simpering, young Neapolitan belles out for a night of adventure, sexhungry soldiers willing to settle for any port in a storm, cynical oldsters who have seen it all and are busily evolving their philosophy of frustration; there is blustering masculinity, wilting femininity, all of the moods and the frantic chatter which often characterize such places, and last but not least the rare and seldom-seen lovers who carry between them a manly and invulnerable dignity, whose homosexuality is only the minor evidence of a fearless and blazing spiritual comradeship.

Gay bars, whether in Naples during wartime, or in the City of Angels during peacetime, wear much the same face, whose aspects stem from the homosexual temperament itself. Here, frequently. in addition to Caucasian patrons of types referred to above, there are groups of Orientals and Negroes. If these latter feel a little uncertain of their welcome, they will usually monopolize one corner of the bar, and emerge only if invited. However, for those who have managed to crash through the invisible and illusory barriers of race, there is a free exchange of sociability and, one tends to think, a noticeably higher degree of dignity, understanding, and sophistication.

One can scarcely make any cogent observations on the Gay Bar without first making some observations on the anterior questions of bars generally, and finally the relationship of drinking to the single individual. So far as I have been able to observe, people. including myself, use artificial means to change their state of consciousness for one basic reason to escape from some form of dissatisfaction. Note that it is an "escape from," not a "solution for." The dissatisfaction may be momentary, vague and general; or it may be lasting, intense and specific. The point is that escape is

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what is desired, and for some the various degrees of numbness and irresponsibility produced by alcohol provide the escape. But bars, it would seem, have a more specialized function; that is, they provide escape from a specific kind of dissatisfaction. I used to think, long ago, that the function of bars was solely to dispense liquor, but after comparing the price one pays for a pint of whiskey by the shot in a bar with that which one would pay for the same pint in a grocery store, I concluded that the commodity dispensed by bars was not an alcoholic beverage, but something much more significant and less tangible.

To illustrate, let us take the modern phenomenon of the cocktail party. Here a dozen or so people are gathered, who presumably are incompatible in everyday life, otherwise the cocktail party would not be necessary to bring them together in the first place. They arrive at eight, and sit around in embarrassed and sometimes horrified silence until after the third martini. Then the hors d'ouvres appear, there are more drinks, tongues loosen, and everyone begins talking excitedly on inconsequential subjects which will be quite forgotten by the following morning. What has happened is that these people have used alcohol to escape the dissatisfaction of loneliness, to create a momentary empathy between themselves and others, an empathy which for one reason or another is lacking in their sober, everyday lives. Bars are only cocktail parties on the commercial level. They may be crowded and hectic, or they may be reduced to one customer and a genial bartender. Nevertheless, the essential commodity is the same—a temporary release from isolation, from bare walls, from dry routine, from dull family or business associations. Different people are there,

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