Review: Was Abraham Lln gay? A new play offers a queer lens - Los Angel Tim

Contents:

• WAS ABRAHAM LLN OUR FIRST GAY PRINT?
• WAS ABRAHAM LLN GAY?
• FURTHER PROOF THAT LLN WAS GAY
• A FAY HISTORY PROVIS MORE EVINCE THAT LLN WAS GAY
• PETE BUTTIGIEG SAYS THERE HAVE PROBABLY BEEN GAY PRINTS. HERE'S WHY THAT THEORY IS COMPLITED
• WAS LLN GAY?
• NEW BOOK EXPLOR WHETHER ABRAHAM LLN WAS GAY
• ‘BOOK OF QUEER’ CREATOR ERIC CERVI TEACH LGBTQ HISTORY, LIKE HOW ABRAHAM LLN MIGHT’VE BEEN GAY
• A REPUBLIN HERO, BUT WAS ABE LLN GAY?
• WERE LLN AND NIXON GAY? THE ‘HISTORY’ BOOK THAT IS DIVIDG AMERI
• HOW GAY IS LLN?
• REVIEW: WAS ABRAHAM LLN GAY? A NEW PLAY L.A. IMAG HIS LIFE THROUGH A QUEER LENS
• WAS ABRAHAM LLN GAY? HOMOSEXUALY AND HISTORY
• WAS ABRAHAM LLN GAY, STRAIGHT, OR BI?
• 7 REASONS PEOPLE THK ABRAHAM LLN WAS GAY OR BI

WAS ABRAHAM LLN OUR FIRST GAY PRINT?

Scholars have bated whether Lln suffered om a host of physil ailments, whether or not he was clilly prsed, and — perhaps most trigugly to some — if Abraham Lln was gay. For many years, a kd of gay-revisnist history has been wrten, which this or that historil figure is held up to tense scholarly scty and clared by one activist historian or another to have been gay, transgenred, or bisexual.

It’s evable that virtually all of the proment homosexuals of the Victorian Age would go to extreme lengths to keep their affairs as private as possible, and this mak hont scholarship on the subject challengg at bt. After readg about the evince about whether or not Abraham Lln was gay, vis our post on the fotten story of the Lln assassatn and tertg facts about Lln you’ve probably never heard before. Scholars and historians are bld to Lln's same-sex clatns part bee of a personal aversn to male homosexualy, but more importantly bee they fail to perceive the vast differenc between the sexual culture of antebellum Ameri and that of our own time, pecially regard to male-male physil and emotnal timacy.

The studied impulse to make Lln absolutely heterosexual reflects a discernible societal disfort wh the plexi of human sexualy and sexual orientatn, as well as eply embedd streaks of homophobia. At about that time I met Tripp, whose posthumo The Intimate World of Abraham Lln has at last been published by Free the Ksey and I had mon so long ago was the knowledge that homosexual and heterosexual behavr are natural to all mammals, and that what differs om dividual to dividual is the balance between the two plementary but not necsarily nflicted driv.

WAS ABRAHAM LLN GAY?

But not Jonathan Ned Katz; 2001 this relentls scholar wrote a study of their “love affair” as an example of sex between men before the ventn of homosexualy; a word and generic ncept that dat back only to the late 19th century, while “heterosexualy, ” prevly popularly known as “jt sex, ” is now the name for a new admirable team whose first appearance public prt was a 1924 edn of, I fear, the New York Tim. One fdg that Tripp evaluatg Lln: Ksey’s rearch showed that those mal who entered puberty early were more apt to seek homosexual outlets if only bee girls were out of reach. Incintally, the one thg that the Ksey report, Tripp’s The Homosexual Matrix, and my The Cy and the Pillar had mon, asi om the unwele ndor about our human tate, was the hysteria we created at The New York Tim.

“It might be more accurate to say that there may have been prints the past who sired men, or had sexual experienc wh men… they wouldn’t have necsarily intified as gay a 21st century sense.

“I thk that there were always gray areas and nuanc and plenty of possibili for men the late 19th and 20th century to have sex wh other men and not nsir themselv gay, ” Clev says. “I fd that the early 19th century, ironilly, almost prents an era where the same kds of pathologi [agast gay men] that will be prent all the way through the pre-Stonewall era aren’t que place yet.

FURTHER PROOF THAT LLN WAS GAY

“As we bee more and more terted broang the tt, so to speak, of LGBT history, what we fd is we’ve taken people, who for one reason or another, don’t f to a normative pattern of heterosexual marriage and we basilly put this label on them as gay, ” Balcerski says. Tripp is not the first to argue that Lln was homosexual -- earlier wrers have parsed his iendship wh Joshua Speed, the young store owner he lived wh after movg to Sprgfield, Ill.

Tripp argu that a cultural nocence -- the word "homosexual" had not yet been ed -- allowed acts of physil closens between men that had no eper meang, as well as acts that did but uld pe scty. Department of Defense astronomer and gay rights activist Frank Kameny, is beg adapted by Tony-wng playwright Matthew López (“The Inherance”) as a limed seri for Amazon wh Brad Pt’s Plan B Entertament producg. Tripp produc evince that one of Ameri's greatt Prints had a long-term relatnship wh a youthful iend, Joshua Speed, and shared his bed wh David Derickson, pta of his, a former rearcher for sex scientist Aled Ksey and an fluential gay wrer, clus asis by many of Lln's close iends.

A FAY HISTORY PROVIS MORE EVINCE THAT LLN WAS GAY

However, crics say that the pneer days men sleepg together rough circumstanc was not Tripp has disvered letters between Lln and Speed which supposedly betray a ep Tripp's book really breaks new ground s exhstive portrayal of many of Lln's possible gay lovers, cludg one man who said Lln's thighs 'were as perfect as a human beg uld be'. 'Make no mistake - Abe Lln was gay, ' said Profsor Stt Thompson, om the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at David Donald, a Harvard profsor and rpected Lln bgrapher, has disputed Tripp's fdgs his own book, We Are Lln Men, published last year, and says there is no five proof of Lln havg affairs wh any men. Gay-rights activist and award-wng thor Larry Kramer is 79 and failg health, but that won’t fe the impact of his latt bombshell project: the first 800-page stalment of a two-part history of Ameri that tells of the secret gay life of figur om Alexanr Haton, Gee Washgton and Abraham Lln to Mark Twa, Herman Melville and Richard Amerin People: Volume 1, subtled Search for My Heart, has taken nearly 40 years to plete and may prove to be one of the most provotive historil, or psdo-historil, acunts of Amerin, who is -founr of Aids servic group Gay Men’s Health Crisis and the Aids Coaln to Unleash Power (Act Up), as well as a chronicler of queer life wh plays cludg The Normal Heart and The Dty of Me, said the book is a labour of love signed to unter what he feels to be the excln of gays – or gay life – om history books.

”The Amerin People, Volume I: Search for My Heart is g nsternatn among historians, who say there is ltle evince to back Kramer’s Chernow, thor of an epic 2004 bgraphy of Alexanr Haton – the statman Kramer claims was at least bisexual if not entirely gay – utns agast “ransackg history service of a polil agenda” also claims that John Wilk Booth assassated Abraham Lln not bee he was unhappy that the South was losg the civil war, but bee Lln had spurned him. He claims Lln bgrapher Doris Kearns Goodw beme “hysteril” at the suggtn of homosexual tennci the print but this was, he add an terview wh NPR, “only bee she didn’t wre first” book, which has been labelled as a novel to avoid legal plitns, has divid US reviewers. Whether is absolutely accurate or not, The Amerin People speaks to a need across gay and straight muni to revise historil acunts om which sexual orientatn was absent.

”From some quarters there have been lls for a exclively gay branch of archaeology directed solely at tablishg sexual orientatn (Kramer claims trac of semen found the stools of English settlers prove his pot) where gay rights warrrs sought to fe themselv as gay fiance of the stigma around Aids, Hickl nsirs that sexual orientatn is no longer a sgular marker of inty. Tripp matas that other wrers, cludg Ida Tarbell and Margaret Leech, also found evince of Lln's homosexualy but shied away om fg as such or omted ccial Tripp c Lln's extreme privacy and acunts by those who knew him well. Baker qutn of Lln's sexualy is plited by the fact that the word homosexual did not fd s way to prt English until 1892 and that "gayns" is very much a morn Baker said the foc of 19th-century moral opprobrium was masturbatn, not homosexualy.

PETE BUTTIGIEG SAYS THERE HAVE PROBABLY BEEN GAY PRINTS. HERE'S WHY THAT THEORY IS COMPLITED

We exame the powerful and never accsible rmatn that mak startlgly clear a great sufferg; we see this turn bee the source of power which mov this parched great spir to worldly greatns while matag his humany; and are forced to nclu that he uld never e to personally satisfyg terms wh the active homosexualy which he sacrificed to pnce and ambn on the thrhold of his reer. For this se, any traed scholar who (like the prent wrer) is gay has a substantial advantage, the very same tuive feel that mastream analysts have for heterosexual is a paful qutn for most honorable, tolerant Amerins even to thk of posg.

WAS LLN GAY?

Equally obv is the reason for the agonized ristance offered to the sight--not to the trsic relevance of the sexualy of a master spir, but to the anxieti that the issue evok, once so much as posed among men of our culture alg wh homosexualy--pecially perhaps homosexualy how to make so dac a claim upon perhaps our greatt print? Homosexualy has never been attributed to this man--even a recent splendid psychobgraphy by the historian Michael Burlgame, which vlat every ntemporary piety wh a twenty-three page chapter on Lln's loathg of women, fails to explore the possibily. We would like to propose a five-fold tt for the tablishment of homosexual nature, clared or unclared, and argue that anyone fulfillg at least three of the ndns is more likely sence gay than straight, whatever route to which he ms himself: to argue that where the are met that the prumptn of heterosexualy ought not to obta and that of bisexualy at least should be entertaed.

NEW BOOK EXPLOR WHETHER ABRAHAM LLN WAS GAY

For the fact is that a gay man, however much he lik women, lik to gossip wh women, lik to ok wh women, isn't erotilly drawn to them and over time this be pably apparent unls he mak a staed, character-distortg effort. Marriage is perhaps the olst survivg, harst, and most rewardg form of work, one of the centiv to work at beg sex, which also repairs difficulti; but for a gay man sex wh a woman is ually a st, a drawback, not an attractn. Numero gay men still marriag will tell how they avoid sex-- the hope that over time the wiv' sire for may attenuate (or the hbands will divert her to other pleasur and satisfactns).

‘BOOK OF QUEER’ CREATOR ERIC CERVI TEACH LGBTQ HISTORY, LIKE HOW ABRAHAM LLN MIGHT’VE BEEN GAY

) But then the centiv to that succs were legn: his voted wife was patient wh his early sexual malfunctn, she was enormoly rich, and opened all manner of doors to his bankg and polil reers--all this startg a perd far ls iendly than our own to homosexualy--ed to most 'differenc' well beyond the sexual--and th providg all the more centive to try anythg to mata the marriage. Until recently, so far as morn Wtern culture went, avowed homosexualy was patible wh a public reer; remas a stigma of still-remarkable power, sometim, fact ever more monly, manifts no longer a sgle lighteng-like stctn but as a terme-like pacy to hollow and unrme.

Homosexual men--and we are largely speakg of men spe the risg number of women public life--eher have had to seek the seedy si for some fulfillment wh the danger"of exposure always lurkg"--as did Robert Bman, the gay-bashg Maryland ngrsman of recent fame, who was duly overtaken and ed by his hidn choic, or Whaker Chambers cisg Dupont Circle a generatn earlier. Or, a very special few put themselv through a powerful disciple of transcennce: that is to say, they mt experience their homosexualy to s fullt pths, accept , unrstand that is patible wh other strivgs, namely for power or ed for any form of cent thory and digny, and put asi this central element of their élan--parallel, a sense, to a pritly vow of celibacy.

A REPUBLIN HERO, BUT WAS ABE LLN GAY?

Of urse this is a polilly rrect ncln, pecially for nservative crics of society's expandg acceptance of gay people--though hardly for those gay non-leftists who several years ago formed, all unknowgly, the natnal anizatn of 'Log Cab Republins.

' Ined the bt empiril evince om an examatn of Lln on the first variable--a bond relatnship--and will be far more pellg to the gay TtIn his early thirti, before eher he or his love-object Joshua Speed married, they lived together cramped circumstanc over four full years; not to put too fe a pot on , "the young men slept the same bed every night, " acrdg to a very straight and nventnal source.

Emotnally srred as he was childhood, Lln lacked the pacy to tst women and relate easily to the se for transcennce suggts that when he took the cisn to marry was the Uned Stat rather than Mary Todd that he poed and that the image of the Republic blossomg om Ann Rutledge's bosom rri the ronance of a burial: both were symbolic and ever more eply TtThe fourth variable, the 'feme' si of Lln asserts self not his appearance--though gay men are seldom surprised by the appearanc of new 'nverts to the e, ' who e siz and shap the heterosexual do not envisage.

WERE LLN AND NIXON GAY? THE ‘HISTORY’ BOOK THAT IS DIVIDG AMERI

Even more important than--but related to--the feme si that homosexualy is often so primively taken to reprent a gay man is the distance and distancg effects--and th the necsary transcennce om polics-as-ual.

HOW GAY IS LLN?

Surely the body 'half-slave and half-ee' was Lln's before was his untry's: surely was he whose wounds mt be bound up wh the urage which is the healer's first requise, wh passn, wh TtFally, are we entled to out Abe if there were no mors of homosexualy?

REVIEW: WAS ABRAHAM LLN GAY? A NEW PLAY L.A. IMAG HIS LIFE THROUGH A QUEER LENS

Our fifth tt, that of ntemporary ment, is of ltle help cultur whose homosexualy is or was mostly supprsed; not gossiped about bee not even noticed or noticed and nied. ) Th a gay stunt of me om an thorarian and socially backward untry mented that he uld get away wh his substantial homosexual practice, even a high ernmental post (ed, at the mistry self), bee"no one would have a clue what to notice. There is even the possibily that a gay temperament may drive s young posssors to public life--so that if they mt hi their worlds wh them at least they may, pensatn, act upon the universe whout; the paradox of Gary Hart suggts that such n work for heterosexuals as well.

Havg achieved some gree of power and wh the abily to reward alli, punish enemi, formulate agendas, the homosexual like any other potentate mt stand back and ask, to what larger end?

The say don't entirely nvce me that Lln was gay (as I am also, by the way), but any gay man n tell you that historians the past have gone to extraordary lengths to disguise and/or ny any ht of homosexualy. Perhaps McCollum's say is a rrective the other directn, but your knee-jerk distaste is exactly the kd of rponse gay historians have had to al wh for s, to the triment of both gay people's digny and historil accuracy. Every gay historian, or gay activist who claims to be an historian, wants to "out" all of our great historil figur, pecially those they or other revisnists n't otherwise fd any dirt on.

WAS ABRAHAM LLN GAY? HOMOSEXUALY AND HISTORY

Perhaps Walt Whman (Lln's great homosexual ntemporary) provis a further perspective that WW chose to wre a magnificent funeral o on Lln, "When Lilacs Last by the Dooryard Bloom'd. Stt Thompson, spe the rehg sensivy of his argument, is merely tchg our attentn wh the word "gay, " rather than helpg to see that Lln's love of his fellow men was as ep and plex as we should naturally expect so great a person.

At the Walt Whman Quarterly Review, for stance, is nsired perfectly legimate to intify Whman as gay, and likewise, the leadg Thore scholar, Walter Hardg, not only adms that "Thore was gay, " but he has also reunted the hysteril meetg some years ago when he outed Thore, and was rmed that not only had he stroyed his own reer, but also the entire field of Thoreavean studi. 11Sce there is such strictns about termology, I want to expla what I mean by the mps as unlikely bedfellows: the nservativ, which have the polil power to censor gay history schools and mms, snap up the Marxist doctr for their own purpos, as shown by our nservative postg, for stance: "... It is my perceptn that sce gay activism has bee vogue some circl, that every gay historian, or gay activist who claims to be an historian, wants to "out" all of our great historil figur, pecially those they or other revisnists n't otherwise fd any dirt on.

Others have wrten about this much more specifilly but is pretty well tablished historil scholarship about sexualy that our morn way of tegorizg sexualy (hetero/homosexual, gay/straight) don't really work very well for people's sexual liv before the late 19th century. While I am only very roughly aware of the bated tails surroundg Lln's sexual life, I would enurage you to rensir labellg him eher gay or straight so unproblematilly. 11Personally, I thought Thompson's most powerful argument was the fifth: "a gay stunt of me om an thorarian and socially backward untry mented that he uld get away wh his substantial homosexual practice, even a high ernmental post (ed, at the mistry self), bee 'no one would have a clue what to notice.

WAS ABRAHAM LLN GAY, STRAIGHT, OR BI?

But was this relatnship romantic and/or sexual, or somethg more monplace an age that was blsed wh a more diverse range of male relatnships than our morn, hypersensive, “no homo” era? And spe what provotr-wh-a-book-to-sell Larry Kramer would have you believe—he was partly rponsible for sparkg the scholarly tert Lln’s boudoir, thanks to a 1999 lecture which he claimed the Amerin hero as a kd of gay forefather—textual overton are all we have to go on.

7 REASONS PEOPLE THK ABRAHAM LLN WAS GAY OR BI

If you’ve read your Fouult, you know that homosexualy—which is to say, a total inty predited on same-sex attractn as opposed to discrete sex acts—was only vented as a possibily wh the rise of psychoanalysis and the medil and legal tablishments’ creasg tert “perversn” the late 19th century. While historians will probably never terme for sure if Lln nsummated his relatnships wh Speed or other men close to him, the new film provis a perfectly reasonable space for imagg what a “gay” Lln might look like. If they uld outn their shame and embrace the love that dared not speak s name 19th century Ameri or for much of the 20th, for that Kramer long ntend that Lln was gay and ed even wrote about his novel “The Amerin People: Volume 1, Search for My Heart.

For years, the field of amic history has been lurchg to the dch of historil revisnism, wh var rearchers and wrers--most hopg for tenure at a major universy--pursug the sex liv of var historil personag, lookg for "transgrsn" and this, a group of homosexual advot has been ransackg history, lookg for trac of homosexualy major historil figur. Their agenda is clear--to argue for the normalizatn of homosexualy by suggtg that some of history's most preement figur were actually closeted (or not so closeted) release of The Intimate World of Abraham Lln ught the immediate attentn of the natnal media.