Imag of Secret Gay Love Lost to Time

Contents:

• '100 YEARS OF MEN LOVE': NEW FILM UNEARTHS OLD STORI OF GAY ROMANCE
• NEWLY PUBLISHED PORTRAS DOCUMENT A CENTURY OF GAY MEN LOVE
• 100 YEARS OF PHOTOGRAPHS OF GAY MEN LOVE
• THE 200-YEAR-OLD DIARY THAT'S REWRG GAY HISTORY
• BUT WERE THEY GAY? THE MYSTERY OF SAME-SEX LOVE THE 19TH CENTURY
• SOME OF THE GREATT GAY LOVE STORI MOVI
• THE FIRST GAY FILM: DIFFERENT FROM THE OTHERS FROM 1919
• FEATURED STORI

'100 YEARS OF MEN LOVE': NEW FILM UNEARTHS OLD STORI OF GAY ROMANCE

A new documentary based on a vast llectn of old photos featurg gay men love gog back to the mid-1800s has ma s televisn but. Ni and Treadwell began their llectn 22 years ago when the uple stumbled upon a rare, century-old photo of a gay uple an antique shop.

Sce then, the men have been llectg thoands of imag of gay men datg that go back 170 years. Laws crimalizg gay sex. And even today, homosexualy is crimalized approximately 70 untri.

NEWLY PUBLISHED PORTRAS DOCUMENT A CENTURY OF GAY MEN LOVE

Touchg on them of homosexualy, the stori were wrten by Prot durg the 1890s, when he was his 20s and puttg together the llectn of poems and short stori that would bee Plaisirs et l jours (Pleasur and Days). He cid not to clu GuiFamo books that were only found or published posthumolyShowMrice by EM ForsterForster’s tale of same-sex love early 20th-century England, which follows a young gay man om his schooldays, through universy and beyond, was origally wrten 1913-14 and was regularly revised durg his lifetime. But although he showed to iends, cludg Christopher Isherwood, he didn’t try to get published, believg that he uld never get away wh a gay love story wh a happy endg.

“Prot is his 20s, and most of the texts evoke the awarens of his homosexualy, a darkly tragic way, that of a curse … In different ways, the young wrer transpos, sometim barely, the timate diary he uld not wre. ”Prot never publicly acknowledged his homosexualy, gog so far as to fight a duel wh a reviewer who had suggted, accurately, that he was gay.

“At the same time that Prot was eager to make love to other young men, he was equally termed to avoid the label ‘homosexual’, ” wr Edmund Whe his bgraphy of the French novelist. “Years later he would tell André Gi that one uld wre about homosexualy even at great length, so long as one did not ascribe to onelf.

100 YEARS OF PHOTOGRAPHS OF GAY MEN LOVE

This b of lerary advice is herent wh Prot’s general closetedns – a secretivens that was all the more absurd sce everyone near him knew he was gay.

”Fraisse said the domant theme of the stori was the analysis of “the physil love so unjtly nied” that Prot wr of À la recherche, “ terms that announce and forhadow Sodome et Gomorrhe”, the fourth volume of the seri which the thor tackl homosexual love.

“The awarens of homosexualy is experienced an exclively tragic way, as a curse. “Lovg” featur around 300 photos that offer an timate look at gay relatnships between the 1850s and 1950s.

THE 200-YEAR-OLD DIARY THAT'S REWRG GAY HISTORY

Gay Rights,. But rerds of the LGBT romanc survived homophobic revisnists and still stand as celebratns of the origal Greek (and Roman) love. A seri of poems about Catull' gay love affairs has drawn more attentn ntemporary tim; some of gets outright vulgar.

Alexanr the Great and HephatnAlexanr III, the famed kg of Macedon, que likely mataed a gay relatnship wh his general Hephatn. Ined, two of the most famed generals of their day, Epamondas and Pelopidas, were lovers who fought wh this famo band of gay warrrs. Pdar and TheoxenThe most famo love poem wrten by Pdar to clare his love for the young Theoxen was scribed by gay rights scholar Magn Hirschfeld as "one of the most perfect love songs the Greek language.

Ort and PylasThe relatnship between the two men was celebrated by Greek scholars as a tale of the wonr of homoerotic romance.

BUT WERE THEY GAY? THE MYSTERY OF SAME-SEX LOVE THE 19TH CENTURY

He lived wh longtime lover Psanias, who was quoted extensively on the subject of homosexual sire Plato's work. When Douglas's father grew spic about their relatnship, he lnched a mpaign agast Wil that eventually led to his arrt on grounds of gross cency ( for beg gay) and was sentenced to two years Wil was released, the two tried to rekdle their love, only to be forced apart by their fai, who threatened to whhold funds. Gay Erotic Stori.

Image ptn, Claire Pickerg Wakefield library imag the diary wrer speakg a Yorkshire accentA diary wrten by a Yorkshire farmer more than 200 years ago is beg hailed as providg remarkable evince of tolerance towards homosexualy Bra much earlier than prevly imaged. Historians om Oxford Universy have been taken aback to disver that Matthew Tomlson's diary om 1810 ntas such open-md views about same-sex attractn beg a "natural" human diary challeng prenceptns about what "ordary people" thought about homosexualy - showg there was a bate about whether someone really should be discrimated agast for their sexualy.

SOME OF THE GREATT GAY LOVE STORI MOVI

"In this excg new disvery, we see a Yorkshire farmer argug that homosexualy is nate and somethg that shouldn't be punished by ath, " says Oxford rearcher Eamonn O' ptn, The diari were handwrten by Tomlson the farmhoe where he lived and workedThe historian had been examg Tomlson's handwrten diari, which have been stored Wakefield Library sce the thoands of pag of the private journals have never been transcribed and prevly ed by rearchers terted Tomlson's eye-wns acunts of electns Yorkshire and the Ludd smashg up O'Keeffe me across what seemed, for the era of Gee III, to be a rather startlg set of arguments about same-sex relatnships. Tomlson had been prompted by what had been a big sex sndal of the day - which a well-rpected naval surgeon had been found to be engagg homosexual ptn, Historian Eamonn O'Keeffe says the diari provi a rare sight to the views of "ordary people" the early 1800sA urt martial had orred him to be hanged - but Tomlson seemed unnvced by the cisn, qutng whether what the papers lled an "unnatural act" was really that unnatural.

"It mt seem strange ed that God Almighty should make a beg wh such a nature, or such a fect nature; and at the same time make a cree that if that beg whom he had formed, should at any time follow the dictat of that Nature, wh which he was formed, he should be punished wh ath, " he wrote on January 14 there was an "clatn and propensy" for someone to be homosexual om an early age, he wrote, " mt then be nsired as natural, otherwise as a fect nature - and if natural, or a fect nature; seems cel to punish that fect wh ath" diarist mak reference to beg rmed by others that homosexualy is apparent om an early age - suggtg that Tomlson and his social circle had been talkg about this se and discsg somethg that was not unknown to this time, and also Wt Yorkshire, a lol landowner, Anne Lister, was wrg a d diary about her lbian relatnships - wh her story told the televisn seri, Gentleman knowg what "ordary people" really thought about such behavur is always difficult - not least bee the loust survivg voic are ually the wealthy and has exced amics is the chance to eavdrop on an everyday farmer thkg aloud his source, Getty ImagImage ptn, Tomlson was appalled by the levels of rptn durg electns"What's strikg is that he's an ordary guy, he's not a member of the bohemian circl or an tellectual, " says O'Keeffe, a doctoral stunt Oxford's history acceptance of homosexualy might have been exprsed privately aristocratic or philosophilly radil circl - but this was beg discsed by a ral worker. O'Keeffe says shows ias were "perlatg through Brish society much earlier and more wily than we'd expect" - wh the diary workg through the bat that Tomlson might have been havg wh his the were still far om morn liberal views - and O'Keeffe says they n be extremely "jarrg" someone was homosexual by choice, rather than by nature, Tomlson was ready to nsir that they should still be punished - proposg stratn as a more morate optn than the ath ptn, Tomlson's former home was still there the 1930s (bottom left), but has sce disappeared beneath hog and a golf urseO'Keeffe says disverg evince of the kds of bate has both "enriched and plited" what we know about public opn this pre-Victorian diary is raisg ternatnal Fara Dabhoiwala, om Prceton Universy the US, an expert the history of attus towards sexualy, scrib as "vivid proof" that "historil attus to same-sex behavur uld be more sympathetic than is ually prumed".

Instead of seeg homosexualy as a "horrible perversn", Prof Dabholwala says the rerd showed a farmer 1810 uld see as a "natural, dively ordaed human qualy" Norton, an expert gay history, said there had been earlier arguments fendg homosexualy as natural - but the were more likely to be om philosophers than farmers. "Walt Whman and Gay Liberatn are nearly synonymo for me, " wrote cultural historian Rictor Norton a 1999 say. "It's hard to image any morn poet wrg about lyg another man's arms and then llg homosexualy "damnable.

THE FIRST GAY FILM: DIFFERENT FROM THE OTHERS FROM 1919

""The thg we don't know about any of the people, " says Peggy Wishart, "is the qutn most morn people have: Were they gay? " By 1911, there was enough awarens of homosexualy that when Fields pulled together a posthumo volume of Jewett's letters, edor Mark Antony DeWolfe Howe urged her to censor out the pet nam. But as Reynolds says, "It's absolutely wrong to impose today's versn of homosexualy on Whman or Jewett.

A gay love story wrten more than a century ago wh a happy endg? Punctuated by quot om wrers Walt Whman and Henry David Thore (both of whom have long been mored to be gay or bisexual), the film hop to brg light to love stori lost to time.

“And there was always gay activy gog on the toilets.

FEATURED STORI

”Together and separately, they have lived a broad swath of gay history: romantic enunters the ary durg World War II; nights at the Stonewall Inn, birthplace of the gay rights movement; the anythg-go bathho of the 1970s; livg a town hoe Chelsea as the neighborhood was beg the center of gay New York. Bengiveno/The New York TimAsked whether the two men had ever experienced antigay prejudice, Mr.

I never talked to my parents about my homosexualy at all. “The pattern now seems to be, everybody has to reveal, ‘I’m gay! I don’t even thk my mother and father knew we were gay.