SKU: 18658770837

The Wonderful World That Almost Was: A Life of Peter Hujar and Paul Thek

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The Wonderful World That Almost Was: A Life of Peter Hujar and Paul Thek"As official narratives everywhere strain and crack, Peter and Paul and Durbin offer a desperately needed alternative way of seeing and being." Benjamin Moser, author of Susan Sontag: Her Life and Work, winner of the Pulitzer Prize "Andrew Durbin has made of these lives and these times a jam packed poem in prose. It's like a trip with these guys, without pulling tight at the ending, just death." Eileen Myles, author of a "Working Life" The cinematic,

"As official narratives everywhere strain and crack, Peter and Paul--and Durbin--offer a desperately needed alternative way of seeing and being." --Benjamin Moser, author of Susan Sontag: Her Life and Work, winner of the Pulitzer Prize

"Andrew Durbin has made of these lives and these times a jam-packed poem in prose. It's like a trip with these guys, without pulling tight at the ending, just death." --Eileen Myles, author of a "Working Life"

The cinematic, never-before-told story of two intimately entangled artists who redefined queer art.

When Paul Thek met Peter Hujar in the winter of 1956 in Coral Gables, Florida, a slow-simmering connection began to burn. Thek, twenty-three and living in Miami, was handsome and itching to make it as a painter; in the twenty-two-year-old Hujar, a shy, sensual photographer, he'd found a kindred spirit. By 1960, they were dating and living in New York, beginning decades of sex, love, competition, and reconciliation--an entanglement that changed American art forever.

Surrounded by a robust creative scene populated by Susan Sontag, Andy Warhol, Fran Lebowitz, John Waters, and David Wojnarowicz, Thek and Hujar's profoundly influential careers, from the early 1960s through the late 1980s, differed as much as the men themselves. The unpredictable and often overlooked Thek crafted visceral installations and sculptures, while Hujar, celebrated and sociable, took penetrating portraits of his world, queer and otherwise. Yet even at their most estranged, and even after their deaths from AIDS, both men were united by a pursuit of liberation--from artistic and sexual limits, from anything short of changing the world.

Andrew Durbin's The Wonderful World That Almost Was unravels, for the first time, the intertwined stories and work of two boundary-burning, paradigm-tilting, never-more-relevant American artists. Weaving together deft art criticism with moving portraits of both men's inner lives, and assembled with exhaustive research, Durbin's book is an ode to a lost but still-living world--and two men who defined it.

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SKU: 18658770837

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PAMELA
Pawtucket, US
★★★★★ 5
Fits perfect
Fit Type: Regular Fit, Color: Grey, Size: X-Large
This shirt is a perfect fit. I would buy it again in other colors.
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Reviewed in the United States on May 9, 2026
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Amazon Customer
Houston, US
★★★★★ 5
Comparable to high end mens shops!
Fit Type: Regular Fit, Color: Blue, Size: Large
Beautiful, heavy blue Oxford comparable to upper end mens store at 75% less! Full cut, great for casual wear or sending out for professional starching. Downside, no pocket, but I had mine monogramed wear the pocket would be and it looks like an expensive dress shirt. I bought more (with pockets) in blue & white
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Reviewed in the United States on May 3, 2026
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Anon
Alexandria, US
★★★★★ 3
Heavier fabric, very durable
Fit Type: Regular Fit, Color: Grey, Size: Large
3 stars. Pretty nice shirt but the fabric is a bit firmer than i like. I iron it when i usually wear it so that it looks half decent since wrinkle resistance is low or poor. I usually have to use a higher setting on the fabric since the material is thick making it alot heavier. Overall great for the lower end cost, anything that beats it would probably be double the price. I work in a cubicle so this works well for me, a simple shirt, with a simple color.
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Reviewed in the United States on March 18, 2026
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MMongelli
Lowell, US
★★★★★ 5
True to size, good quality, great value!
Fit Type: Regular Fit, Color: White, Size: Medium
Great quality! Amazing thick material! Perfect basic button down shirt!
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Reviewed in the United States on December 14, 2025
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Ed
Port Orchard, US
★★★★★ 4
No Shirt Pocket!
Fit Type: Regular Fit, Color: Blue Stripe, Size: X-Large
No Pocket! The material was nice quality, a little thicker than I would have anticipate for a low priced shirt, and very soft. The only disappointment was there was not shirt pocket. I suppose I did not look closely enough at the photos to notice that before I purchased. Otherwise, this is a very comfortable shirt.
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Reviewed in the United States on February 23, 2026

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