open road—it’s ten city blocks in a New York not as siloed as it is today by disparities in wealth. It’s a place where “the men in [Lila’s] life” are three homeless guys on her street with whom she has daily interactions. It is a mixed social world where lesbians are intersectional in their politics and polyamorous. It’s an art world devoid of ambition where poor lesbians work crappy day jobs and make art for themselves and each other—a campy version of A Streetcar Named Desire; a festival of deliberately bad performance art; and a short story about being rejected, which Lila shoves under the door of the woman who rejected her. Their art, unlike those of the Beats, couldn’t be commodified, but the women don’t care so much—they are preoccupied by rising rents and love affairs. Big-hearted Lila is falling in love with a high-strung costume designer and soon may have to choose between the freedom to love many, and the responsibility of cherishing one. This is a charming tender-queer novel that nicely captures the near-past.

[Theo Dora · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Isabel, when God tells you that you can have anything you want, what are you going to ask for?”
“I don’t know.” Isabel answered, scratching her head. “I wouldn’t want to get any of the things that I want too suddenly, because then the fun and the search and the dreams would all be over. It’s not the satisfaction I’m after. I like thinking about new ways of doing things and then making up shows about the trying. Do you think God could give me something like that?”
“You’ve already got that.”
“Oh, yeah. Well, how about health insurance?”

[Brianna · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm unsure about this. I certainly enjoyed reading it quite a lot, but I can't tell whether I think it's well-written. Also: what was that ending? I wish we had some more explanation. But overall, enjoyable to read and detailing a very important part of LGTBQ (mostly lesbian) life in New York in the 80s.

[kot · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sarah Schulman writes a love story? I started to get nervous about it. Thank God for the last couple of chapters--you restored my faith in the cynical, snarky, overwhelming and gut-wrenching Schulman.

[Kate · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book and, as other reviewers have mentioned, there are a lot of great quotes. I also appreciated the insights provided in this book. There are beautiful, funny, and dark moments, all wrapped up into one. Sarah Schulman’s preface at the beginning is excellent.

[Bingqian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Could’ve been better written. The first half of the book is rather dry. Wandering on the street in New York is such a topic with potentials, even though the protagonist’s life is supposed to be banal. The second half contains some decent quotes. The ending where Emily and Lila walking down the street, hand in hand, actually made me sad.

[Hilo]

Das lustigste Dykebuch, das ich bisher gelesen habe

[jo]

I LOVE LESBIANS !!!!!!!!

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love gay people.

[Madisen Armstrong · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 ⭐️s

[Dhani S · Rating 5 out of 5]

Schulman writes of a period before queerness was marketable, and the continued invisibility of lesbian life and what kind of possibilities emerge from that... such a fun, sexy, eye-opening look into the changing cultural, geographical landscape that was new york in the 80s.

[Relly Robinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Lila sat quietly, never moving, while Isabel danced around the roof, pointing to the skyscrapers and tenements, using the bridges as her blackboard.” Finished this couple of weeks ago but will be sitting with it for awhile, I hope. So beautiful and lovely and also painful—much like living in this city. Vivid and sweet and melancholy. “Sometimes love means finding out more about yourself than you ever really wanted to know.” Need I say more?

[Meagan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book in my local Little Free Library, and what a treat! Very well written and intriguing. I really enjoyed the evolution of the main character, Lila, from the beginning to the end of the novel.

[em · Rating 3 out of 5]

"i'm not falling in love until 1990. i refuse to be romantic during the reagan era. i'm waiting for a democratic president." this book had the same energy as the films 'skate kitchen', 'the watermelon woman', and 'do the right thing' all mixed up into one. a lesbian's 'on the road'. needless to say, the vibes were immaculate.

the late 80s, gritty, enduring-while-quietly-changing depiction of new york city was so visceral and real, it made the story feel palpable. the setting was so well-done, it was as distinct as it was believable.

this strong sense of place made the characters even more complex because although we don't get to spend a lot of time with them, they became unique in voice against the vibrant backdrop of the city. also these characters deal with and experience may of the same hardships, complications, as well as joys, that the lgbtq+ community does now. beyond their identity, these characters faced the same societal and systematic problems that are still around today, especially gentrification, an unnecessary war, and a housing crisis.

i have to include some of my favorite quotes because there were so many;

"well, maybe you'll get some good material at least. remember, when your heart is breaking, write it down. when a relationship is over, what do you have? you have nothing. but if you write it down, you have material. that's the best a girl can hope for in these troubled times."

"men slept with women all the time and they still didn't understand them."

"no moving around like the old days. new york is closed. pretty soon it's just going to be bag ladies and rich people stepping over them, plus a few old timers hiding out in their rent-controlled apartments hoping no one's gonna notice. for everybody else, the city is closed."

"all of this was why she had been seriously considering taking a trip somewhere, just to remember that lila would be lila wherever she was standing and it didn't have to be on those four square blocks below fourteenth street surrounded by those same old girls. she needed to take a trip like jack's. but, then again, maybe it would be different for a woman. maybe it didn't require a road at all."

a beautiful description of intersectionality in a place as all-encompassing as nyc. a reckoning and a coming-of-age, all in the course of a summer.

[Vanessa (V.C.) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Girls, Visions, and Everything might be lacking in plot, but how it packs a punch in a series of vignettes that serve as a throwback of 80's NYC when it was gritty, dangerous, and full of chutzpa with seedy characters that were as risk-taking as they were beloved. Lila Futuranksy is a Jack Kerouac-esque dyke about town who always has a copy of ON THE ROAD in tow and an elusive crush on the horizon. She and numerous queer characters from lesbians to gay and bisexual men color this nostalgic, breezy read of a book. Again, the story here is barely-there and pretty loose, but the characters are so charming, interesting, and natural that you get a real sense that they represent Sarah Schulman and the people she knew from a New York City of long-ago. When you look back on the author's work and how she has long fought for queer liberation (especially through the HIV/AIDS movement through ACT UP), it makes even more sense why Girls, Visions, and Everything feels like a time capsule of maybe Sarah's younger-days as a wise, wide-eyed activist who had a lot to say about gentrification, feminism, politics, pop culture, sex, and same-sex love, but also knew how to have a good carefree time, as did everyone back in those days. This book above all was truly a delight and will have you wishing, even if only for a moment, that we'd have for one last time that NYC of yesteryear that the author experienced first-hand. Plus, I LOVED the ending which was surprising, yet not surprising, and yet a very thrilling way nonetheless to finish off this super-queer, very 80's piece.

[Grace · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book took me by surprise. I had no idea what I was getting into when I picked it up, and I ended up loving so much more than I could ever have predicted. For starters, Lila was such a fun and compelling main character. She has so much self confidence, and it allows her to do what ever she wants for the entirety of the book, creating an entertaining, unpredictable tale. Despite being a sort of slice of life of a summer in New York City, I was never bored thanks to Lila’s antics. I also loved how it was all loosely tied together by Lila’s reread of On the Road. It was an interesting framing device, as she frequently returns to the book and lets in influence her thoughts and decisions. I really loved Lila’s internal dialogue, which often veered into the philosophical. All that is to say I loved Lila as the main character and how vibrant and full her life was. I also loved her love interest, Emily. She was a deeply complex character, and caused Lila’s character development, culminating in what I thought was a fantastic ending. So overall I recommend!

[Anna · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was fine, I didn't hate it like the two stars might suggest; I just didn't get a whole lot from it. I never got close to the characters despite the explicit intimacy of their physical relationships and some of their deepest fears being shared on the pages. The sharing was very casual. I didn't understand the protagonist's motivations at all. The ending really took me by surprise. It's uneventful, generally, more of a musing over a series of moments relating to love and sex, with some 80s queer politics thrown in.

[Lafe C · Rating 4 out of 5]

A portrait of a steamy summer in 1980's NYC as wealthy white gentrification encroaches on the protagonist, Lila's, neighborhood and community. This is the backdrop to a rich cast of characters who are trying to figure out whether to make art or to make money, whether to remain independent or to build intimacy and connection, whether to fight back or to stay safe, and just how much they are open to being changed by love as a choice repeated.

[Tess · Rating 4 out of 5]

Schulman often talks about not receiving any formal training in novel writing, just writing what she knows and feels. Her raw, experimental style is perfectly suited to what she is writing about. There is a real immediacy to the writing and the characters jump off the page. I wouldn’t say this book is perfect, but it is brilliant.

[Leigh · Rating 4 out of 5]

this book takes place during pride 1984 and it was really fun to read it during pride month in 2025 and make comparisons. the author lost me a couple times but for the most part i was sucked in. im not quite sure how i feel about the ending though. regardless it feels like an important part of queer media/history.