1900 - 1909
Ruby, Gold & Malachite by Henry Scott Tuke (1902)
1900 ‘The Great Good Place’ by Henry James is published in Scribner’s Magazine.
30 November. Death of Oscar Wilde in Paris. Robbie Ross is present.
Georges Eekhoud is prosecuted for corrupting public morals. Leading writers protest and the
case is dropped.
Love of Comrades and Friends in World Literature by Elisàr von Kupffer.
Drift by Horatio Brown. It contains some homoerotic poems, but he was antagonistic to
Uranian poets, who thought he helped to delay homosexual emancipation.
Claudine à l’école by Colette showed that a witty, intelligent young woman could enjoy normal
lesbian relationships without becoming a victim or a predatory fiend.
Eros’ Throne by George Ives – some poems celebrate homosexuality in a coded manner.
September. Henry James wrote to William Morton Fullerton, an American journalist that “I’d
do anything for you” and mentioned that he was “magically tactile.” Fullerton was bi-
sexual, some have argued he is the most likely to have had sexual relations with Henry
James.
Chansons de Bilitis by Pierre Louys contains poems supposedly written by and about lesbians.
The second and final volume of August von Platen’s diaries are published.
Lieblingsminne und Freundesliebe in der Weltliteratur by Elisár von Kupffer – an anthology of
historic same-sex couples. An inspiration for Edward Carpenter.
New Sermons for a New Century by Rev. S.E. Cottam considered the cult of Hadrian for “the
everglorious lad” Antinous a missed opportunity: “Antinoüs was within an ace of
becoming the god of the modern world. We may say it was only the divinity of Christ
which prevented this.”
‘Pederasty and Tribady Among Animals in Literature’ by Ferdinand Karsch-Haack.
Ronald Gower & Frank Hird settle into ‘Hammerfield’ in Kent, a Tudor-style mansion.
A.E. Housman (41) is attracted to a Venetian gondolier (23), visits on an annual basis and
supports him financially when he becomes ill.
Frederick Rolfe works on his autobiographical novel Nicholas Crabbe.
7 November. Lady Paget gains a divorce from the Fifth Marquess of Anglesey for non-con-
summation. He was a flamboyant cross-dresser who has been assumed to have been
homosexual, but no sexual partners have been located. His private papers were
destroyed by his family.
Thomas Mann (25) had an affair with the artist, Paul Ehrenberg (23) for 4 years, which he
looked back on as the happiest time of his life.
An Italian study estimates that 60% of homosexuals were musicians.
c.1900 Wilhelm van Gloeden photographs a nude man in the same pose as Hippolyte Flandrin’s Nude
Young Man Seated on a Rock.
Rumours circulate of Sir Hector Macdonald’s affair with a male Boer prisoner.
1901 Kim by Rudyard Kipling published. The relationship between Kim and the Tibetan lama may
be read in a homo-social light.
The Story of a Life by Claude Hartland is published “for the consideration of the medical
fraternity.”
Idylle saphique by Liane de Pougy includes a lesbian romance, but the novel ends with failure,
ruin and remorse.
In His Own Image by Frederick Rolfe. Narratives in Stories Toto Told Me are republished with
extra tales. Many stories are pederastic in nature.
‘The Sacred Fount’ by Henry James. It has a homosexual subtext.
Monsieur de Phocas by Jean Lorrain – protagonist is a homosexual steeped in vice.
H.C. Andersen: Proof of his Homosexuality by C.H. Fahlberg is published in German.
A Berlin homosexual philologist discreetly advertised for a partner in 11 journals. He had 140
replies, with 111 men being open that they wanted a homosexual relationship.
Arnold Alterino addresses the 5th conference of criminal anthropology arguing that Uranism is
natural and should be accepted was opposed by most other delegates.
In Budapest Weiberbeute by ‘Luz Frauman’. It has a ridiculous plot of a frustrated lesbian
hypnotising her girlish stepson into thinking himself as a woman with a pregnancy.
Alfred Redl, Austro-Hungarian intelligence officer, is blackmailed over his homosexuality, to
spy for the Russians.
16 January. Murray Hall (59) a New York politician, on his death is discovered to be a woman.
He died of breast cancer which he had not had treated for fear of exposure. He was
buried in women’s clothes in an unmarked grave. [1857].
February. E.M. Forster is elected to the Cambridge apostles. Many of them are homosexual,
but not practicing. Forster’s friendship with Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson dates from
this time.
Charles Beach is hired as a model for the illustrator Joe Leyendecker, thus beginning a 50-year-
long same-sex relationship.
‘The School-Friendships of Girls’, an essay by Havelock Ellis.
Countess V—a foreign robust & virile noblewoman, hunter of large game & an expert boxer &
fencer, commits suicide.
Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson openly supports Magnus Hirschfeld’s campaign against German anti-
homosexual laws.
1902 Ioläus by Edward Carpenter published. Includes an anthology of friendship, and maps out the
cultural and historical roots of homogenic love. Excerpts included are from: Plato,
Pindar, Plutarch, Saint Augustine, August von Platen and Lord Byron. Known
unsypatherically in the book-trade as the Bugger’s Bible.
L’Immoraliste by André Gide. A fictionalised account of his homosexual initiation.
Vice Abroad by Jean Lorrain – the protagonist is a homosexual steeped in vice.
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. The relationship between Marlow & Kurtz may be read
in a homosocial context.
Henry Scott Tuke paints the homoerotic Ruby, Gold and Malachite – mainly male nudes in a
boat.
Kafka begins writing ‘Description of a Struggle’ (Bescreibung eines Kempfes), which contains
sudden, unpremeditated outbursts of intimacy between men.
Beiträge der Psychopathia sexualis by Ivan Bloch. (Contributions to the Etiology of
Psychopathia sexualis).
Claudine en ménage by Colette is a sequel to the novel from 1900.
The Virginian: A Horseman of the Plains by Owen Wister. The protagonist is “irresistibly hand-
some” and very taciturn, but becomes a bosom buddy of the narrator when they adopt a
lonely hen.
Lucien Römer, Dutch author, writes his first article on Henri III. He would write many more on
homosexual subjects.
Poems by A.C. Benson. Some have vague Uranian undertones.
‘What the People should know about the Third Sex’ a pamphlet is produced in German.
Ferdinand Karschhaak travels to Switzerland to look for data about Heinrich Hössli.
Iwan Bloch publishes social-anthropological studies of homosexuality.
D’Adelswärd-Fersen, French author, meets Jean Lorrain in Venice.
Debauchees, Lustful Men & Sodomites: Pathology & Crimes by Francisco de Macedo.
9 February. Henry James writes a homoerotic letter to sculptor Hendrik Andersen after the
death of his brother: “lean on me as a brother & a lover.”
Friedrich Alfred Krupp is forbidden to return to Capri and probably commits suicide.
Viscount Esher wrote to his friend Charles ‘Chat’ Williamson congratulating him on his
relationship with a Ventian gondolier.
September. The Battersea Scandal takes place. Long suppressed…
September Collier’s Magazine’s cover is of a homoerotic brawny shirtless blacksmith by Joe
Leyendecker. Charles Beach starts dealing with the business side of the operation.
Stefan George (poet, 34) met Maximilian Kronberger (14), a gifted & beautiful youth. Maximin
became George’s platonic inspiration.
E.M. Forster writes ‘The Story of a Panic, a thinly-veiled story of an awaking sexual self-
awareness.
November. E.M. Forster begins teaching at a college for working-class students. He makes the
acquaintance of E.K. Bennett, a homosexual clerk, who, later became a German
literature don at Cambridge.
December HOM initiates E.M. Forster into a chaste love-affair possibly mirroring that between
Clive Durham & Maurice Hall in Maurice. Forster realises that he is “other.”
The British Medical Journal advocated use of Krafft-Ebing’s book as lavatory paper.
Rumours circulate of Sir Hector Macdonald’s irregular sexual activities in India.
1903 Joseph Conrad’s Typhoon is published, which includes a scene in which Jules and Captain
MacWhirr are forced to embrace to survive a violent storm.
The Ambassadors by Henry James.
The Pederasts: A Crew’s Diversion, an item of homosexual pornography was published.
The Way of All Flesh by Samuel Butler is published posthumously. There are several homo-
social relationships being ruined by heterosexual marriage.
Noonday Heat by Henry Scott Tuke – homoerotic painting.
25 March. Hector MacDonald shoots himself in Paris over an alleged homosexual scandal in
Ceylon, where homosexual acts weren’t actually illegal.
Sex and Character by Otto Weininger. The book argues that every man is comprised of both
male and female elements. He commits suicide the same year.
Tonio Kröger by Thomas Mann – inspired by his schoolboy crush on Armin Martens.
Hombres, erotic poetry by Paul Verlaine – frank evocations of sexual pleasure & the joys of the
human body.
J.C. Leyendecker starts providing most holiday issue covers for the Saturday Evening Post,
many featuring homoerotic male figures.
The 12th edition of Krafft-Ebing’s book now has 238 cases, as opposed to 45 in the first.
For the Pleasure of his Company: An Affair of the Misty City by Charles Warren Stoddard –
same-sex desires place the protagonist outside the norms of US culture, so he must seek
an alternative.
Henry James (60) meets Jocelyn Persse (30) and falls in love with him at first sight.
June. French author Jacques d’Adelswärd-Fersen & Count Albert Hamelin de Warren were said
to have indulged in Black Masses, but Fersen claimed he was re-enacting what he read in
Baudelaire. La Mort des amant was read while incense burned, flutes played, and young
men were posed draped only in shawls & togas. They were punished with 6 months in
prison and a fine of 50 francs. On release Fersen flees to Capri.
Jean Cocteau (14) fell in love with a very good-looking school-fellow, Pierre Dargelos (13).
Shortly afterwards Cocteau is expelled.
Cavafy meets poet Alex Mavroudis on a trip to Athens. He falls in unrequited love.
The Social Problem of Sexual Perversion, a German pamphlet.
Adolf Brand is imprisoned for 2 months for the sexual content in the magazine Der Eigne. In
this year he also split from Magnus Hirschfeld’s Scientific-Humanitarian Committee.
Brand forms Gemeinschaft der Eigenen with Benedict Friedlaender & Wilhelm Jansen. To
this new group the love of an older man for a youth, was viewed as a simple aspect of
virile manliness available to all men.
Hirschfeld’s questionnaire has 137 questions to recognise oneself as homosexual.
1903-6 Twenty officers are court-martialled in Berlin for homosexual offences.
1903-15 Cavafy (40) writes & privately publishes his homoerotic poetry.
1904 Under the Hill by Aubrey Beardsley is written but unpublished. Chapter 7 includes a homo-
sexual scene. The book remained unfinished and unrefined on Beardsley’s death.
Belchamber by Howard Sturgis. It has been described as ‘the natural history of the passive
male.’ Lord Charmington is a puny effeminate character.
Die Renaisssance des Eros Uranios by Benedict Friedlaender.
The Challoners by E.F. Benson.
Pijoelijntjes by Jacob De Haan. It concerns two homosexual men living together and “Pijpen”
is Dutch slang for fallatio. Most copies were destroyed just after publication because the
book was based on, and was dedicated to Arnold Aletrino, who was trying to safeguard his
reputation after being criticised by the prime minister for being too open about his
sexuality. Publication caused an outcry and de Haan lost both his teaching job and his
work on a newspaper.
Prometheus is painted by Kristian Zahrtmann – a large male nude.
Hadrian VII by Frederick Rolfe. The protagonist shows a goldsmith the Hermaphroditic
Apollo of the Belvedere.
Hombrès by Paul Verlaine – 15 posthumous poems celebrate male body & homosexuality.
Mikaël by Herman Bangs – the Danish author’s most overtly homosexual novel.
The Island of Tranquil Delights by Charles Warren Stoddard – sexual tourism homoerotic
stories
Lucien Römer translates Rochester’s Sodom into Dutch.
Franz Grillparzer & His Love Life by Hans Rau is published in German.
The Alternate Sex, or The Female Intellect in Man, & the Masculine in Woman by Charles
Leland.
‘The Love of the Third Sex’ a pamphlet by Johanna Elberskirchen, suffragette, is published.
Berlin’s Third Sex by Magnus Hirschfeld – Berlin’s flourishing homosexual culture.
Renaissance des Eros Uranios by Bendedict Friedländer – medical interference in homo-
sexuality is caused by Christianity.
Voyous de velours by Georges Eekhoud – indirectly depicts a homosexual misfit.
Anna Rüling told Hirschfeld’s committee that the woman’s movement was greatly helped by
Uranian women, but it couldn’t attract more opprobrium by making the links too public.
Easter. James Elroy Flecker holidays in Wales with his very close friend J.D.Beazley.
E.M. Forster begins to write explicitly homoerotic stories, but these are not intended for
publication.
July. Jacques D’Adelswärd-Fersen & Hamelin de Warren, aristocrats, are arrested & charged
with indecent assault & “exciting minors to debauchery.” After prison d’Adelswärd-
Fersen returns to Capri once villa Lysis has been completed. He lived there with his
secretary Nino Ceserini (14) a construction worker and newspaper vendor. A portrait of
Nino is painted by Paul Hoecker.
10 August. Henry James writes a letter to Hendrik Andersen, which seems to suggest they may
have been tactile with each other.
Vincento Gémito produces a nude on the back of a racing horse as an advertising poster, which
was rejected by the newspaper for whom it was designed.
c.1904 Eugène Jansson, Swedish artist visits Italy and starts to paint gymnasts & naked wrestlers,
athletes etc.
1904-6 Frederick Rolfe & R.H. Benson have a passionate, but chaste friendship, sometimes intimate
letters were exchanged on a daily basis.
1905 The Garden God: A Tale of Two Boys by Forrest Reid. It was dedicated to Henry James
without his consent, and their friendship was immediately ended by James.
Henry James and Hendrik Andersen visit Rhode Island together.
The Hill: A Romance of Friendship by Horace Annesley. Fond friendships are formed at
Harrow.
The Troll Garden by Willa Cather. Includes: ‘Paul’s Case’ and ‘The Sculptor’s Funeral.’
A.C. Benson reissues William Johnson Corey’s Ionica, which inspires several younger Uranian
poets.
An expurgated version of Oscar Wilde’s De Profundis is published by Robbie Ross.
Lord Lyllian by Jacques d’Adelswärd-Fersen. It includes touches of the Oscar Wilde affair, but
also satirises details of his own scandal from 1903.
Magnus Hirschfield republishes Karoly-Maria Benkert’s pamphlet in which he coined the term
homoszexualitás.
Freud’s Three Essays on Sexuality: “It will be seen that we are not in a position to base a satis-
factory explanation for the origin of inversion upon the material at present before us.”
Freud tells a newspaper that “homosexuals must not be treated as sick people, for a perverse
orientation is far from being a sickness.”
Hubertus Schouten article refuting the legend that John Calvin was branded on the right
shoulder for being a sodomite is finally published.
André Gide has an affair with Maurice Schlumberger.
Stefan George (37) meets Hugo Zemik [Ugolino] (14) and is inspired to write passionate love
poems to him.
Maynard Keynes in a letter to Arthur Hobhouse signs himself “your most constant true lover.”
April. James Smith, 65 (see 1877 & 1897) released from Parkhurst Prison and works as a clerk
for the Salvation Army.
Two “queer men” R.H. Benson & Frederick Rolfe go on a walking tour, and their friendship
survives this event.
October George Mallory begins studying at Magdalene College, Cambridge. He has affairs with
Duncan Grant, and James Strachey.
Robbie Ross attends the first performances of Wilde’s Salome in England. Ross has an affair
with Frederick Smith, one of the actors.
Mikhail Kuzmin visits a St Petersburg bathhouse and is persistently offered a good-looking
attendant.
Marsden Hartley, artist, met a circle of Whitman admirers in Maine. William Sloan Kennedy
gave him a signed portrait of Whitman, which Whitman had given him just before he died.
The young Hugh Walpole declares his affection for A.C. Benson, who gently rebuffs him.
Gabriel Yturri dies from diabetes, leaving his companion of 20 years, Count Robert de
Montesquiou-Fezensac alone, until he finds a replacement.
Magnus Enckell, Finnish artist, returns home from a decade in Italy with Giovanni, his model,
chauffeur & manservant.
A cartoon appears in Jugend, a Munich weekly. Census taker: “how many children?”, & the reply
is: “2 daughters, 1 boy, 3 homosexual intermediates & 1 Uranian.”
Vincenzo Gémito’s sculpture is reviewed: “The working-class youths he took back… burned by
our torrid sun and tinted the colour of bronze. The quickness of their limbs shaped the
bodies of these ephebes into a singularly gracious form.”
1905-6 Mountain of Light by Louis Couperus – the androgynous polysexual Emperor Elgabalus.
1905-9 John Henry Mackay, Scottish-German anarchist, wrote six books about Nameless Love under
the pseudonym ‘Sagitta.’
1906 An expanded edition of Ioläus by Edward Carpenter.
Days with Walt Whitman by Edward Carpenter.
Edward Carpenter also publishes The Intermediate Sex. The first straightforward defence of
homosexuality published in Britain.
The Yankee Saviour (Walt Whitman) by Eduard Bertz is published in German.
Imre: A Memorandum by ‘Xavier Mayne’ [Edward Prime-Stevenson] is printed privately in
Naples. A masculine Englishman loves a Hungarian soldier and at the close they stroll
blissfully along the Danube serenaded by a gypsy orchestra.
Wings by Mikhail Kuzmin is the first homosexual Russian novel with a Russian theme: the
protagonist goes to Italy, and decides to live with an older man. At the conclusion he
“opens a window onto a street flooded with bright sunlight.”
The Homosexual Life of the Civilised Peoples – East Asians: Chinese, Japanese, Koreans by
Ferdinand Karsch-Haack – first projected volume of a trilogy.
Les Invertis by Armand Dubarry has a ridiculous plot. A homosexual count woos his bride’s
lover by promising not to take the virginity of the bride. Meanwhile, the bride is
harassed by the count’s lesbian sister.
The Confusions of Young Törless by Robert Musil. Extreme bullying, including sexual bullying
is found both repellent & attractive by the protagonist.
Maximin, a poem by Stefan George dedicated to Ludwig II of Bavaria.
Une Jeunesse by Jacques d’Adelswärd-Fersen – includes a pederastic subplot.
Fersen lived in Rome with his secretary Nino Ceserini (14) a construction worker & newspaper
vendor. A portrait of Nino is painted by Paul Hoecker.
Paul Hoecker’s Portrait of Nino
Sandor Ferenczi, Hungarian doctor, urges colleagues to accept ‘Uranism’ as a naturally
occurring form of sexuality and asked for decriminalisation.
Christopher Millard is jailed for 3 months in Wormwood Scrubs for gross indecency.
Tchaikovsky’s beloved nephew Bob Davydov shoots himself.
Carl Hansen Fahlberg, deputy commander of Copenhagen CID, is implicated in a large homo-
sexual scandal. He is in custody for 10 months, and suffers a breakdown.
John Maynard Keynes adds David Charles Erskine (40), Liberal Party politician to his “sex
list”.
Spring. Archibald Wakley, homosexual artist, who often painted naked guardsmen, is found
murdered. He had the marks of spurs on his thighs.
November. Maximilian Harden publishes an article about an unnamed German diplomat being
homosexual, who was meant to be Prince Philipp zu Eulenburg. He alleged that the
diplomat was having a relationship with an unnamed French diplomat, who was black-
mailing him to divulge state secrets. Eulenburg was having an affair with Raymond
Lecomte, but there is no evidence secrets were being given to France. When Lecomte
read the article he promptly destroyed his side of the correspondence. Harden concen-
trated on Eulenburg’s supposed effeminate characteristics.
Diaghilev & Dmitry part company, and Diaghilev takes up with Alexei Mavrin, who becomes
his lover and secretary.
E.M. Forster (27) meets Syed Ross Masood (17) & falls in unrequited love with him.
February. Coming & Going of the Dandy by W.K. Haselden in the Daily Mirror shows a dandy
being kicked out a window by John Bull: “there’s no room for you in this century.”
c.1906 Jean Cocteau became one of the youths surrounding Edouard de Max, a flamboyant aesthete &
actor.
1906-7 Six German officers committed suicide after being blackmailed for homosexual acts.
1907 Der siebente Ring by Stefan George. Including the poems ‘On the Life and Death of Maximin,’
‘Ripening’ & ‘The Dancer’.
Colette and her lover, Mathilde de Morny, Marquise de Belboeuf, performed a pantomime Rêve
d’Egypte, which resulted in near riots.
Georges Eekhoud, Belgian novelist, is referred to as homosexual in Das Sexualleben unsere
Zeit by Iwan Bloch.
In Siegfried Moldau’s Wahreit [Truth] – one character sounds another out on the subject of
homosexuality.
Magnus Enckell is commissioned to provide an altarpiece for Tampere cathedral, Finland – 2
men walk hand-in-hand.
Socrates and Alcibiades is painted by Kristian Zahrtmann. Alcibiades is nude.
Roger Casement begins a relationship with Gordon Miller (17).
Baden-Powell brings together 22 boys from both working-class & private upper-class schools,
which eventually led to the Scouting movement.
Cavafy moves into a Rue Lepsis with his brother – giving more freedom in his private life.
27 April. The journalist Maximillian Harden accused Kuno von Moltke of having a relation-
ship with Philipp, Prince of Eulenburg – the Kaiser’s favoured adviser.
6 July. The Irish Crown Jewels are found to be missing. They were in the custody of Sir
Arthur Vicars, who was in the habit of entertaining homosexual friends in drinking
parties. He was removed from his post.
F. Holland Day moved away from Biblical subjects and now used male youths as models for
pagan subjects for his photography.
Eugène Jansson exhibits Naked Young Man – a full figure painting of Knut Nyman. Naval
Bathhouse also dates from this time.
23-9 October. The Moltke v. Harden trial takes place.
27 October. Adolf Brand alleges that the Imperial Chancellor, Bernhard Prince von Bülow had
embraced and kissed his private secretary during an all-male gathering hosted by
Eulenburg. Von Bülow succeeds & Brand is imprisoned for 18 months.
29 October. The trial’s verdict is that Moltke is homosexual and Harden innocent of libel.
7 November. The trial for slander against Adolf Brand starts.
Frank Shackleton introduces Ronald Gower to a shady accountant, Thomas Garlick, who will
defraud Gower, Frank Hill and others out of thousands of pounds.
Lord Kitchener meets Oswald FitzGerald and they become lifelong companions.
Fred Barnes, openly homosexual music hall entertainer, first sings ‘The Black Sheep of the
Family’: “It’s a queer, queer world we live in / And Dame Nature plays a funny game –
/Some get all the sunshine,/ Others get the shame.”
C.K. Scott-Moncrieff publishes in the school magazine a short story ‘Evensong and Morwe
Song’, which has a homosexual connotation.
Christopher Millard becomes one of the earliest lovers of C.K. Scott-Moncrieff.
Radclyffe Hall (27) falls in love with Mabel Batten (50), a married singer & pianist.
Nijinsky catches the eye of Count Pavel Lvov, and becomes his lover. He also meets Diaghilev
during a meal, but Nijinsky makes little impression on Diaghilev.
Ainsi chantait Marsyas by Jacques d’Adelswärd-Fersen. Some of the poems concentrate on the
physical attractiveness of youths.
Autumn. James Flecker holidays in Florence with his very close friend J.D.Beazley.
Gide writes but does not publish Le Ramier. An account of Gide’s meeting with Ferdinand
(17), the handsome son of a farmworker and their sexual encounter.
Eugène Jansson, Swedish artist, paints a homoerotic nude athlete in a cruciform pose, framed
by a door.
Benedict Friedländer believed that doctors were beginning to abandon the ‘sickness’ theory of
homosexuality under pressure from their patients.
Walter Jekyll meets Claude McKay in Jamaica & plays a mentoring role.
After the publication of The Longest Journey, E.M. Forster begins reading the gay canon.
Norman Douglas, writer, lives impoverished in Paris with companion Guiseppe Orioli.
Sandor Ferenczi discovers Freud’s theories, and begins to see ‘Uranism’ as a neurosis & starts
forming his own theories.
1907-9 The Eulenburg Affair. A series of trials of officers in the Kaiser’s circle concerning homo-
sexual offences. The journalist Maximillian Harden accused Kuno von Moltke of having
a relationship with Philipp, Prince of Eulenburg. In a subsequent trial the journalist was
acquitted. However, in a 1908 retrial the journalist was found guilty of libel. A British
Liberal Statesman, Edward Marjoribanks (58), was implicated by a German newspaper.
He suffered a breakdown in health around this time.
1907-11 John Maynard Keynes and Duncan Grant are lovers.
1907-14 Hubertus Schouten writes several pseudonymous articles on homosexual issues.
1907-19 Composer Charles Tomlinson Griffes’ diaries document his musical accomplishments and
homosexual encounters.
1908 The Intermediate Sex by Edward Carpenter published. A collection of essays.
The Sexual life of Our Time by M. Eden Paul, a translation of Ivan Bloch’s 1901-3 works is
published in one volume.
The Intersexes by ‘Xavier Mayne’ [Edward Prime-Stevenson) – a ponderous defence of
homosexuality.
‘The Hidden Things’ by Cavafy, acknowledges that his sexual identity was a practical obstacle
in his way.
Pathologieën by Jacob De Haan is published – centred on a sadomasochistic homosexual
relationship.
How to Recognize Homosexuals by Raphael Kirchner was published as a guide for “employ-
ers, managers & men in key positions.”
A French documentary and anecdotal study of German homosexuality was reprinted 19 times
in 3 months.
Elisár von Kupffer published a monograph on Sodoma, the Renaissance homosexual artist.
The Amorous Journey of a Pederast, a lost item of homosexual Nuremberg porn was
published.
Scouting for Boys by Baden-Powell.
Daniel-Daniela. From a Man who Bears a Cross by *** [Anon. but by Karl Larsen] – a
friend of Joachim Reinhard. The book was a portrait of a tragic & pitiable
feminine homosexual. Larsen claimed he had no sympathy for effeminate
homosexuals.
Eugène Jansson paints Bathing Scene – many male nudes.
Sibilla Aleramo meets Cordula (Lina) Poletti, a student 9 years younger, and they have a 1-
year affair. Aleramo rejected Poletti’s masculinization of herself.
Mid-January. E.M. Forster is taken to meet Henry James, but is repelled.
A new performance of Rêve d’Egypte, which included more scantily-clad female dancers,
resulted in a hugh fine for the owner of the Moulin Rouge.
‘Evensong and Morwe Song’ by Charles Scott-Moncrieff is published in the Winchester
School magazine. A headmaster punishes boys for sins he committed in his youth.
The magazine was supressed and the editor expelled.
Count Harry Kessler discovers the poet and librettist Hugo von Hofmannsthal rummaging
through his luggage looking for a stash of homoerotic pornography.
Count von Hűlsen-Häseler dies of a heart attack while dancing in a ballerina’s tutu in the
presence of the Kaiser.
Robbie Ross produces the definitive edition of Oscar Wilde’s works.
Robert de Montesquiou publishes a volume of poetry and dedicates them to Gabriel Yturri,
his deceased partner.
Summer. James Elroy Flecker holidays in Italy with his very close friend J.D.Beazley.
A.E. Forrest is driven to suicide after a life of peadophilia.
Marcel Proust
1909 Proust begins writing A la recherche du temps perdu.
Et le feu s’éteigniut sur la mer by Jacques d’Adelswärd-Fersen. A sculptor who loves the
classics leaves his wife for his male companion, braving social opprobrium &
Christian sanction.
The German review, Sexuale Probleme, asks Belgian novelist, Georges Eekhoud, to declare
himself, but he equivocates.
Italian Hours by Henry James reprints essays written over nearly a 40-year period. “Most
people, I think, either like their gondolier or hate him; and if they like him, like him
very much.”
The Desire and Pursuit of the Whole by Frederick Role has two males apparently in love, but
one turns out to be female.
Akadémos, a short-lived homosexual periodical is founded by Jacques d’Adelswärd-Fersen.
It includes pieces on aestheticism, androgynous love, poems of Sappho and paintings
of Saint Sebastian. Contributions were from homosexual authors, such as Georges
Eekhoud & Achille Essebac.
Rupert Brooke “pulled my fresh, boyish stunt” on meeting Henry James, and enchanted him.
Strait is the Gate by André Gide.
Memoirs of the Notary Public Isaías Caminha by Lima Barreto – portrayed the writer João
do Rio as Raul de Gusmão, a “talented lad” who pays to have sex with a marine.
John Henry Mackay’s homosexual novels published in Germany are declared obscene after a
19-month trial.
Charles Leadbeater ‘acquires’ Krishnamurti, an attractive young Brahmin, and declares him
future world saviour. The boy’s father initiates a court case causing scandal.
Joannes Henri François meets M.J.J. Exler, who shows him the MS of Sorrow of Life– a
novel which reads like a lecture on homosexuality. François reviews the novel.
8 July. E.M. Forster is shocked after an evening with Malcolm Darling & his friend Ernest
Mertz (27), that the latter commits suicide after speaking to Forster alone. Darling
was about to be married, was Merz secretly in love with him? Forster begins a locked
diary, to write down him most intimate thoughts.
29 October. Rupert Brooke loses his virginity with Denham Russell-Smith.
Charles Masson Fox visits Venice with James Cockerton and meets Frederick Rolfe. Rolfe
later sends Fox the pornographic Venetian Letters.
The Greek View of Life by Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson. It popularised ancient Athenian
ideas for the general reader.
Georges Eekhoud states: “I have never professed or confessed to homosexuality.”
Duncan Grant begins an affair with Adrian Stephen (brother of the future Virginia Woolf).
M.D. O’Brien publishes Socialism & Infamy: The Homogenic or Comrade Love Exposed.
This was an attack on Edward Carpenter: “is the infamy which is said to have brought
destruction on Sodom & Gomorrah likely to bring … destruction upon the trade of
Sheffield?” According to O’Brien, Carpenter was a “disseminator of filth & dirt
vomited up from the foul pit of sin & death.”
Rupert Brooke and James Strachey conduct a love affair.
Diaghilev and the ballet dancer Nijinsky become lovers.
Cole Porter meets Monty Wooley, with whom he haunts Harlem male brothels.
Claude Cahun (15), photographer, first meets Suzanne Malherbe (13), a fine-arts student.
Years later they would become lifelong companions.
The British Medical Journal reviewed Edward Carpenter’s The Intermediate Sex & recomm-
ended that homosexuals should all abandon Britain and “leave serious people in
England” in peace.
Critic Rudolf Borchardt hints at the poet Stefan George’s homosexuality as being a danger to
Germany’s youth.
Bibliography
Ackroyd, Peter, Queer City: Gay London From the Romans to the Present Day, London: Chatto & Windus, 2017.
Aldrich, Robert, Gay Life Stories, London: Thames & Hudson, 2023.
Aldrich, Robert & Garry Wotherspoon (eds.), Who’s Who in Gay & Lesbian History: From Antiquity to World War II: London,
Routledge, 2001.
Bray, Alan, The Friend, University of Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2003.
Griffin, Gabriele, (ed.), Who’s Who in Lesbian & Gay Writing, Routledge: London, 2002.
Norton, Rictor, My Dear Boy: Gay Love Letters through the Centuries, San Francisco: Leyland Publications: 1998.
Rowse, A.L., Homosexuals in History, London: Wiedenfeld & Nicholson, 1977.
Spencer, Colin, Homosexuality, a History, London: Fourth Estate, 1995.
Woods, Gregory, Homosexuality in Literature, London: Yale University Press, 1998.
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