# Gay characters in books. **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 16, 2005, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951 "2005-12-16T18:43:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [December 20, 2005, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/61 "2005-12-20T12:05:13Z")
I just read an interesting historical tit-bit in the book _Stonewall: The Riots that Sparked the Gay Revolution_, by David Carter. The name of the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village, NYC, goes back to a lesbian book titled _The Stone Wall_, the (fictionalized) autobiography of “Mary Casal” published in 1930. In the same year, a “notorious” lesbian tearoom was opened in the Village and named Bonnie’s Stone Wall. Carter believes the choice of name was meant as a signal to lesbians, because of the book title. But by the 1940s Bonnie’s Stonewall Inn changed its character and its lesbian origins were forgotten. It became a more ordinary restaurant that hosted wedding banquets and even policemen. It didn’t go queer again until the 1960s. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/62 "2005-12-21T04:17:16Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > Good call on Mary Renault, **sampiro**. I thought _The Persian Boy_ was the best thing she ever wrote. Thanks especially for outing her and adding to my list of role models. 😉 She works well as a role model. In addition to being a good writer (even bitchy old Gore Vidal praised her work), she risked her life many times as a nurse in WW2 and was a very outspoken anti-Apartheid activist in South Africa in the 60s and 70s. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/63 "2005-12-21T12:34:19Z")
**Sampiro** , as soon as your post above made me start digging, I went and ordered Renault’s novel _The Middle Mist_ (title of the U.S. edition of _The Friendly Young Ladies_). See how a seemingly casual offhand remark can directly affect someone else’s life. Mary, I think this is the continuation of a beautiful friendship. ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/64 "2005-12-21T14:20:35Z")
The main characters in Sarah Waters’ _Fingersmith_ are lesbians. Not surprising, since I found it in the Lesbian section of the bookstore, but the bookstore I used to work in had Ms. Waters’ books in the general fiction section. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/65 "2005-12-21T16:53:30Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > I have never agreed with the interpretation of David and Jonathan from the OT as gay lovers (I think the “beyond the love of women” line is basically translatable as “I would rather spend time with you than with a beautiful woman”- not necessarily sexual or romantic, but more like two cowboys who each have wives but still like to go hunting together on Brokeb Errmm . . . well . . . _cough_ Look, when two guys **say** that . . . > **[Brokeback Mountain (2005) - IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0388795/)** > > Brokeback Mountain: Directed by Ang Lee. With Heath Ledger, Jake Gyllenhaal, Randy Quaid, Valerie Planche. Ennis and Jack are two shepherds who develop a sexual and emotional relationship. Their relationship becomes complicated when both of them get... ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/66 "2005-12-21T22:52:12Z")
Ahh – you already covered that possibility, didn’t you, **Sam?** My bad. ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/67 "2005-12-21T23:40:24Z")
In S.M. Stirling’s Nantucket trilogy there is a prominent lesbian character, Marian Alston. She’s a Coast Guard captain, caught up, with ship and crew, with the rest of the Islanders in the Event. ---
**Author:** ![Coin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@Coin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Coin)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/68 "2005-12-22T00:34:11Z")
Robinson Crusoe’s first description of Friday always stuck me as the gayest thing since queer came to Homoville. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/69 "2005-12-22T15:39:28Z")
> [@Baker](#): > > In S.M. Stirling’s Nantucket trilogy there is a prominent lesbian character, Marian Alston. She’s a Coast Guard captain, caught up, with ship and crew, with the rest of the Islanders in the Event. May I congratulate you on your excellent taste in alternative-history _belles-lettres_. (Hint: Post #34 above) ---
**Author:** ![Ensign\_Edison](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7ab992/32.png) [@Ensign\_Edison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ensign_Edison)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2005, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/70 "2005-12-23T16:26:51Z")
I believe Melissa Scott’s Trouble of _Trouble and Her Friends_ is a bisexual woman, and I’m sure a gay male couple in a BDSM-based relationship show up in another of her books, but I can’t remember more than that. It might not even have been her, actually, though Trouble surely is. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2005, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/71 "2005-12-23T20:16:08Z")
In David Eddings Tamuli trilogy, the Atana slave Mirtai belonged to a gay man when she was a teenager. He used her as a “beard” and unobtrusive bodyguard; when he was betrayed and killed by his lover for another man, she gutted them, tied them to chairs facing each other, then set the house on fire around them. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2005, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/72 "2005-12-24T03:11:43Z")
It’s my speculation that Mrs. Danvers had a lesbian affair, or at the very least, an unrequited love for her mistress, Rebecca de Winter. ---
**Author:** ![catnoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7ab992/32.png) [@catnoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catnoe)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2005, 6:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/73 "2005-12-24T06:41:10Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > No subtext, but critically well received books about gay characters that were the first gay fiction I read include [Dancer From the Dance](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060937068/qid=1134773887/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl14/103-7986852-0274253?n=507846&s=books&v=glance), I thought I was the only person to ever read that book! Read it 20 some years ago, fell in love with Malone of course. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2005, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/74 "2005-12-24T14:20:09Z")
Ashley Wilkes? What about Rhett Butler? Here’s a overly macho man who notices all the latest details in Paris fashions, pursues a woman who clearly doesn’t want him, endures a sexless marriage, and leaves when his wife admits to loving him and wanting to have his children? How gay is that? ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2005, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/75 "2005-12-24T14:39:32Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > Ashley Wilkes? What about Rhett Butler? Here’s a overly macho man who notices all the latest details in Paris fashions, pursues a woman who clearly doesn’t want him, endures a sexless marriage, and leaves when his wife admits to loving him and wanting to have his children? > > How gay is that? Don’t forget that the woman he marries is the ultimate drama queen! ---
**Author:** ![Indyellen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/indyellen/32/4176_2.png) [@Indyellen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indyellen)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2005, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/76 "2005-12-24T15:09:15Z")
Wow, I can’t believe I’m the first one to mention this, but there is an _excellent_ (if little known) book by Marion Zimmer Bradley titled [The Catch Trap](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345280903/qid=1135436758/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-9420362-3688957?s=books&v=glance&n=283155). The book is about circus life (specifically trapeeze artists) in the 1940’s/1950’s and the two main characters are gay. The book has some of the “uneven writing” problems that MZB occasionally has, but it is probably one of the best books I’ve EVER read…and I’ve read a lot. (This is desert island good, IMO.) ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2005, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/77 "2005-12-24T17:33:29Z")
Gary Jennings’ historical novel _Raptor_ (set in Europe during the last century of the Western Roman Empire) is the only book I’ve ever read with a hermaphrodite protagonist. (And sexually active both ways.) ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2005, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/78 "2005-12-24T18:01:28Z")
Startled by the absence of what I thought was the prototypical gay novel: _[The Front Runner_ by Patricia Nell Warren. I read whatever gay youth stuff I could get my hands on when I was one, and one that I most fondly remember discovering was [url=“[http://www.lambdarising.com/NASApp/store/Search;jsessionid=a1I16dcs2FAc](http://www.lambdarising.com/NASApp/store/Search;jsessionid=a1I16dcs2FAc)”]Entries from a Hot Pink Notebook]([http://www.lambdarising.com/NASApp/store/Product;jsessionid=a1I16dcs2FAc?s=showproduct&isbn=0964109964](http://www.lambdarising.com/NASApp/store/Product;jsessionid=a1I16dcs2FAc?s=showproduct&isbn=0964109964)) by Todd D. Brown. There’s a burgeoning gay literature field (well, as burgeoning as any field of literature can be in this postliterate age); I was pleased to discover a wild field of gay novels when I was in Spain, including the book I’m translating, [Yo también lo sé](http://www.libreriaberkana.com/fichalibro.php?isbn=84-95470-16-0) by Alberto Ciáurriz. I had the opportunity to meet him while I was in Spain and to read his other works, one of which became a best-seller across Spain, including in the mainstream press: [El gran salto](http://www.libreriaberkana.com/fichalibro.php?isbn=84-663-0688-9). There’s also tons of fabulous gay and lesbian comic collections out there, some of whose leading lights include [Alison Bechdel](http://www.lambdarising.com/NASApp/store/Product;jsessionid=a1I16dcs2FAc?s=showproduct&isbn=1555838286), [Diane DiMassa](http://www.lambdarising.com/NASApp/store/Search;jsessionid=a1I16dcs2FAc), and [Iván Vélez Jr.](http://www.planetbronx.com/talesofthecloset.html). I also discovered some great ones while I was in Spain, such as [Sebás Martín.](http://www.libreriaberkana.com/fichalibro.php?isbn=84-7833-650-8) ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2005, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/79 "2005-12-24T20:16:37Z")
There’s _Faggots_ by Larry Kramer – according to the Amazon review, “perhaps the most reviled novel in the gay literary canon.” [http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0802136915/qid=1135455308/sr=1-1/ref=sr\_1\_1/104-9291609-1967151?s=books&v=glance&n=283155](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0802136915/qid=1135455308/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/104-9291609-1967151?s=books&v=glance&n=283155) ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2005, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951/80 "2005-12-31T20:51:10Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Gary Jennings’ historical novel _Raptor_ (set in Europe during the last century of the Western Roman Empire) is the only book I’ve ever read with a hermaphrodite protagonist. (And sexually active both ways.) The novel _[Middlesex](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0312422156/qid=1136061940/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_1/103-9694960-8493440?n=507846&s=books&v=glance)_ by Jeffrey Eugenides was a bestseller and prizewinner two years ago and has a hermaphrodite main character. The character, like most hermaphrodites, only has the _visible_ sexual attributes of one gender, however. > [@](#): > > I was born twice: first, as a baby girl, on a remarkably smogless Detroit day in January of 1960; and then again, as a teenage boy, in an emergency room near Petoskey, Michigan, in August of 1974. After fourteen years as a girl it is discovered that the main character is biologically a boy whose testicles are internal and who has phalloplasty to create a penis. Totally worth reading if you’re at all interested in the subject as it’s probably the best researched book on the subject of hermaphroditism out there. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/gay-characters-in-books/335951.md?page=5)