His influence was so pervasive that Martin Luther King is quoted as saying, “We’re going to let our children know that the only philosophers that lived were not Plato and Aristotle, but W.
Woolf struggled with her mental health her entire life, and eventually succumbed to suicide in 1941.Īlain Locke was an American writer, philosopher, and educator, known as the unofficial “Dean” of the Harlem Renaissance. The effect of Vita on Virginia is all contained in Orlando, the longest and most charming love letter in literature, in which she explores Vita, weaves her in and out of the centuries, tosses her from one sex to the other, plays with her, dresses her in furs, lace and emeralds, teases her, flirts with her, drops a veil of mist around her. Virginia Woolf’s queer feminist classic Orlando (which you may know from the excellent film adaptation starring Tilda Swinton) is inspired by the events of Sackville-West’s life, and Woolf’s son Nigel Nicolson said of the novel: This encouragement may have been what allowed Woolf to feel secure enough to have a long-term relationship with poet, writer, and garden designer, Vita Sackville-West. Woolf was a member of the Bloomsbury Group, a group of prominent English literary figures, who, among other things, encouraged a liberal conception of sexuality. Virginia Woolf was an English writer and poet, best known as the author of Mrs. After release, Wilde spent the rest of his life in exile and died destitute in Paris in 1900 (possibly due to complications from an injury incurred while in prison). The world mocks at it, and sometimes puts one in the pillory for it.” After his conviction, Wilde spent two years in prison, and his final work, The Ballad of Reading Gaol, was inspired by this imprisonment.
#Famous gay men in literature trial#
It was during this trial that Wilde was called upon to make his famous “the love that dare not speak its name” speech, during which he said, “It is beautiful, it is fine, it is the noblest form of affection. In 1895, Wilde became embroiled in a libel case against the Marquess of Queensberry this case did not turn out in Wilde’s favor, and led to his arrest and conviction on charges of sodomy and gross indecency. Dorian Gray was originally published in Lippincott’s Monthly Magazine, and drew such harsh criticism for its depiction of “immorality,” (one character in the novel expresses a potentially romantic infatuation for another male character) that when it was later re-published as a book, Wilde toned down the novel’s homoerotic subtext. Oscar Wilde was an Irish novelist and poet, and is often remembered for his novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, and the drama that surrounds its publication. Oscar Wilde (who also appears on this list), after meeting Whitman in 1882, was adamant that Whitman was gay, and even told the activist George Cecil Ives, “I have the kiss of Walt Whitman still on my lips.” Whitman suffered from poor health later in life, and eventually passed away in 1892 of several lung-related illnesses. He often denied that there was any homoerotic subtext in his writing, yet those who knew him claimed that in their relationships, he was rather frank about his sexuality. Whitman himself was cagey (to say the least) about the queer tones in his work.
Biographers have continually debated Whitman’s sexual orientation his poetry, particularly Leaves of Grass, which faced serious censorship after its publication, contains several homoerotic images, however others argue that this was unintentional. His prolific career is perhaps best remembered for his epic poems Leaves of Grass and Song of Myself. Walt Whitman was a American, poet, author, essayist, and journalist. Discrimination, violence, and oppression have contributed to the erasure of queer individuals who have been blazing the trails since before your grandparents’ grandparents were born, and here is just a small drop in the ocean of queer writers throughout history. Queer folks have been around since the dawn of time, and we aren’t going anywhere. Given the scarcity of satisfactory LGBTQ representation, one might be inclined to think that LGBTQ people haven’t existed for the bulk of human history.