Dreadful: The Short Life and Gay Times of John Horne Burns

by David Margolick

dreadfuldreadful,” but which was also known around the place simply as “It.” Those with “the clap”—gonorrhea—had it relatively easy: four injections over a single day. But because no one was quite sure how much penicillin syphilitics required, the doctors erred on the side of excess: eight full days of injections: every three hours around the clock. Patients were jabbed with primitive blunt needles in a grim orbit around their bodies, rotating from one shoulder, and then one cheek of the buttocks, to the other. As the days passed, and with their skin reduced to hamburger, the injections of the precious, yellow, viscous fluid became even more painful. In between jabs, the soldiers slept restlessly, ate listlessly, exchanged gallows humor, and wandered catatonically around a courtyard—“a chain gang without chains.” As in Dante, jaded veterans—those a few days into the cure—explained things to neophytes. In what Burns called the “freemasonry of penicillin,” a certain camaraderie developed. At last came the final injection, followed by the “baccalaureate sermon,” when hardened doctors warned departing soldiers not to fuck up—and come back—again. Some listened, though many did not.