"Ooh! Isn't he bold?" as Julian and Sandy would say to "Mr. 'Orne" the heyday of Polari, or the old Brish gay slang. Julian and Sandy's e of Polari on the BBC rad edy "Round the Horne" troduced Polari to a mass dience, intifyg them as gay to those the know. Round the Horne's e of ultimately led to Polari's near-mise as a means of munitn between gay men. I su…
Contents:
- THE GAY LIFE OF KENH WILLIAMS
- POLARI: THE LANGUAGE GAY MEN ED TO SURVIVE
- KENH WILLIAMS: INIC GAY COMEDY ACTOR
THE GAY LIFE OF KENH WILLIAMS
Bgrapher Christopher Stevens has unvered the pth of the star's iendship wh a young gay uple who have never spoken publicly before and who were wns to Williams's long and bter stggle wh his sexual inty. Polari was spoken to skirt the UK’s strict anti-homosexualy laws. ”That may seem like a strg of nonsense words om Dr Sss’s The Cat the Hat or Anthony Burgs’s A Clockwork Orange but ’s a real-life greetg gay men the UK would say to each other the 1950s and 60s.
”Until 1967, homosexual sex was illegal England and Wal. To avoid imprisonment, gay men ed Polari, a language that the Oxford English Dictnary says is “ma up of Italianate phras, rhymg slang and nt terms. Williams is also scribed as never beg able to e to terms wh his homosexualy.
Although often perceived as gay, Williams on var ocsns claimed that he was fact asexual. However, his later published diari there are referenc to ‘barely nsummated homosexual dallianc’. Christopher Stevens is the thor of a new bgraphy on Kenh Williams, whose work has been scribed as havg ‘unvered the pth of the star’s iendship wh the gay uple’.
POLARI: THE LANGUAGE GAY MEN ED TO SURVIVE
Williams was also a close iend of Joe Orton – the gay playwright who wrote a character wh Williams md for his 1966 play LOOT.
KENH WILLIAMS: INIC GAY COMEDY ACTOR
The pair were portrayed as a gay uple (homosexualy ws still illegal until 1967) and ma much e of Polari.
His diari nta referenc to unnsummated or barely nsummated homosexual dallianc, which he scrib as "tradnal matters" or "tradla" (sce male homosexual activy was a crimal offence the UK before 1967, outright admissn would have been held agast him if anyone had read the diari). He beiend gay playwright Joe Orton, who wrote the role of Inspector Tstt Loot (1966) for him, and had holidays wh Orton and his lover, Kenh Halliwell, Moroc.