Star Gayzing

One of my new projects is research into lgbt heavenly bodies. No, I don’t mean Matthew Mitcham! I mean stars and planets. When I was preparing my talk “Putting the Flags Out” I intended to begin with a history of the symbols ♀ and ♂,  and why the astronomical symbols for the planets Venus and Mars came to be used as gender symbols.

However, the more I looked the more I discovered there were many lgbt angles to the planets and stars and soon realised it could become the basis of a presentation in its own right.

Most of the constellations and planets have Greek or Roman mythology associated with them. Some originate much earlier in the Babylonian civilisation. Even way back then some stars had gay connections.

Star atlases over the centuries have seen constellations being chopped and changed as new were created or dropped. One of those that was dropped was called Antinous. The star maps below show you the before, during and after arrangements of this lost constellation.

Antinous was a real person. He was the boyfriend of the Roman Emperor Hadrian. A native of north-west Turkey, he was born probably 1900 years ago this year. After he met the emperor he was an inseparable companion. This came to an end in 130 AD when Hadrian and his court were in Egypt. After hunting for lions in the desert Antinous mysteriously drowned in the Nile. Legend says that Hadrian had received a prophecy saying the sacrifice of the thing he loved the most would guarantee future success. Stories of ritual sacrifice, suicide and murder have surrounded Antinous’s death ever since.

Whatever the truth behind Antinous’s death, Hadrian was utterly devastated. As is often the case even today a loved one’s death is commemorated. Rather than have a park bench with a plaque, Hadrian founded a city near to where Antinous drowned and name it Antinoopolis (that’s Antino-opolis). There were statues erected and coins minted with his image all around the empire, and Antinous was declared a god. To make sure that he could see his boyfriend every night wherever he was in his empire, Hadrian also created a new constellation called Antinous.

Constellations didn’t have fixed “boundaries” in those days. There were areas in-between which had no significant stars in them and weren’t assigned to any constellation. One constellation well known to the Romans was that of Aquila (map 1).

This represented the eagle which the Greek god Zeus sent to kidnap young Ganymede because he fancied him. Hadrian chose some stars below Aquila to turn into the constellation Antinous to show him being lifted away by the eagle (map 2).

It was symbolic location, with Antinous becoming a new Ganymede, a youth taken from the mortal world into the sky to be with the gods.

The constellation remained in the sky until quite recently. In 1930 the International Astronomical Union “cleaned up” the night sky in an effort to make proper scientific research more formalised and easier. As the third star map shows the stars on Antinous were absorbed back into Aquila (map 3).

Over the coming months I’ll be revealing more lgbt star tales as I go through the zodiac and other celestial bodies. So, if you’re star sign is Scorpio look out for my entry on 24^th October.

R.I.P.

Sad news of a friend ending his life. Miss you Paul. All my love and thoughts are with his partner Jens. I know how devastating it is to lose a partner.

Ready to be horrified?

Happy Bisexuality Day

If you’ve been to a Pride event anywhere in the world in the past few years you may have seen this flag.

It’s the Bisexuality Pride flag, and today is Bisexuality Day.

This month also sees the 30^th anniversary of the founding of the first organised bisexual group in the UK – the London Bisexual Group. The anniversary was celebrated at the annual BiCon which was held in Leicester earlier this month.

Bisexuality is one of the “labels” that have been around a long time. It was first used in the natural sciences in the 17th century to define organisms – plants as well as animals - that had both male and female parts. Bisexual was first used in human terms from the middle of the 19th century to describe the undifferentiated male and female condition found in the early embryonic state.

Even though bisexuality (as we use the word today) was being practised and groups like the Bloomsbury Group of artists and writers were formed, it wasn’t a word used by them. It wasn’t until the 1940s that it came to mean the recognition of sexual attraction to men and women.

Like homosexuality, once a separate named identity was defined people formed specific bisexual groups, and soon they revealed the discrimination there was against them. The bi activism echoed the gay rights movement in its intent, though it was felt that bisexuals were being discriminated against by both the gay and straight community. Many bisexuals felt driven away and isolated and felt they were being overlooked.

Bisexual rights groups grew during the 1970s, and a varied array of groups and organisations appeared around the world. It wasn’t long before international bisexual conferences were being held.

Like most developing communities, bisexuals identified their own specific issues and problems but had no overall unity. Partly because of this Wendy Curry, Michael Page and Gigi Raven Wilbur, bi activists in the US, founded the internet site BiCafe.com, now one of the major bisexual sites in the world.

Michael Page went on to create the Bisexual Pride flag for BiCafe’s first anniversary party on 5^th December 1998, and the following year, with Curry and Wilbur, created Bisexuality Day.

Like other celebrations Bisexuality Day is not just for bisexuals but for everyone to celebrate. After all, unlike football where club rivalry borders on tribal warfare, it doesn’t matter if you’re not “in the team” you can still “enjoy being at the match”.

Preparing for a few Thrills

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I was trying to produce a gay Hallowe’en tour. Well, I think I’ve done it. Using my Seven Deadly Gay Sins tour as the basis I’ve put together a bigger tour with lots of new stories. I did it this way because there’s very little I could use for a traditional Hallowe’en tour with a gay theme. But don’t despair – the way it has turned out there is still blood and guts, and tales of vampires, ghosts and murder.

I intend this to be a one-off tour – never to be repeated. Because of that, and because it’ll last longer, I’m going to put up my usual charge and ask people to pre-book. I haven’t finalised a date or time yet, but if you’re interested let me know anyway.

Another reason for the increase in charge is the need to raise funds for an exhibition in LGBT History Month next February. I don’t have the financial resources that Nottinghamshire’s Rainbow Heritage has for their displays so funding it myself is my only option at the moment.

Without giving too much away – the new Hallowe’en tour will take us to old and new locations around Nottingham city centre and look at the origins of the modern vampire, a cross-dressing clairvoyant, and perhaps the ghost of Oscar Wilde. Add a good sprinkling of dismembered body parts and I think it’s a tour to thrill.

More information and full details of the tour will appear in a few days.

Pink Night of the Proms

Last weekend was the Last Night of the Proms. I have always enjoyed watching it, ever since my childhood, and the thing I remember most vividly from those days are the flags. That may be the reason I became a vexillologist (that’s a studier of flags, by the way). In the past few years I’ve noticed a distinctive flag being waved in the audience. There were 3 large ones being waved enthusiastically just in front of the conductor this year. It’s this one

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This is called the Pink Jack. It is becoming very visible at lgbt events worldwide. It was first used by London artist David Gwinnutt in 2005 for an exhibition he put together on what it meant to him to be British and gay. He felt he didn’t identify himself too well with the rainbow flag. Not long afterwards David began a company called Pink Jack which produced all sorts of merchandise with the flag on it – badges, t-shirts, mugs, and of course the flags themselves. The Pink Jack became very popular quite quickly. Probably the first time it was used to symbolise the lgbt community in an international setting was at the opening ceremony of the first World Outgames in Canada in July 2006 by the British team.

But back to the Proms. There are several rousing moments in the concert when the whole audience joins as one in singing a patriotic song. The one which has been used by an unofficial national anthem is “Land of Hope and Glory”. Everyone talks about Elgar writing the music, but few can remember who wrote the words. They were written by Arthur Benson (1862-1925), a member of a family that included 3 gay sons (including Arthur) and a bisexual mother (wife of the Archbishop of Canterbury, no less).

Arthur Benson was first and foremost a teacher. He was a schoolmaster at Eton and Fellow and Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge. But he loved writing essays and poetry, becoming an unofficial poet laureate to Queen Victoria. It was this connection that led to an invitation to write words to Elgar’s music for the coronation of King Edward VII in 1902.

Benson’s sexuality was influenced by his moral Christian upbringing. He undoubtedly had romantic feelings towards men which, as if often the case with people form a background similar to his, began with a crush on a fellow pupil at public school. But Benson always advocated a celibate platonic relationship, which was perhaps very wise considering in later life he was surrounded by schoolboys and young men. Twice he suffered from serious bouts of depression, the first brought on while he was an undergraduate after his boyfriend left him to have a physical relationship with another undergraduate.

A new name I came across this week in connection with the Proms is Mrs. Rosa Newmarch (1857-1940). She was a musicologist, specialising in the classical music of Russia. Between 1908 and 1927 Rose wrote programme notes for the Prom concerts. But what caught my attention this week was a reference to Rosa Newmarch as “the first truly queer poet in English literature”. At a time when human sexuality was beginning to be separated, named and defined, Rosa’s poetry showed a pioneering attitude to the new views of sexuality and same-sex desire in literature. I must confess I haven’t read any of her work, but I’m going to read her biography to find out more.

Extraordinary Lives No. 2

Elagabalus, Emperor of Rome

One of the most extraordinary lgbt characters from history has to be the Roman emperor Elagabalus. You couldn’t make his life up if you tried. Even by Roman standards he was an odd-ball. Perhaps this may partly be due to him being born into a Syrian family of hereditary priests who worshipped a sun god in the form of a meteorite.

Some time ago I came across the story of Elegabalus as told by Neil Gaiman, the celebrated fantasy writer and artist. He set himself the challenge of telling Elegabalus’s whole life story in comic strip format, producing 24 pages in 24 hours. It’s a valiant attempt and has inspired me to do something similar in the future.

One of the most famous stories about Elegabalus involves his court officials scouring the Roman Empire for men who were, shall we say, especially “blessed” in the “trouser department”!! What Gaiman’s version doesn’t have room to tell is the full story, so here it is.

Elegabalus was married to his lover Hierocles (being High Priest of his own religion he could do that) with whom, so says the Roman historian Cassius Dio, he had a more stable relationship than with any of his wives. The court officials found a particularly “blessed” athlete by the name of Zoticus and brought him before the emperor. Elegabalus married him on the spot and took him to the palace baths where he saw for himself the naked truth.

But like a lot of gay, Hierocles became jealous. He was afraid that the emperor might dump him for this new muscle-bound stallion, so he furtively drugged Zoticus’s drink.

That night, as Emperor Elegabalus was high on expectation, handsome hunk Zoticus struggled to rise higher than a limp lettuce and the emperor was furious. Zoticus was immediately divorced and banished form Italy. How Hierocles would have sniggered as Zoticus was booted out of Rome with his tail between his legs!