This is a very tricky topic (I struggled with it in an essay I did on
Virgil, Spenser, and Barnfield for a collection on Barnfield ed. George
Klawitter; it has some possibly useful references. I myself do find the
word "homosocial" useful in many circumstances, but obviously EK's
flirtation with thoughts of what was indeed sometimes called "sodomy"--
"pederastike" or however EK spells it-- and Barnfield's amusingly feeble
denials go well beyond that. Homosocial with thus more opportunities for
the homosexual, at least for some? I found Leonard Barkan particularly
helpful on the whole topic and a couple of others too, like a book by Greg
Bredbeck. I admire Gary Bouchard's work in many regards, but the omission
of any reference to homosexual overtones or opportunities or whatever was,
to me, mystifying (I *think* I said so in a review, but my memory is like
swiss cheese). It is fascinating to see classical texts (in this case
Virgil's second eclogue) used to sneak in discourses of the sort condemned
by the same dominant culture that required schoolboys and college boys/men
to read those very texts. Hence, says Bredbeck, the way Marlowe uses
Virgil in the poem only later said to be to a nymph. A good cover, like
Beza explaining that his early poetry wasn't indecent or homosexual in the
slightest--just imitating the classics, he said (not that anyone believed
him). As for sex/gender at college, I read to my delight a few years ago
that one college didn't allow women on campus except for nurses and they
should be at least 50 years old. A bit naive about us senior citizens,
maybe. I too have struggled with the terminology and have no satisfactory
solution, but that essay is quite persuasive. All the best, Anne.
> I am rewriting (again) the section of my Virgil in the Renaissance book
> that deals with homosexuality* in The Shepheardes Calender. Don't need
> to rehearse all of the evidence for this crowd. Have been wondering,
> though: was there a homosexual* subculture at English universities in
> the 1570s? If so, has anyone written about it?
>
> Gary M. Bouchard, Colin's Campus: Cambridge Life and the English Eclogue
> (Selinsgrove: Susquehanna University Press, 2000) argues that much of
> The Shepheardes Calender can be understood in reference to student life
> at Cambridge, but doesn't comment on this aspect.
>
> * Many scholars, I know, deprecate the use of "homosexual" for this
> period. But the period terms -- bugger, sodomite, tribade -- are equally
> misleading; or so I have been convinced by reading Claude J. Summers,
> "Homosexuality and Renaissance Literature, or the Anxieties of
> Anachronism," South Central Review 9 (1992): 2-23.
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> Dr. David Wilson-Okamura http://virgil.org [log in to unmask]
> English Department Virgil reception, discussion, documents, &c
> East Carolina University Sparsa et neglecta coegi. -- Claude Fauchet
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
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