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TEENAGE BOY WHO GAVE RUDOLF NUREYEV THE FIRST LSON GAY SEX
" Five years olr than Nureyev, wh wavy blond hair and Cupid's-bow lips, Kiselev was "an exotic" by Lengrad standards, one of a terie of homosexual iends who, he says, were already aware of Nureyev's te sexual orientatn. Shy, awkward and foppish, the oppose of his gregar brother, Sergei had a secret: He was gay.
Sergei's homosexualy would st a long shadow over his strange and heroic life, and would also, ultimately, be the e of his horrifyg and untimely ath. It st a shadow over Vladimir's life as well: He loved his brother, but whatever else he may have been -- a brilliant wrer, a lovg father -- Vladimir was a nfirmed homophobe, and his gay brother was a nstant source of shame, nfn and regret to him. Acrdg to Sikorski, who quatly refers to Sergei's homosexualy as his "attu, " the fay stuted a kd of "don't ask, don't tell" policy.
Vladimir was the young homme du mon -- handsome, romantic looks, somethg of a snob and a gay charmer -- Serge was the dandy, an athete and balletomane... But he was gay, a b dolent, and highly sensive (and therefore an easy butt for teasg sports). Sergei f easily to the growg gay muny there, and he was iendly wh German activist Magn Hirschfeld, founr of the world's first gay tolerance anizatn.
THE GAY NABOKOV
While Vladimir never stopped mourng the Rsia of his youth, Sergei most likely felt at home for the first time a cy that celebrated art and mic, and that took his gayns stri. Tchelchev was also gay and also a Rsian imigri, and the two of them shared an apartment wh Tchelchev's lover, Allen Tanner. Nabokov simply didn't like homosexuals.
Even after Sergei's ath, Nabokov ed homophobic slurs that make the morn rear crge. " And he referred to gay Rsian cric Gey Adamovich as "Sodomovich. Acrdg to Andrew Field, his first bgrapher, Nabokov nsired homosexualy to be a heredary illns.
Nabokov's homophobia is fact one of the dirty ltle secrets of 20th century lerature, on a par wh T. "I believe Nabokov was que homophobic, " says Galya Diment, vice print of the Nabokov Society and a profsor the Slavic partment at the Universy of Washgton.