The Christmas Tree by Isabel Bolton (Mary Britton Miller)

New York : Charles Scribner's Sons, 1949

As Christmas approaches, we often think about past holidays. Our memories usually begin with the good times, certainly our memories are of that perfect Christmas. But as we continue down this rabbit hole, thoughts of our family in general appear, quickly followed by memories of the myriad family disagreements and complications. It's easy to think that this is a new phenomenon—that Christmases of the past were perfect and everyone got along. The characters in Isabel Bolton's novel, The Christmas Tree suggest that families have always been difficult and tensions run high at this time of the year.

Opening in the days leading up to Christmas 1945, Bolton presents the members of a family who are scattered across the country. Each person's inner dialogue is unique but all conclude that this Christmas will be challenging, particularly if everyone shows up.

Mrs. Danforth, or Hilly, is in New York with her 6-year-old grandson, Henry. She plans to give Henry that perfect Christmas that she remembers from her own childhood, including a tree with real candles.

Henry's mother, Anne is in Reno obtaining a divorce from Hilly's son, Larry. In support of the divorce, Hilly supplied a deposition confirming her son's behavior in the marriage. While still in Reno, Anne immediately marries Captain George Fletcher, a pilot during the war. Due to heavy snow, Anne and George are to arrive by train from Santa Fe.

Larry is also in the military but served stateside during the war. He lives in Washington DC and is gay. Christmas at his mother's house seems to be just the excuse he needs to end his current relationship with Jerry. Larry arrives by train, but not alone.

Novels from the 1940s and 50s typically have a Freudian slant in their explanations of relationships in general and gayness in particular—overly close relationship with the mother, absent father, etc. The Christmas Tree is no different. However, in this case it's not subtext. It is couched in the specificity of Anne's experience with analysis and her doctor's explanation of who's to blame for Larry's gayness. The explanation provided is the glue that holds the family together, for better or worse.

Bibliographies & Ratings: Cory (IV); Garde (P78**); Mattachine Review (IV); Young (345*)

Interior at Paddington by Lucian Freud

Interior at Paddington (1951)
Lucian Freud (German, English, 1922-2011)
Oil on canvas
114.3 x 152.4 cm
Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool UK

The Prince's Boy by Paul Bailey

New York: Bloomsbury, 2014

Written in form of a memoir in 1967, The Prince's Boy tells the story of Dinu Grigorescu's life of the past forty years in Bucharest, Paris and London.

Razvan Popescu, a Romanian peasant boy of 11 whose father is deceased and whose mother is struggling with many children, is adopted away from his difficult home situation by a Romanian prince around the turn of the 20th century. The prince hires the best tutors who educate Razvan in literature and the arts. When they relocate to Paris, this boy of peasant ancestry begins to operate in society and is known as the prince's boy. After the prince’s death, Razvan inherits an apartment but is forced to provide sexual favors for cash.

In 1927, Dinu Grigorescu is sent to Paris by his wealthy father to become a great author or poet—to experience la vie de Boheme, but mainly to help him move on from his mother’s death 5 years earlier. While there, he is drawn to the Bains du Ballon d'Alsace, a notorious establishment where men of a certain class can procure sexual services that are a bit more out of the ordinary. It is here that Dinu meets Honore (Razvan), who supplies these services. Immediately becoming something much more than sex worker and client, and feeling a strong connection through their mutual Romanian ancestry, they fall in love.

Covering the forty years after their initial meeting, Dinu relays the internal struggle to form a permanent relationship with Razvan against the backdrop of the beginnings of obvious anti-semitism in Romania, Romania's alliance with the Nazis, and all of the social changes that come with the horrors of World War II. As an aesthete, Dinu's life is more influenced by literature and the arts. The work of Marcel Proust plays an important role in his life and how he sees the world. His close relationship with his own mother meant he connected easily to Marcel's relationship with his. As well, the work of Romanian poet Mihai Eminescu is a major influence.

Told in very plain language, this is a melancholy work. Dinu describes himself as "Romanian by birth, French by choice, and English by accident."  He really seems to be a man out of time and place, a man heartbroken by the past and unable to move into the future.

Hendrik Andersen and John Briggs-Potter in Florence by Andreas Andersen

Hendrik Andersen and John Briggs-Potter in Florence (1894)
Andreas Andersen (1869-1902)
Museo Hendrik Christian Andersen

Grievous by H. S. Cross

New York : Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2019

Taking place in 1931 at St. Stephen's Academy, five years after the events of Cross' 2015 novel, Wilberforce, Grievous is a sweeping novel with complex inter-related storylines. The central characters are Grieves, a Housemaster who finds his responsibility for disciplining students in opposition to his pacifist inclinations and Riding, a creative student who struggles more generally after the loss of his father.

As with Wilberforce, Cross pays homage to the classic boarding school novels and authors. Riding, who writes fantastic stories which, with the help of other students are acted out in secret, provides a connection to the lives of C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien. Interestingly, while Wilberforce follows the classic form of focusing on games, they are only mentioned in passing in Grievous. The action here is focused more on choir, creative writing and acting.

A central theme of the novel is illness and death. Many characters have experienced the death of a parent or spouse and frankly none of them handle it well. Neither the students, nor the adults seem to be able to talk about their feelings, causing any number of misunderstandings and errors in judgement. Grieves' troubled personal life manifests in his impossible relationship with a married woman who is now ill and traveling with her daughter throughout Europe and America to find a cure.

Riding and Grieves are heavily involved in each others lives but this manifests itself almost exclusively in their relationships with others. Over the summer while Cordelia is traveling with her mother to find a cure, she is engaged in a one way correspondence with Riding about her days. As well, Riding's mother, a nurse, is corresponding with Grieves who is trying to help the woman he loves find a cure.

New York : Fox Books, 2008

Some have described this novel as less claustrophobic than Wilberforce since significant parts of the action take place outside the walls of St. Stephens. While there is the experience of life outside the school, the weight of life's challenges seem to follow the characters wherever they go. There's a certain melancholy and longing for connection that permeates the book in both the adult and adolescent characters. This creation of setting based on emotions or feelings as opposed to lengthy description of locations is one of the strongest elements of the novel.

Grievous is described as Cross' second novel, but it has its roots in a novel called Riding, published by Cross in 2008. Riding was issued in two volumes amounting to over 1000 pages. Following the same structure, Grievous has been tightened up and the writing generally improved. In Riding the bones are certainly there, while 10 years hence, Grievous is a much stronger work.  In a July 28, 2008 interview with Amande Green, Cross spoke about Riding and described her next work at the time as a prequel called Wilberforce.

Sunburst by Claude Buck

Sunburst (1913)

Claude Buck (American, 1890-1974)

Gouache, watercolor, pencil, pen and colored ink on paper

23.2 x 14.9 cm

Smithsonian American Art Museum

Self-portrait by Claude Buck

Self-portrait (1917)

Claude Buck (American, 1890-1974)

charcoal and crayon on paper mounted on paperboard

19.8 x 12.7 cm

Smithsonian Museum of American Art

The Master by Colm Toibin

New York : Scribner, 2004

Henry James is known as the gay writer that never wrote anything gay. Certainly in recent decades there have been queer readings of his work, but overall his intent was to avoid gay stories or to obscure them so totally that they go unnoticed. Colm Toibin has brilliantly conveyed aspects of James' life, highlighting his fear of being found out and the struggle of not being able to live as ones true self. Myriad examples of what can happen when one does live authentically present themselves and remind James that it's not safe.

Opening in January 1895 with the premier of Guy Domville, Henry James' first play, The Master proceeds through the final five years of the nineteenth century. James is 52 at the start of the novel and the events of the ensuing five years recall key moments in his life—particularly the deaths of his parents, his sister and his close friend, the novelist Constance Fenimore Woolson. These events highlight his struggle to maintain relationships throughout his life.

Writing short stories and novels, James has preferred to work in solitude, resulting in challenges in  relationships with both family and friends. His primary relationship is to his work so he avoids the opening of his play by attending another theater performance, an Oscar Wilde play (likely An Ideal Husband). After Guy Domville closes as a failure the night that it opens, The Importance of Being Earnest opens in its place, giving Wilde two plays in production at the same time.

Within a few months, Wilde's star has fallen and two friends (Jonathan Sturgess and Edmond Gosse) begin sharing weekly updates with James regarding the ensuing trial for gross indecency. James' reaction makes it clear that he believes it's too dangerous to live honestly and the trial only confirms his commitment to his writing and avoidance of romantic attachments.

References to more accepting countries in Europe are used to highlight the danger of being gay in England at this time. Rumors of Wilde's fleeing to France before he was ultimately imprisoned made sense given the permissive laws there. After Wilde's imprisonment, James continued to converse with Edmond Gosse and the subject of expatriate John Addington Symonds entered the conversation. Symnonds had lived in Italy because of its more accepting culture and had privately published A Problem of Greek Ethics, a defense of homosexuality and sent copies to friends in England who were horrified. Although not expressly stated, there is an implication that James was one of the recipients.

Henry James and Hendrik Anderson
c.1907

James walked a tightrope when it came to managing relationships in society. He needed the interaction, since that's where many of his storylines were borne, but how do you maintain relationships with men without inciting gossip, such as happened regarding his relationship to the young sculptor, Hendrik Christian Anderson, or with women without creating an expectation of something more. As Baroness von Rabe notes late in the novel,

“I remember you when you were young and all the ladies followed you, nay fought with each other to go riding with you. That Mrs. Sumner and young Miss Boott and young Miss Lowe. All the young ladies, and others not so young. We all liked you, and I suppose you liked us as well, but were too busy gathering material to like anyone too much. You were charming, of course, but you were like a young banker collecting our savings. Or a priest listening to our sins.” (p.265)

In order to survive, James had to keep his interior feelings quite separate from his outward interactions. When he occasionally softens that division, society provides a warning encouraging that wall to remain in place. When he's asked by his niece why Isabel returns to Osmond at the end of Portrait of a Lady, he says "It is easier to renounce bravery rather than to be brave over and over.” (p.325)

Bathing by Duncan Grant

Bathing (1911)
Duncan Grant (Scottish, 1885-1978)
Oil on canvas
228 x 306 cm.
The Tate

Horizon by Boleslaw Biegas

Horizon (circa 1912)
Bolesław Biegas (Polish, 1877-1954)
Oil on Canvas
97 x 130 cm.

Leading Men by Christopher Castellani

New York : Viking, 2019

Tennessee Williams notes in his diary that he was invited to a party in Portifino by Truman Capote in late July 1953. The following week lacks entries and there is no subsequent mention of whether he attended the party.

Christopher Castellani has created a fiction that supposes that he did attend that party and what might have happened. The result, primarily told from the point of view of Williams’ secretary and lover, Frank Merlo, includes a who’s who of American gay authors living abroad. John Horne Burns, the now largely forgotten author of The Gallery, is a significant character, while Capote and Paul Bowles appear in more limited roles. In addition the completely fictionalized actress, Anja Blomgren, is added to the mix.

Being told from the point of view of Frank Merlo, highlights the ways in which Williams and Burns struggle with the pressure of fame and its fleeting nature while also drawing attention to the extent to which these authors rely on their secretaries/lovers to manage their lives. Their dependence is clear to the reader, but it is unclear if the authors recognize it.

Williams used many of his life experiences, particularly with family in his plays and short stories. Knowing this, Castelllani cleverly creates a life story for the character of Anja that explains events in Williams’ work that doesn't obviously connect to what we know of his life. In a gutsy move, a previously unknown final play by Tennessee Williams is created by Castellani and connected to events in the later years of Williams’ life. His use of fictionalized characters and events woven into the work in much the same way Williams might have done results in an impressive novel which mostly doesn’t feel like a novel at all.

Im Schoße der Natur (In the Bosom of Nature) by Rudolf Koppitz

Im Schoße der Natur (In the Bosom of Nature) (1923)
Rudolf Koppitz (Austrian, 1884-1936)

Houston Incident by Steve Allen

New York : Henry Holt & Company, 1955

"It's a long road that has no turning."

This Irish proverb is the opening line of Allen's short story, Houston Incident. Meaning "your luck will change," is it offered as a bit of encouragement, or wishful thinking on the part of its speaker?

On a Houston street, Mac, a 'boy' traveling from Chicago to the west coast is engaged by an unnamed fifty-ish man in a mismatched suit. After agreeing with the statement, Mac takes the man up on the subsequent invitation to join him for a cup of coffee. After he has had his fill of coffee and hot dogs, he agrees to the offer of a bath at his nearby hotel.

The use of the term boy to describe Mac is meant to emphasize his naiveté. While earlier in our history, adolescence was considered to continue for several years beyond age eighteen, this 'boy' is certainly above the age of consent.

What at first appears to be a typical story of the homosexual predator with a plan to corrupt an innocent youth is complicated by the youth himself using his appeal to get his needs met. In fact, the predator is reduced to the prey, drunkenly begging the young man to stay with him.

Houston Incident first appeared in Steve Allen's (yes, that Steve Allen) short story collection, Fourteen for Tonight and was later included in the 1990 collection, The Public Hating.


Bibliographies & Ratings: Cory (IV); Garde (OTP, c*); Mattachine Review (IV); Young (44)

Man With a Thistle (Self-Portrait) by Lucian Freud

Man With a Thistle (Self-Portrait) (1946)
Lucian Freud (German, English, 1922-2011)
Oil on Canvas
80 x 69 cm
Tate, London

Head of a Greek Man by Lucian Freud

Head of a Greek Man (1946)
Lucian Freud (German, English, 1922-2011)
Oil on panel
28.4 x 24.8 cm (11.25 x 9.75 in)
From the Collection of John Craxton

Cast the First Stone / Yesterday Will Make You Cry by Chester Himes

Cast the First Stone was published as Chester Himes' third novel. In fact, it was begun before both If He Hollers Let Him Go (1942) and Lonely Crusade (1947) but struggled to find a publisher.  What was eventually released by Coward McCann in 1952 barely resembles Himes' original manuscript, having been rewritten multiple times by the author and suffering through heavy editing and reordering by the publisher. An author in the vein of Richard Wright and James Baldwin, Himes left the US after this disappointing experience with the publishing industry.  He would relocate to Paris where he later gained success for a series of novels set in Harlem featuring two black police detectives, Gravedigger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson. In 1998, Himes' original manuscript, under the original title, Yesterday Will Make You Cry was published by Norton, restoring an important literary work.

New York : Coward McCann, 1952

Jim Monroe has just begun his sentence of twenty to twenty-five years for robbery. He's young, still a teenager really, and good looking. From the moment he sets foot in the prison, there is already competition to make him. There is an honesty about the existence of wolves and fags within the prison. It quickly becomes clear that everything in the prison is transactional; poker games, smokes, and sex.

As Jim becomes acclimated to his new environment, he begins to understand if he helps others, he’ll get something in return. While he was perceived as a prospective fag upon his arrival, he quickly gains capital by running poker games and occasionally fronting money to those in need. Others are willing to fag for him, should he want that. Over time, Jim's descriptions of other inmates becomes increasingly tinged with adjectives of beauty or a sense of attraction.

The bulk of novel is focused on the day-to-day activities of the prison; work assignments, meals, working around the rules, getting caught breaking the rules, being transferred to less desirable jobs and cell blocks for breaking the rules.

While the relationship between inmates and guards is always adversarial, there are examples of violence against inmates resulting in broken bones and even death. One prisoner dies of pneumonia while in the hole because the guards won’t allow him to see a doctor. During an escape attempt, prisoners from other wards brutalized or kill several guards in the process. When the prisoners are caught, punishment is swift. When a fire breaks out hundreds of inmates die while locked in their cells. Guards do little to save them and many inmates put themselves in danger to save others.

Jim longs for connection with others, but he rejects the constant conversation about sex with other inmates. Metz is the first inmate he meets that he has a true connection with. They talk about everything including religion and philosophy. It is in the aftermath of the fire however that Jim finally asks Mal, an inmate he met on his first day, to be his woman and kisses him. This traumatic event and his need for connection begin to change how he sees relationships. Later, an innocent friendship with Dido, a young inmate who is unsteady and quickly grows dependent on Jim, grabs the attention of the other inmates and the guards. Dido is devoted and would do anything for Jim. Their complicated relationship puts Jim's possible commutation at risk.

Told in the first person, Cast the First Stone reads like a pulp novel, with a focus on sensational themes. Hiding between the lines are glimpses of the true emotions of the characters but the focus is on the action of the story, not about how the characters feel about their situation.

New York : W.W. Norton, 1998

Yesterday Will Make You Cry feels related to Cast the First Stone, but is obviously the more sophisticated and complex of the two. Told in the third person and including an extended flashback that provides the background of Jim's childhood, the characters are more complex. They aren't a caricature of the 'prisoner.' While they are tough, they also have feelings and crave human connection.

Yesterday retains some of the pulp sensibility and language, surprisingly for the 1930's using the f-word. However, the overall feeling is of a true literary work — complex and engaging.

In Melvin Van Peebles' introduction, he discusses the problematic cover copy on the 1950s paperback release which certainly implied that the novel was about black prisoners. This, no doubt, came from a belief that a black writer couldn't (or wouldn't be permitted to) write white characters. While there are black characters in the novel, all of the central characters are white.

Peebles' criticism is so strong, that it is truly jarring that the publisher decided to use an archival photograph on the dustjacket that shows a prison lineup of all black men. Further exacerbating the message, when Library of Congress created the catalog record for the work, they assigned it a subject of Afro-Americans—Fiction. It appears we still can't imagine a black man writing white characters.


Bibliographies & Ratings: Cast the First Stone: Cory (III); Garde (OTP, a***);  Young (1826 *)

Self Portrait by John Craxton

Self Portrait (1946-47)
John Craxton (English, 1922-2009)
Oil on paper
32.3 x 23.2 cm (12.75 x 9.125 in)

Out of Sickness by John Paignton (John S. Barrington)

London : Neville Woodbury Limited, 1950

As the novel opens in 1939, David, an extremely handsome young Englishman, has just inherited the estate of a Frenchmen who has committed suicide in Cannes. Wanting to study art and having been supported by the Frenchman in his studies, he was now free to travel and do as he wished. Searching for love, he falls in and out of relationships with both men and women finally culminating in marriage. When that sours and he is nearly out of money, he travels by ship to America partly to avoid the encroaching war in Europe but also to avoid his feelings around his failed marriage.

When he returns to Britain the war is in full effect and much has changed. Everyone is doing what is necessary to get by, including members of his family. One of his brothers is being kept by a rich man and his sister falls into prostitution. The underworld of bohemians, queers and black market racketeers in the West End of London that we would normally associate with the period between the wars continues unaffected even once the horrors of the Blitz begin.

Acting as a stretcher bearer for the A.R.P (Air Raid Precautions), David helps to rescue those trapped in bombed buildings. While there is tremendous fear, misery, and death all around, everyone is also in search of someone to love. David goes from one person to another, searching for that special one but it always ends in disaster and disappointment. While he has liaisons with both men and women and at one point in the novel refers to himself as bisexual, his search for love is always directed towards women.

Portrait of John S. Barrington
by Angus McBean

'Like the houses that were collapsing suddenly, completely, irrevocably, human beings were also falling to pieces, their values changing ; some mental canker was destroying happiness.'

The end of the war finds David without funds and his decision to hustle to make ends meet appears to bring his search for love to an end.

The content of the novel is based on actual experience. According to the dustjacket, 'the author spent ten years living this novel, and five years writing it.'  John Paignton was the pseudonym of John S. Barrington. Barrington is better known for his photographs of physique models published during the 1950s and 60s. After the war, he managed to get some of his earlier photos into physique magazines of the time and also started advertising at magazine kiosks in London. That's how he met Neville Woodbury, an artist and collector. Woodbury would later start an imprint that published a handful of books. In exchange for photography lessons and models supplied by Barrington he produced both Out of Sickness (with Barrington's original cover art signed 'J.S.B.') published under the Paignton moniker, and Art and Anatomy published under Barrington's actual name.

Bibliographies & Ratings: Young (2960)

Untitled (Hand in Pocket) by Andy Warhol

Untitled (Hand in Pocket) (c1956)
Andy Warhol (American, 1928-1987)
Ballpoint pen on paper
16 3/4 x 13 3/4 in.

McCaffery by Charles Gorham

New York : The Dial Press, 1961

16-year-old Vincent McCaffery has grown up in the Irish-Catholic immigrant enclave of Yorkville on the upper east side of Manhattan. After his mother's death, for which he rightly blames his father, Vincent is lost. He's not old enough to take a 'real job' but is uninterested in the kinds of work that a boy might do. His friend Conny suggests a way for them to get some easy money — something he heard from his older brother who serves in the navy. 'What we oughta do is roll a faggot.'

What starts off as a simple way to get money — pick up a queer in the park and then when things get serious, knock him out with a rock and take his wallet — quickly escalates when Vincent finds that he enjoys beating the filthy queers. One can read Vincent's animus against gay men as coming out of his self-hatred and doubt related to his own sexuality. When they are picked up by the police, Vincent is only encouraged when the queer refuses to press charges. When the police warn McCaffery and Conny to stay out of the park, Conny ends his participation in the scam. Vincent is undaunted.

When he is later picked up by a man in a Cadillac who seems to know all about him, he is given an opportunity to make money under his protection. He is unsure he wants to commit to prostituting himself to both men and women but when he discovers his father forcing his aunt to have sex with him in much the same way he had forced his wife (leading to the pregnancy that killed her), he attacks him with a kitchen knife and leaves his childhood home forever.  He quickly moves into Easy Tiger's place in the Village and begins his new life. Although he is making money and living in comfortable surroundings he soon realizes that he has sacrificed his autonomy and all of his power to make his own choices.

While the gay characters of this novel are not central or well developed, the larger questions around blackmail, what would later be known as gay-bashing, and exploitation of teenage boys for prostitution are central. This is a dark story of money, power and poverty.

Bibliographies & Ratings: Young (1543)

Now & Then by William Corlett

London : Abacus, 1996, ©1995

Revealed in alternating chapters taking place in 1990s London and Kent and in 1960s public school, Corlett tells the story of Christopher Metcalfe. After his father dies, he returns to the family home in Kent and while there, he finds the box of his school things that his father had saved. The picture of Stephen Walker, two years his senior, with whom he shared an intense relationship starts him on a journey to discover what really happened and where Stephen is now.

The chapters taking place at school in the 1960s hearken back to classic boarding school novels of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. There is a focus on sport, and an emphasis on the classic structures of prefects using (or abusing) their power over younger boys. And like those classic stories there is an unsanctioned, too-close relationship between a prefect and one of the younger boys. Unlike those classic romances, they share far more than a chaste kiss. In fact, one is reminded of the scene in Peyrefitte's Les amitiés particulières when the relationship is bonded over the sharing of blood — only in the case of Stephen and Christopher, it's a different bodily fluid.

Christopher never got over losing Stephen all those years ago, and in many ways the pain of that event seems to have prevented him from moving on. Neither his family nor his closest friend knows anything about his romantic life or even whether or not he is gay. He has walled that part of himself off. His search for Stephen forces uncomfortable conversations with his family and brings him in contact with others from school who share their knowledge of events all those years ago that Christopher never knew. How much do his memories reflect what really happened? This is Christopher coming to terms with the love of his life — a love, that at the time was impossible, not to mention illegal.

Portrait of Mefody Lukjanov by Konstantin Somov

Portrait of Mefody Lukjanov (1918)
Konstantin Somov (Russian, 1869-1939)
Oil on canvas
Russian Museum, St. Petersburg

Mefody Lukjanov was the artists lover from 1910-1932.

The Stringed Lute : An Evocation in Dialogue of Oscar Wilde by John Furnell

London : Rider and Company, 1955

Beginning in 1891 when Oscar Wilde first meets Lord Alfred 'Bosie' Douglas, the author recounts their relationship in the form of a play. Even before their relationship began, there were those within society who took issue with Oscar's writing, specifically The Picture of Dorian Gray. The relationship was a particular problem for Bosie's father, the Marquess of Queensbury whom Wilde sued for libel for calling him a homosexual.

The Stringed Lute is a play within a play as it begins and ends with the author in his apartment in the former home of Oscar Wilde. Furnell makes use of Wilde's own writings to create an authenticity to the dialogue. The first part focusing on the relationship with Lord Alfred draws most heavily from The Picture of Dorian Gray. The final part, taking place after his release from prison, draws most heavily from De Profundis.

The action of the play truly humanizes Wilde and presents him as a martyr of sorts; a Christ-like figure willing to be sacrificed for the cause. Furnell only alludes to the trials and the time in prison is skipped in its entirety. The effects of the imprisonment, however are seen in the subsequent years in France and briefly in Naples with Lord Alfred. Wilde died in poverty in Paris in 1900 surrounded by friends who had supported him through everything.

The Stringed Lute as well as The Trials of Oscar Wilde by H. Montgomery Hyde formed the basis of the 1960 movie.  While Hyde's text fills in the details of the trials, unfortunately much of what makes The Stringed Lute so appealing doesn't appear in the film.

Bibliographies & Ratings: Cory (IV); Garde (P, 138 **); Mattachine Review (IV); Young (1345 *)

Young Man With a Sword by Max Svabinsky

Young Man With a Sword (1896)
Max Švabinský (Czech, 1873-1962)
Oil on canvas laid on board
73 x 58 cm

Oscar Wilde : a Play by Leslie & Sewell Stokes

New York : Random House, 1938

First published in 1937 in Britain and having been first performed in 1936 at London's Gate Theatre Studio, Oscar Wilde : A Play by Leslie and Sewell Stokes is tightly focused on Wilde's trials; first his libel suit against the Marquess of  Queensberry followed by his trials for gross indecency. His experience in prison is not discussed except in passing after his release. The focus is so tight, in fact, that several characters and events are simply not included. Completely absent are Lady Wilde (Wilde's mother) and Constance (Wilde's wife). Wilde's bankruptcy while imprisoned is also not discussed, although there is an acknowledgement late in the play of Oscar's need for monetary assistance from friends. Interestingly, Wilde's friend, the controversial author and journalist, Frank Harris appears as a character.

While Lester Cohen's play on the same topic from 1928 uses Wildean epigrams to create a true comedy in its early acts, the Stokes' present the story as straightforward drama. A few epigrams are used early on but they are used sparingly and there is even a comment by one of the characters that don't feel they are appropriate to the seriousness of the situation.

In this telling of the story, blessed by Lord Alfred 'Bosie' Douglas who wrote the forward, we see a very different Lord Alfred. Gone is the spoiled young man using Oscar as a means to attack his father, the Marquess, for all of the wrongs he felt were done him. Here, Oscar and Lord Alfred present a united front where they come to agreement on how to proceed at each stage. Based on the attention given, there is a particular defensiveness regarding Lord Alfred's absence during Wilde's imprisonment and his subsequent release. This is explained, in part, by Douglas' family's financial control over him — no contact with Wilde, or he would lose his allowance. For Wilde's part, he explains Lord Alfred's absence when he is released from prison as due to his friends withholding financial support if he and Douglas reunited.

Left: Oscar Wilde : Tre Atti by Niccolò De' Colli
Firenze : Gruppo di cultura fiorentino degl'ISVICI, 1933
Right: Le procès d'Oscar Wilde : Pièce Inédite, en Trois Actes
Précédés d'un Prélude by Maurice Rostand
Paris : [publisher not identified], 1935

Just as Cohen's 1928 play was preceded by two non-English plays on the subject in the 1920s, the Stokes' play was also preceded by two European works in the 1930s. The first, an Italian work titled Oscar Wilde : Tre Atti by Niccolò De' Colli was published in 1933. The second, a French work titled Le procès d'Oscar Wilde : Pièce Inédite, en Trois Actes Précédés d'un Prélude by Maurice Rostand was published in 1935. An English language production of this French work was originally to be produced in London by Mr. Norman Marshall but a conversation with Lord Alfred Douglas who was outraged at its inaccuracies (largely that Douglas never saw Wilde again after he was imprisoned) led to the idea being scrapped in favor of producing an original work, the result being the Stokes' play.

It's not surprising that so many plays were written and produced during the second and third decades of the 20th century. European countries continued to be more socially permissive and were destinations for British gay men who felt unsafe after the Wilde ordeal. By the end of the 1930s with the rise of fascism in Europe, that would all begin to change.

Bibliographies & Ratings: Cory (IV); Garde (P, 62 **); Mattachine Review (IV); Young (3662)

Oscar Wilde

Oscar Wilde (1882)

Oscar Wilde: a Play by Lester Cohen

New York : Boni & Liveright, 1928

In 1928, Cohen penned the first play on the life of Oscar Wilde in English. He refers to it as having been 'written for presentation — rather than for reading', however it was inadvisable to produce it in climate of New York at the time. In the play's forward, he also makes it very clear that he intends to leave history to the historians. A significant amount of artistic license has been taken with the facts of history.

The story is focused on four major events: Marquess of  Queensberry's confrontation of Wilde regarding his relationship with Queensberry's son, Lord Alfred 'Bosie' Douglas, a truncated telling of the trials — primarily focused on Wilde's libel suit against Queensberry and then a single trial for gross indecency, a short scene in prison, and finally Oscar in Paris following his two years at Reading Gaol.

Since the play doesn't intend to strictly follow actual events, major characters in the real-life drama have been replaced and/or renamed. Completely absent are Lady Wilde (Wilde's mother) and Constance (Wilde's wife). The character of Lady Diana, a jilted lover of sorts, serves the dual role of would-be savior and as the representation of society's opinion of Wilde and his behavior. The most comical addition to the cast of characters is Zadi, a servant girl who is brought in to replace Melville, a page, after rumors of Wilde's sexual behaviors are known. She is dressed in a gauzy harem costume which leaves nothing to the imagination and her presence is intended to throw the public off the track. The running joke is that the men who visit Oscar pay her little attention. Lord Alfred is written as a petulant and self absorbed young man determined to hurt his father regardless of how that may affect others. Oscar, on the other hand, is depicted as completely in Lord Alfred's control and unable to defy his wishes.

Cohen uses Wilde's style to great effect, creating conversations among the characters that are both witty and biting. For instance, when Lady Diana says 'Oh - I suppose I'm an idiot.', Wilde replies, 'You just go on making one discovery after another, don't you Diane?' What starts out as a comedy quickly turns dark during the trial scene. The 'sin' of excess must of course be punished. Repentance during incarceration soon follows.

Left: Oscar Wilde by David Peña
Buenos Aires : Sociedad Editorial Argentina, 1922
Right: Oskar Wilde : Sein Drama by Carl Sternheim
Potsdam : G. Kiepenheuer, 1925

Although Wilde did convert to Catholicism while in prison, Cohen might take that transformation a bit too far.  In particular, he suggests that Lord Alfred breaks with Oscar after he so spectacularly loses the libel suit against Queensberry. As well, after serving his prison term, Oscar thinks of their relationship as an anomaly when he 'lost [his] way in life - and stumbled into the slime'. We know from history that he did see Lord Alfred again after prison and he certainly had other liaisons before, after and during his relationship with him.

Oscar Wilde's ordeal became the subject of many plays starting in the early 1920s. Prior to Cohen's 1928 work, two non-English plays about Oscar Wilde were published: David Peña's Spanish play, Oscar Wilde, in 1922 and Carl Sternheim's German play, Oskar Wilde: Sein Drama in 1925. The French, with their more liberal attitudes regarding sexuality, helped to keep Oscar Wilde's story and his writings alive even as the British had consigned him to oblivion. As M. de Vedia y Mitra notes in the forward to Peña's work, the educated classes of Argentina had adopted the French language and their connection to Wilde's work was largely through French translations. During the period of the Wiemar Republic, Germany also maintained more liberal views on sexuality and staged productions of Wilde's work during that time. Sternheim's play elevated Wilde beyond simply the author of these plays, to a subject of theatrical production itself.

Bibliographies & Ratings: Cory (IV); Garde (OTP, C *); Mattachine Review (IV); Young (716)

A Portrait of John Singer Sargent by Giovanni Boldini

A Portrait of John Singer Sargent (c1884)
Giovanni Boldini (Italian, 1832-1931)
Oil on panel
27 x 22 cm