Was Shakpeare Gay?

Contents:

• WAS SHAKPEARE GAY?
• WAS SHAKPEARE GAY?
• SHAKPEARE HAD GAY CHARACTERS TOO, PEOPLE JT IGNORED : SIR IAN MCKELLEN
• WAS SHAKPEARE GAY, AND DO MATTER?
• WAS SHAKPEARE GAY? HIS SEXUALY IS STILL DEBATED BY SCHOLARS TODAY
• 11 PIEC OF EVINCE WE HAD A GAY SHAKPEARE
• NO, SHAKPEARE WAS NOT GAY

WAS SHAKPEARE GAY?

This is a really big qutn that people have wrten a great al about, so this episo acts as a sort of summary of some of the arguments for and agast Shakpeare beg gay. I’m Jennifer Reid, and today we’re askg, “Was Shakpeare gay? And prev podsts, I’ve played you lots of short clips om a variety of speakers, but this week I’m gog to do slightly differently, and play you fewer, longer clips, as the clips ought to be played their was Shakpeare gay?

DOLLIMORE: I don’t know whether Shakpeare was gay or not, bee he didn’t leave any personal rerd. So, what that actually entailed [sic] people isn’t the equivalent of what a lovg gay relatnship is, whether or not Shakpeare was gay is a difficult qutn. One thg that is fe, though, is that there was no self-inty as gay or homosexual or, as far as we know, any other term durg that time perd.

So, Shakpeare certaly didn’t go around self-intifyg himself as homosexual or bisexual or straight or gay.

WAS SHAKPEARE GAY?

Michael Dobson explored this ia, the ia of Shakpeare’s awarens of different sexuali and sexual preferenc when I spoke to Well, sofar as the tegori of gay and straight didn’t exist, then he wasn’t gay, but that equally means that he uldn’t have been straight eher. There's a lot of bate about whether anybody was gay, any of the morn sense, Elizabethan culture, or whether there were jt certa thgs they did, sometim, that didn’t actually fe a particular set of inti.

So, the morn term would probably be… terted, rather than, [lghs] rather than gay. Did Shakpeare have relatns, or lovg relatns, wh a male person – was he, as we say, gay? Well he certaly wasn’t gay the plete sense of the word throughout his life, bee he marri early, marri young, and he has three children – so to that extent, he’s heterosexual.

SHAKPEARE HAD GAY CHARACTERS TOO, PEOPLE JT IGNORED : SIR IAN MCKELLEN

However, ’s not impossible, my view, that Shakpeare did have sexual relatns, actually wh both femal (other than his wife) and wh don’t portray homosexual relatnships very clearly his plays.

WAS SHAKPEARE GAY, AND DO MATTER?

But over to Greg, to expand upon this and tell you what he thks about Shakpeare’s Was Shakpeare gay?

WAS SHAKPEARE GAY? HIS SEXUALY IS STILL DEBATED BY SCHOLARS TODAY

Well, there’s a lot of nonsense talked about this “gay wasn’t really gay then”, as if human nature and the exprsn of human feelgs changed this one regard the last 400 years. I do believe Shakpeare was gay, and… Ah, you know, as I say that I’m aware that everyone tends to st Shakpeare their own image, some way, so I, as a gay man, brought up a Catholic Lanshire, like to feel that Shakpeare might have spent his last years as a teacher Lanshire, had some Catholic sensibili (or at least an unrstandg of the nostalgia for the old fah), and that he experienced a passnate sire for his own sex!

” Now, that is a pretty [chuckl] extraordary erotic scriptn of male of urse, there’s also a scriptn on the battlefield of homophobia – of homophobic prejudice, at any rate – and the most scurrilo terms, the mouth of Thers  Troil and Crsida, where he ris the love of Achill for his iend Patrocl, sayg, “Thou art thought to be Achill' male varlet. It’s a brilliant scriptn of homophobia.

And, I thk there has been homophobia regnisg where those relatnships – those gay relatnships Shakpeare occur. So, if Shakpeare wasn’t gay, he certaly had a great passn for and an unrstandg of gay relatnships, that’s certaly the se.

11 PIEC OF EVINCE WE HAD A GAY SHAKPEARE

Actors today’s theatre regularly portray the relatnships as homosexual, and ed actors are often crlo toward anyone who doubts that to be the se. In Troil and Crsida, Patrocl is moured to be Achill’ “mascule whore” (V, 1, le 17), as is suggted Homer, and certaly the two are very close iendship, though Patrocl do admonish Achill to engage battle by sayg, A woman impunt and mannish grown Is not more loathed than an effemate man In time of actn Aga, on the morn stage this relatnship is often portrayed as obvly, even flagrantly, sexual; but whether Shakpeare saw as such, or the play valoriz homosexualy or bisexualy, is another matter.

“It’s bee fashnable sce the mid-1980s to thk of Shakpeare as gay. Vickers, a visg profsor at Universy College London, asserted that a Tim Lerary Supplement book review was wrong to state that Shakpeare’s 119 son was wrten a “primarily homosexual ntext”. The pretty explic (for this era) homosexual romance of the sons wasn’t some nventn of Elizabethan poetry eher, was pretty unique and th, pretty meangful.

NO, SHAKPEARE WAS NOT GAY

And do the prence of all this queerns the sons (and other works of Shakpeare) mean we n ll him a gay in? The dark lady, along wh the fact that we know Shakpeare was married and had children make the ia of claimg Shakpeare as “gay” himself, tricky and also a big potential se of bisexual erasure. Published: 18:30, 25 July 2017 The Jabean-era Cobbe portra said to be of William Shakpeare, which is on display at the Natnal Tst's Hatchlands Park claims that Shakpeare was gay or bisexual have emerged this week om two of the Bard’s most proment Royal Shakpeare Theatre’s artistic director Gregory Doran has suggted that William Shakpeare might have been gay based on the fact that 126 of Shakpeare's 154 sons are addrsed to Doran exprsed the views durg an terview on BBC Rad 4's Today programme last was also cril of Victorian amics for attemptg to ver up Shakpeare’s alleged homosexualy out of embarrassment bee was not keepg wh the inic image of the world’s greatt playwright.

I am jt aware of how many tim Shakpeare has gay characters, and how sometim those gay characters are not played as gay, and I thk the 21st century that's no longer acceptable, ” Mr Doran bate about Shakpeare's sexualy has been raised before and certaly wh the last few years, this spe rerds showg the he married, aged 18, and fathered three children wh his wife Anne Stanley Wells, Honorary Print of the Shakpeare Birthplace Tst said this week: “Shakpeare was certaly not exclively gay. ' So seems pretty clear that he had at least one actively gay his plays, the most clearly gay uple are Patrocl and Achill the partly historil Troil and Crsida.

You n't avoid playg them as gay.