THE HOMOSEXUAL THEME IN WALT WHITMAN'S POETRY

The Homosexual Theme in the world literature (from the Ancient World up to the Renaissance)

"The institution of the dear love of comrades" was the most desired dream of Walt Whitman that he glorified in his poetry. Throughout his life he dreamt of a free democratic society of America full of people's love and affection towards their country and each other. And that, actually, was the subject of his narration. He talked about ordinary people doing their ordinary jobs; he celebrated love and all its manifestations thus shattering the ideal American world of unstained morality. And that Whitman's reality included no slavery or discrimination, no restricts to a free choice of people going together, hand by hand, to the 'loving' society.

At the same time Walt Whitman didn't regard the union between a man and a woman as the only possible manifestation of love. His war experience, despite or perhaps because of its violence, destruction and widespread suffering, paradoxically allowed him to feel another kind of love - men's comradeship of the most profound level. That was a sort of sacral fraternity between people who underwent the same torture of war that Whitman managed to experience and celebrate in his verse afterwards. Thus Whitman became the one who spoke about his feelings in the culture that yet had no word for 'homosexual', but here, logically enough, arises the question: was he the first one who started to present the physical and emotional tenderness existed between men? That's certainly the question that deserves dwelling upon in more detail.

Actually the earliest western documents concerning homosexual relationships come from the history of antique Greece and Rome, where same-sex relationships were a societal norm, valued as a means of population control. At the same time such relationships did not replace marriage between man and woman but occurred before and beside it. They were based either on the physical affection between men or emotional connection that was scientifically proved by massive evidence of love poetry and paintings on ceramic vases. In this respect, Orestes and Pylades or Achilles and Patroclus may be taken as the archetype of the queer pairs; these two lovers are virtually indistinguishable from one another. Aristotle in Politics praised the lifelong love of the Theban lawgiver Philolaus and the Olympic athlete Dioclese, who 'maintained a single household and arranged to be buried beside each other', whose tombs, at Thebes, were a tourist attraction in Aristotle's day. The Sacred Band of Thebes, the military unit composed of 300 pairs of lovers formed in 368 BC, was cited in lists of famous homosexuals from an early period, for example by Plutarch, who likened their relationships to those of 'the greatest heros of old, Meleager, Achilles, Aristomenes, Cimon, Epaminondas'. Plutarch also mentions Hercules' love for Iolaus, citing Aristotle's statement that 'the tomb of Iolaus was a place where same-sex lovers plighted mutual faith' in the fourth century BC. On the other hand, Sappho of Lesbos who was called "The Tenth Muse" by Plato is believed to have founded a school for girls, to whom she wrote romantic love poems. Her birthplace gave rise to "Lesbian" as an erotic term. On the whole during the Hellenic period sex between wife and husband was just one of many choices available -- at least to the male. There were slaves of both sexes and concubines, all of whom were available, if only for a fee. Men could also try to entice a young man just past puberty. These relationships were celebrated on vases and in much of Athenian literature. In Plato's Symposium (a treatise on Athenian eroticism) Aristophanes offers a colorful explanation for why all these sexual options existed. In the beginning there were three types of double-headed humans, varying according to sex: male/male, female/female, and male/female. Zeus, angered at the humans, punished them by splitting them in half. From then on, each half has forever sought out his other half. Another eminent Roman poet Virgil (Publius Vergilius Maro), an author of The Aeneid, glorifies unrequited love of the shepherd Corydon for the beautiful Alexis in his idealized pastoral Eclogues. Thus, the idea of the same-sex love was one of the current themes in the ancient literature.

Continuing the ancient tradition of male love in which Ganymede, cup-boy to the gods, symbolized the ideal boyfriend, Moslem - primarily Sufi - poets in medieval Arab lands and in Persia wrote odes to the beautiful wine boys who served them in the taverns and shared their beds at night. Among the Moslems the practice of homosexual love was widespread, if not universal, and has survived into modern times. In this regard, a name of Abu Nuwas is worth mentioning. This poet, famed for his mockery of taboos as the court jester in Baghdad, was a master of witty, erotic love poetry (ghazal), celebrating wine, beautiful boys and song.

The Renaissance homoerotic 'friendship' tradition follows the steps of its ancestors. An Italian humanist Marsilio Ficino, known for reviving the Platonic Academy and coining the term "platonic love", in his Commentary on Plato's Symposium lists Achilles and Patroclus, Damon and Pithias, and Orestes and Pylades as parallels to Phaedrus and Lysias, Phaedrus and Socrates, and Phaedrus and Plato. Meanwhile, in the other part of Europe one of the world known English playwrights and poets Christopher Marlowe wrote tragedies (like Doctor Faustus, Tamburlaine the Great, Edward II) which expressed his sympathetic attitude towards gay love. There also were some homoerotic passages in Hero and Leander and his mythological poems.

In a bit later period homosexual theme was raised in Asian literature. For instance, a Japanese novelist Ihara Saikaku decided to make queer love the major theme of most of his works. His masterpiece The Great Mirror of Male Love was a collection of short stories about love between samurai men and boys, monks and boys, and male actor-prostitutes in kabuki theatre.

Thus, now it is fairly clear that the works of Walt Whitman became natural continuation of those of his ancestors touching upon the homosexual theme. He was just one in the long row of people sharing the same ideas but expressing them publicly only at times. He was just trying to show people this strange, unconventional kind of love at the time when every homosexual suffered from American taboo against gay love.

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