LGBTQ Lerature is a Rears and Book Lovers seri dited to discsg lerature that has ma an impact on the liv of lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr, and queer people. From fictn to ntemporary nonfictn to history and everythg ...
Contents:
- BUT WERE THEY GAY? THE MYSTERY OF SAME-SEX LOVE THE 19TH CENTURY
- NEWLY PUBLISHED PORTRAS DOCUMENT A CENTURY OF GAY MEN LOVE
- GAY COWBOYS? SURE, PARDNER.
- THE 200-YEAR-OLD DIARY THAT'S REWRG GAY HISTORY
BUT WERE THEY GAY? THE MYSTERY OF SAME-SEX LOVE THE 19TH CENTURY
A Yorkshire farmer's journal om 1810 reveals surprisgly morn views on beg gay. * gay cowboys in the 19th century *
"Walt Whman and Gay Liberatn are nearly synonymo for me, " wrote cultural historian Rictor Norton a 1999 say.
NEWLY PUBLISHED PORTRAS DOCUMENT A CENTURY OF GAY MEN LOVE
"It's hard to image any morn poet wrg about lyg another man's arms and then llg homosexualy "damnable. ""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.
Such adult men ed the pretext of a srcy of women to tablish enforced homosexual relatnships remote mps and ranch parable to the relatnships for which today's prisons are notor.
GAY COWBOYS? SURE, PARDNER.
The high cince of perasty and homosexual rape is the great dirty secret of the Old Wt ontier--and yet this is not om any lack of ntemporary acunts which document or ht at , cludg the famed woodcuts of men dancg wh boys, scriptns of the practic of multiple men sleepg sgle beds (as if there wasn't room enough out Wt for everyone to throw down his own bedroll), jok about turns the barrel, and the lyrics of certa Old Wt songs which young men seem to be given women's nam. Ask anyone who’s seen Brokeback Mounta (2005) to characterize the film three words, and you’re almost certa to hear some variatn of “gay wboy love-story.” While many have ld the film, directed by Ang Lee, for s nuanced portrayal of two men’s plited love for each other, the film was subject to sthg cricism at the time of s release. Detractors, largely spearhead by right-wg and relig groups, quickly and fervently emed the film’s pictn of a homosexual uple immoral, evince of an attempt to femize men, and even anti-Amerin.
In many s, crics honed on the two leads ’ occupatns as wboys, challengg the existence of a “gay wboy” Amerin history. I n’t thk of a more effective way to alienate most movie-gog Amerins than to show two wboys ltg after each other and even smoochg.” Other crics acced filmmakers of phg an “agenda” onto Amerins, wh one wrg that “Hollywood screenwrers and producers thk that ’s their duty to teach Ameri that homosexual nduct and cross-drsg are normal behavrs that should be affirmed Amerin culture. The beliefs, though objectively bafflg, beg tertg qutns: Was homosexualy ever accepted Ameri’s past?
Supported by sendary sourc, I will argue that this myth is rooted homoerotic relatnships, a reflectn of historil fact.
THE 200-YEAR-OLD DIARY THAT'S REWRG GAY HISTORY
In light of this ntentn, I will explore the reali of homosexualy and homosocialy amongst wboys the Old Wt, argug that they were accepted and monplace.