Tchaikovsky was not gay, says Rsian culture mister | Pyotr Tchaikovsky | The Guardian

Contents:

• TCHAIKOVSKY AND THE SECRET GAY LOV CENSORS TRIED TO HI
• SORRY, RSIA, BUT TCHAIKOVSKY WAS DEFELY GAY
• TCHAIKOVSKY UNVERED: THE SECRET GAY LIFE OF A LEGEND
• WAS TCHAIKOVSKY GAY? HOW RSIA SPENT A CENTURY HIDG THE POSER’S SEXUALY
• TCHAIKOVSKY’S ROMANTIC GAY LOVE LETTERS REVEALED
• TCHAIKOVSKY WAS NOT GAY, SAYS RSIAN CULTURE MISTER
• TCHAIKOVSKY MAY HAVE BEEN GAY, PUT RELUCTANTLY ADMS
• GAY LOVE-LETTERS OM TCHAIKOVSKY TO HIS NEPHEW BOB DAVIDOV
• REMEMBERG GAY COMPOSER PETER ILICH TCHAIKOVSKY ON HIS 183RD BIRTHDAY
• PUT: TCHAIKOVSKY WAS GAY? SO WHAT?
• SCREENWRER QUTNS WHETHER TCHAIKOVSKY WAS GAY, SPARKG FUROR RSIA
• DID THIS LEGENDARY GAY RSIAN COMPOSER COMM SUICI?

TCHAIKOVSKY AND THE SECRET GAY LOV CENSORS TRIED TO HI

But until now some of the letters of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, which he tells of his sexual sir, have been hidn om the world bee the objects of those sir were other the letters have been published English for the first time, rtorg sensive passag about the poser’s homosexualy that had been leted by Rsian one, never before published Rsian or English, Tchaikovsky wrote of a young servant “wh whom I am more love than ever”, addg: “My God, what an angelic creature and how I long to be his slave, his playthg, his property!

SORRY, RSIA, BUT TCHAIKOVSKY WAS DEFELY GAY

” She add that, while Tchaikovsky’s homosexualy had long been accepted the wt, “ is still a subject of heated and often ugly public bate” Rsia. ”Tchaiikovsky quoteIn another prevly omted passage, the poser told of a homosexual acquatance: “Petashenka ed to drop by wh the crimal tentn of observg the Cat Corps, which is right oppose our wdows, but I’ve been tryg to disurage the promisg viss – and wh some succs. They offer sights to the daily ncerns and timate thoughts of a poser whose masterpiec clu the ballets Swan Lake, The Sleepg Bety and The Nutcracker, and opera Eugene Oneg, as well as six symphoni and four book’s troductn not: “The central taboo ncerng Tchaikovsky’s life has been his homosexualy – the topic that has been barred om public discsn for almost a century … In the eye of the thori, would have been unthkable to accept [that] … Rsia’s natnal treasure was a homosexual.

TCHAIKOVSKY UNVERED: THE SECRET GAY LIFE OF A LEGEND

And, nsirg the sorry state of cultural polics Rsia and s anti-gay propaganda, there is no guarantee that that door will rema open much longer. Yuri Arabov told a Rsian newspaper that his adaptatn of the 19th century poser's life won't foc on his sexualy bee “ is far om a fact that Tchaikovsky was a homosexual, " The New York Tim also said that films that "advertise" homosexualy are "outsi the sphere of art, " and that only "philist" thk the poser was gay.

Well, sorry Rsia, but Tchaikovsky — along wh dozens of other Rsian cultural ins — were gay, as many scholars would readily Tchaikovsky (poser)Tchaikovsky posed two of the most qutsentially Rsian ballets — Swan Lake and The Nutcracker.

Harry wr (emphasis add): The history of Tchaikovsky's homosexualy was supprsed Rsia by the Soviets, and has only recently bee wily known post-Soviet Rsia. Tchaikovsky's letters and diari, as well as the letters of his brother Most, who was also gay, make clear his orientatn.

WAS TCHAIKOVSKY GAY? HOW RSIA SPENT A CENTURY HIDG THE POSER’S SEXUALY

] Many of Tchaikovsky's most timate relatnships were homosexual: Tchaikovsky's servant Aleksey Soonov and his nephew, Vladimir “Bob” Davydov. For stance, Wiley pots out that Tchaikovsky was openly gay all his life, to the pot that he femised the nam of the young men he nsorted wh, and ed his own – signg a letter to his brother (who was also gay) "Petrola". The Sexual Labyrth of Nikolai Gogol, by fellow gay Rsian Simon Karlsky, argued that evince of Gogol's homosexualy uld be found his works.

In her review of the book for The New York Review of Books, Helen Muchnic laid out Karlsky's argument this way: His this, brief outle, is that Gogol, unable to be himself a world where homosexualy was proscribed, ncealed his clatns, attempted to supprs his emotns, projected his secretivens unnscly the ceptns, mystifitns, and symbols of his stori and plays, and ultimately broke down unr the stra, g his art and stroyg himself.

TCHAIKOVSKY’S ROMANTIC GAY LOVE LETTERS REVEALED

Here's an excerpt om her 1924 poem "Dreams": Only dreams, wh a broken off moan, so as not to die her sleep, on such a mellifluo wave, above this sky-blue drowng, her whole cht heavg eely wh breath, my soul is published several llectns of poems until censorship unr the Soviet ernment emed her works "unlawful" Nabokov (brother of Vladimir Nabokov)Vladimir Nabokov, bt known for his 1955 novel Lola, was a known homophobe. Grossman wrote: 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 died a Nazi labor mp, while Vladimar went on to wre several novels. Meanwhile, gay characters appear throughout Vladimir's work, possibly regnn of his article is om the archive of our partner The Wire. He studied unr Frank Bridge, John Ireland and Arthur Benjam among others, and was also a fe ground-breakg operas, which clu Peter Grim (1945), and The Turn of the Screw (1954) – and his famo War Requiem – tackle ntemporaneo issu around psychology and post-war trma, as well his own homosexualy, which was illegal Brten’s lifetime.

As well as beg one of the first openly gay posers full stop, Poulenc also didn’t chew his sexualy the ntext of his relig posns spanned om timate chamber sonatas wh sublime, twistg melodi and lite imprsnist harmoni (thk the 1957 Flute Sonata), to his Piano Concerto and epic one-act opera for soprano and orchtra, La voix humae.

TCHAIKOVSKY WAS NOT GAY, SAYS RSIAN CULTURE MISTER

Mic historian Ellen Harris leads on the se for Hanl’s homosexualy, argug that his ntatas exhib a clear homosexual subtext her book Hanl as Orphs. And like them, he was associated wh gay clergyman, Cardal Pietro Baroque poser and vlist is known for his chamber sonatas and ncerti grossi, and has gone down history for refg to play a sectn of Hanl’s orator, The Triumph Of Time And Tth, bee a vl note went higher than Corelli believed appropriate for the stment. Unlike Copland, US poser Samuel Barber ma no effort to keep his homosexualy out of explic view and his life partner was poser Gian Carlo Menotti, who he studied wh at the Curtis Instute.

Leonard Bernste also studied at the Curtis Instute wh Barber and Menotti (see above), and although he had an on-aga-off-aga relatnship wh actor Felicia Cohn Montealegre and eventually married her, he was openly gay.

TCHAIKOVSKY MAY HAVE BEEN GAY, PUT RELUCTANTLY ADMS

Montealegre herself wrote publicly about her book, The Bernste Letters, “you are a homosexual and may never change – you don’t adm to the possibily of a double life, but if your peace of md, your health, your whole nervo system pend on a certa sexual pattern what n you do? ” Bernste’s Wt Si Story llaborator Arthur Lrents is known to have lled Bernste “a gay man who got married”, statg, “He wasn't nflicted about at all.

That Tchaikovsky stggled wh prsn is well documented, but up until the last 20 years, his sadns was attributed to the mere fact of his homosexualy. As turns out, Tchaikovsky was reasonably fortable wh his homosexualy – as fortable as someone uld be, livg as a famo figure 19th-century Rsia. “We now have so many documented letters that his younger brother, Most – who was also gay – saved, but the fay didn’t release for que some time after his ath.

To further cement this ia, ’s now clear that, acrdg to Anrson, Tchaikovsky had a close circle of gay iends and actually referred to his homosexualy personal rrponnce as “the most natural thg ever. In Tchaikovsky’s se, gay men have long upheld the ia that the angst, spair and sufferg emed so apparent his mic’s “melodic lyricism” n be directly traced to the stggle of a closeted gay man livg torture wh his secret. All of the elements have led to a great al of mythology surroundg his swan song, Sixth Symphony, Pathetique, which often gets characterized as eher a suici note, a portra of homosexual martyrdom, or some other form of gay tragedy.

GAY LOVE-LETTERS OM TCHAIKOVSKY TO HIS NEPHEW BOB DAVIDOV

Ptr Ilyich TchaikovskyWhile historians Rsia nied for centuri that Tchaikovsky was gay, Eastern voic recent years have e around to the notn the tenrns the poser's mic me om gay sir. Jean-Baptiste LullyThe liberte Lully was a poser, mician, and famed dancer the urt of France's Kg Louis XIV, where his gay sexualy was an open secret. At one pot, he had a well-known affair wh royal mic page B, acrdg to Gee Haggerty's Encyclopedia of Gay Histori and Cultur, but the boy was imprisoned when the poser fell out of favor wh the kg.

Freric ChopThe legendary 19th-century Polish poser wrote love letters to Tyt Wojciechowski that revealed his persuasn, acrdg to historian Michel Lariviere, and there is evince he had male lovers before that as well, cludg the openly and famoly gay Marquis Cte.

Franz SchubertWhile Schubert as a young man was fely known as a womanizer, he likely was bisexual, later livg many years wh gay poet Johann Mayrhofer. Francis Jean Marcel PoulencAn out poser early-20th-century France, Poulenc created mic opposg the homophobic Nazis durg the 1940s, acrdg to Daisy Falurt's L Six. And acrdg to bgrapher Howard Pollack, he was also nfint his homosexualy om an early age, even though he showed ltle clatn to e out publicly.

REMEMBERG GAY COMPOSER PETER ILICH TCHAIKOVSKY ON HIS 183RD BIRTHDAY

While not known for tolerance himself, Thomson was arrted 1942 durg a raid on a gay borllo near the Brooklyn Navy Yard, acrdg to bgrapher Anthony Tommasi. He was also out, hangg New York's gay cultural circl, at one pot sharg a brownstone wh other famed gay artists, Brten and W. Historians and classil scholars almost unanimoly agree – as letters and diari, cludg letters to his brother, Most, who was also gay, make clear.

Acrdg to bgrapher John Wiley, Tchaikovsky was openly gay all his life, femisg the nam of the young men he nsorted wh, as well as referrg to himself as “Petrola”. Author Konstant Rotikov, who has wrten a gay history of St Petersburg, said: “In the se of Tchaikovsky his homosexualy is so well documented by his own wrgs and the wrgs of others that is simply ludicro to suggt otherwise.

PUT: TCHAIKOVSKY WAS GAY? SO WHAT?

In 2013, a Rsian screenwrer workg on a ernment fund bpic of his life ed furore when he nied that the poser had been gay. However, what is unniable is that Hanl socialized circl which homosexualy was an open secret, om the Italian and German urts to his artistic dr London.

Though the poser wrote about his sexualy at length his letters to his brother Most (also gay), Tchaikovsky’s immense fame and fear of floutg social nventn preclud him om livg openly wh a male partner. Dpe myriad primary acunts that discs Tchaikovsky’s homosexualy, the Rsian ernment’s long history of anti-gay censorship has muddied the bgraphil waters Tchaikovsky’s beloved homeland. His strong sense of inty manifted self arrangements and missns for several Amerin gay men’s chos, and he was regnized for his achievements by the Annual Gay/Lbian Amerin Mic Awards 1999.

As AIDS rearcher and -founr of Gay Men’s Health Crisis Lawrence Mass noted, Harrison was “proud to be a gay poser and terted talkg about what that might mean. Knowg that nservative orchtra boards would not tolerate havg an openly gay mic director, Bernste married actrs Felicia Montealegre 1951. Muhly is a genre-bendg poser whose most recent opera, Sentenc, centers on the life of Alan Turg, the famed Enigma cracker who was also gay.

SCREENWRER QUTNS WHETHER TCHAIKOVSKY WAS GAY, SPARKG FUROR RSIA

But Muhly has unrplayed whatever personal nnectn listeners might draw between his experience as a gay poser the twenty-first century and Turg’s. Mara Kostalevsky, the -edor of the new book told The Guardian that while has been wily accepted the wet that Tchaikovsky was homosexual, is still challenged Rsia.

” She add that, while Tchaikovsky’s homosexualy had long been accepted the wt, “ is still a subject of heated and often ugly bate. The script was apparently revised to remove referenc that uld have ma vulnerable unr Rsia's ntroversial new "gay propaganda" film's screenwrer, Yuri Arabov, nied that Tchaikovsky was gay, and told the newspaper Izvtiya that the poser of Swan Lake and Sleepg Bety was "a person whout a fay who was stuck wh the opn that he supposedly lov men".

DID THIS LEGENDARY GAY RSIAN COMPOSER COMM SUICI?

"Arabov is actually right – there is no evince that Tchaikovsky was a homosexual, " said Medsky, when asked by the Interfax news agency if the climate of homophobia Rsia was forcg film-makers to censor the issue.