WHY
I WRITE ABOUT HOMOSEXUALITY
Looking through my website contents listings, you will
notice several pages relating to homosexuality. I recently created a convenient
contents
sub-category page to list such work which runs currently to some 15 online
pages – modest when you consider that there are about of 1,500 pages on my
website, but it’s still a recurrent theme. . Why therefore do I return to this
subject, especially as my essay AM I GAY? Concludes
that I am not.
My own sexual
experiences would fill only half of the back of a postage stamp, and though
writing as a hobby since 1985, after my escape from a sinister cult, I didn’t
touch on sex as a literary topic for some time. The cult had been a celibate
order for anyone not already married, declaring any kind of sex for
non-reproductive purposes including pleasure to be a bad thing Homosexuality
being unproductive, was classified as bad, though there were several followers
of the Guru, Maharaji (Now officially called Prem Rawat) who maintained their
gay relationships despite the condescension. The Guru, realizing that times
were changing, rarely discussed his acidic views on sex by the time I had been
brainwashed into the fold in 1981.
My first reference
to homosexuality is in an early angry, but humorous poem I wrote in about 1990,
A
MARRIAGE OF OTHER PEOPLE’ CONVENIENCE The poem isn’t about being gay or
straight, but about peer group pressure and how people try to manipulate me
into relationships of their choosing, and think of me as ‘gay’ if I don’t go
along with them. My sister was then in her second of three marriages, and I was
still a bachelor, as I remain at present. Everywhere I turned I was being
introduced to girls picked out for me – it shocked my parents when I first
brought a girl I met without any such assistance home to meet them, and they
freaked her out by being too intrusive.
It was a decade
later in 1995, as secretary of the Manchester Humanists, an atheist society,
that I invited The Gay & Lesbian Humanist Association (GALHA)
to address the society. As I wrote reports and reviews of such talks for the
newsletters I then co-edited, that was my first work to touch on homosexuality.
The talk affected me
profoundly in making me question my own sexuality more. I remembered my poem,
and noticed how many gay people I knew, or read, etc. I had always loved Oscar
Wilde’s verse for example. On
Manchester’s poetry scene, many gay writers were performing, Chloe Poems,
Dominic Berry, and Rosie Lugosi among them. Rosie’s Creatures Of The Night
poetry slams were actually the first platform on which I read my own verse out
in public. The dominance of gay poets
was largely due to the innovative Commonword Gay Writer’s nights. Commonword, a
working class writer’s group and small press publishing house, had several
informal writing groups, a women only group, a black writer’s group, Survivor’s
poetry, for people affected by mental health issues or supportive of those who
are, and the gay writer’s group.
I was in the Monday
night group, the general writing group, for few years, from about 1986 to
1989. Many of the members were also in
the gay writer’s group too. It was the talk by GALHA’s Howard Hughes that made
me realize that a/. I was surrounded by gay people, mal homosexuals and
lesbians b/. I didn’t seem to mind this and largely took it for granted. I
began to ask myself why, and if I might be gay myself - AM I GAY? Explores that
question in some detail.
My essays touched on gay issues from time to time. A review I wrote about the TV shows XENA AND HERCULES . Deals with the issue of lesbianism that was attracting some controversy and attention fin Xena in particular. The article was published in a science fiction journal, and is now on my website too. It was my first work on the issue of lesbianism.
Some time later, when Xena was at its peak in the US ratings, an episode called The Way attracted homophobic attention from an unlikely source, a Polish Internet campaign by the Hare Krishna cult got an episode banned. Xena fans naturally counter-protested, and as an ex-cult member myself I was in a strong position to add my voice to the debate, and I got my essay UNBAN XENA WARRIOR PRINCESS acknowledged in GALHA’s publications and went on local radio to discuss the issue. It was the first time I found myself regarded as a gay rights activist.
I began to see a strong parallel between the stories I was hearing and reading about coming out of the closet to admit to being gay, and my own experiences of openly admitting to having been seduced into a cult. There was my fear of ridicule and rejection – a sense that people might think of me as less of a man than I like to think of myself as being (God that sounds arrogant).
I read a great biography - RICHARD
ELLMANN - OSCAR WILDE which inspired my first poem overtly addressing
homosexuality - HOW
CIVILIZED AND SPORTING OF YOU SIR I read the poem out at a late creatures
of the Night event, more nervous than ever given the number of gay writers in
the audience. The poem was very well received.
I realized then how
many famous writers are gay. Wilde & Alfred Douglas is obvious
examples. Add to that list, in no particular order, Lorca, Carole Anne Duffy,
W. H. Auden, Alan Ginsberg, Walt Whitman, Wilfred Owen, and Sappho, to name but a few.
Much of my own
poetry was fiction. And escapist science fiction at that. I saw poetry as an
extension of my general writing medium, the short story, and often saw my poems
as short stories that happened to rhyme. This was a huge contrast to some more
serious soul searching honest, often confessional poetry that I read and listen
to. I began to see why gay writers have such a strong hold on poetry as a
medium of expression – coming to terms with their own sexuality gives them the
inner honesty that makes a poem stand out. Ginsberg’s Howl wowed audiences for
how open and starkly it bared his soul to live audiences.
As I get older, I write more and seek markets in which to sell my work more often. I often experiment with different styles of writing, particularly poetry forms, and flash fiction. I also keep an eye out for potential publishers, which is how I discovered Scarlet Magazine. This is a women’s erotica publication, and one that invites short stories for its Cliterature supplement. I bought a copy and read it. Two things struck me. A/. I enjoyed a publication aimed at the opposite gender. B/. Virtually none of my fiction writing, in over 20 years, contained sex scenes, homo or hetero-sexual. I just treated sex as a complete no fly zone. Whatever caused it, and that was most likely lack of experience to write about, I decided to correct the oversight immediately. Two of my earliest efforts were accepted by scarlet, and now I write as much erotica as other work, science fiction, horror, non-fiction, etc. Stories relating to homosexuality quickly crept into my canon. I felt it was important not to be squeamish or un-candid about any legal, consenting adult subject matter. Much of my erotica work, including gay stories, is not online, as I still plan to sell it but there are samples online too. See my HOMOSEXUALITY CONTENTS listings for links.
Arthur Chappell
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