Gay Ain't All or Nothin', Y' know

I have had a couple occasions to write about the topic of homosexuality in history and historical fiction in the past, including Gay As a Lord.. Or Lady.. Why Wouldn't There Be Homosexuals in the Middle Ages? and What Is It with Historical Novelists and Gay Men? The first debated notions that there could be no gay people in the Middle Ages because it was against the law of the Church. The second addressed the stereotype that being molested by a man when they were young is what made men gay in the first place.

Now I have another string to harp on... whether you are either gay or not, whether a person who wants to make love with one sex never wants to or can make love with the other.

I have run into this bias or at best mistaken belief before. I recall shaking my head as Larry King asked Richard Chamberlain, astonished, why if he had had sex with a woman and enjoyed it he didn't stick to just women. The implication was that being gay either means not wanting sex with the opposite sex or not being able to manage it. Chamberlain, bless his heart, just laughed. He didn't even bother to explain.

I have run into this topic in historical fiction more recently. The other night at a book club discussing Edward Rutherfurd's Russka one of the members expressed surprised that a gay male character could be both a driven industrialist and into the arts. Thankfully she concluded that if Italian Renaissance doges could be both ruthless businessmen and patrons of the arts why not Alexander? Perhaps it wasn't just his being gay that seemed to preclude this.

But I have also read an ongoing discussion of Richard I Lionheart of England where whether he was gay, a sort of convention for a few decades in historical fiction, is being questioned. The major evidence for each side is that Richard had a bastard child, proof he was straight, and a letter from a monk chiding Richard for his behavior with his soldiers, the proof that he was. There is more to this than these two items, but they serve the purpose of the point I am about to make.

You know, people are not necessarily either gay or straight. A gay man or woman might very well have a satisfying sexual experience with a member of the opposite sex. That they did doesn't mean they are straight or that they are not gay. You may say to yourself, "Well, I certainly could never do that!" Fine, but what has that got to do with anyone else but you?

As with any other group of "outsiders" to the prevalent culture, gayness is subject to a raft of mistaken beliefs about it. Fortunately there seem to be many more historical novelists who understand that they are mistaken beliefs. I have read numerous novels where a man who was hitherto only engaged in relationships with women finds himself responding sexually to another man. Many characters or, for that matter, authors themselves are known for great gay love affairs but also had wives and kids, or husbands and kids.

I guess my point is to try to learn the reality of things, especially those of you who are recreating history for readers. You are all way too smart for that.