POETRY 4 advocated partnership between Greeks and In his vivid and gripping fives, Romans. An ancient catalogue of his works Piutarch stressed the vices and virtues in listed227items1of which87survive, most the personalities of the great as well as lumped together under the title MoraLia, their family, education, personality, and in addition to 50 biographies in Parallel changes of fortune. Their accuracy varies fives of Famous Greeks and Romans. His according to the sources available to him. "On Moral Virtues" is Aristotelian and Many portray pederasty flatteringly, par- anti-Stoic: piety being a mean between ticularly in the case of heroes of Sparta and superstition and atheism. In his dialogues, Thebes, sometimes unflatteringly as in Plutarch, essentially aplatonist, discussed Otho and other Roman emperors, and the fate of the soul after death. His anti- amusingly as in the case of Demetrios quarian works are a mine of information Poliorcetes. They were extremely influen- / about paganism, music, and education. tial and muchread from the1talianRenai.s- Plutarch's "Dialogue on Love" sance through the Napoleonic era, when presents an imaginary debate [an example they were central to the Exemplar Theory of contest literature), between a pederast of history-the concept that history teaches and an advocate of the love of women. through the lives of great men who ex- Declaring that "the one true love is the celled either in virtue or vice. With the love of youths," the pederast, reciting a list emergence of the idea of history as a su- of famous heterosexual lovers, attacks praindividual process, the accomplishment heterosexual love as self-indulgent, vul- above all of the nineteenth-century Ger- gar, and servile. The advocate of the love of man school, the centrality of Plutarch's women, equally cutting, condemns ped- biographies faded. erasty as unnatural and innovative in the Plutarch shows that if pederasty bad sense. With passionate arguments on was an ambivalent and disputed subject in both sides, this example reveals that the late pagan antiquity, stillno general taboo days when the superiority of pederasty on the discussion or even more, the prac- could be taken for granted had longpassed. ticeof it existed before theChristianchurch In a vivacious sketch, Plutarch began to exert its influence on law and sets forth a conversation between Odys- public opinion. seus and one of his men who, through enchantment, has been turned into a pig BIBLIOGRAPHY. R. H. Barrow, Plutarch and His Times,Bloomington: Indiana [Gryllos). To the hero's surprise the pig University Press, 1967; Curt Hubert, De who was once a man does not want to Plutarchi amatoria, Kirchhain: Max return to his human state: he prefers to Schmersow, 1903. remain a beast because, in his view, ani- William A. Percy mals live a life in conformity with nature, while human beings do not. According to Gryllos, one evidence of the superiority of POETRY animals is the supposed fact that they do Through most of history, poetry not practice male or female homosexual- has been a vital form of literature, and one ity. While this claim has been disproved, which has often lent itself to the expres- over the centuries Plutarch's little dia- sion of erotic or romantic sentiment. At logue exercised a good deal of influence as the same time, poetry displays an inherent a touchstone of the "happy beast" conceit capacity for ambiguity which has provided (see Animal Homosexualityj, which ar- a cover for homoerotic elements which gued that human conduct could be re- might otherwise never have reached the formed for the better by adopting the printed page. In light of these considera- "natural, healthy" standards of animals. tions, and the long period during which the poetry of ancient Greece and Rome \ 4 POETRY

(often pederastic) has been held up as a erasty. The sardonic Martial composed model and inspiration, it is not surprising many poems on this subject. Catullus to find an abundant homoerotic tradition wrote several which were so explicit that expressed in poetic form. only recently have they been honestly Traditionally, poetry has been translated into English. classified as epic, dramatic, and lyric. While After the fall of the Roman Em- some homosexual elements appear in early pire, there were a few poets who treated epics, most relevant poetry belongs to the this theme and whose works have sur- lyric genre, which pennits expression of vived, including Luxorius inVandal North individual feelings. Africa and the Greek Nonnus in Egypt; the Antiquity and the Earlier Middle latter's Dionysiaka counts as the only Ages. The history of homosexual poetry surviving "Byzantine" poem to deal ex- begins with the epic theme of the loving tensively with homosexuality. The later friendship between two warriors. In Meso- Byzantines reputedly burned the poetry of potamia, this theme was exemplified by Sappho, but preserved the Mousa Paidike. the love between Gilgamesh and Enkidu, The central Middle Ages (elev- and in Greece between Achilles and Patro- enth and twelfth centuries) saw the ap- clus, depicted respectively in the pearance of a number of medieval Latin anonymous Epic of Gilgamesh, and poets, mainly clergy in France, who wrote Homer's Iliad. David's "Lament for Jon- homosexual works, including Abelard, athan" in the Old Testament (I1 Samuel Baudri of Bourgueil, Hilary (an English- 1:17-27) contains the famous phrase man), Marbod of Rennes, and Walter of "surpassing the love of women," although Chltillon. The "Debate Between Helen it has never been explained whether this and Ganymede," an imitation of the means that Jonathan's love for David sur- ancient contest literature, concerns the passed aman's love for women, or woman's relative merits of women and boys. The love for men. early Portuguese-Galician cantigos de The first lesbian poems were the amigo were poemswritten by men in which ones that ultimately gave lesbianism its a female persona describes her love for a name, the intense lyrics of Sappho of man; some of these poems must have been Lesbos, a Greekisland. Theognis of Megara written by homosexuals. introduced pederastic ideals into Greek Non-Western Poetry. It was not poetry, establishing a long-lived tradition, long after Islam spread across much of the and many of the leading poets of ancient world that pederastic poems began to Greece dealt with the love of boys. In the appear, especially in Iran (Persia] and Hellenistic and Roman periods, Greek Andalusia. The Persian poets were poets turned to this subject in large generally Sufis, mystics whose love for numbers. Theocritus excelled as an expo- youths was disguised as an allegorical love nent of the pastoral conventions for for God; these included such famous poets such poetry. The twelfth book of the as Hafiz, Rumi, and Sa'di. One of their Greek Anthology is the Mousa Paidike favorite thcmes was the love of Sultan ("boyish muse"] edited by Strato of Sardis, Mahmud of Ghazna for the boy Ayaz. a collection of over 250 brief pederastic Omar Khayyam mentions this topic in his poems expressing a remarkable range nf Rubaiyat ("where name of Slave and Sul- sentiment. tan is forgot, and peace to Mahmud on his Among the Romans, most of the golden throne"). The Andalusian poets of leading poets dealt with homosexuality at Granada who extolled pederasty were too some point. Vergil wrote a pastoral poem numerous tomention, but it must benoted about Corydon, which gave Andre Gide that the Jewish poets of Spain also wrote the title for his modem defense of ped- such poetry, including the most famous of POETRY 9 them, Jehuda Halevi (seeJudaism, Sephar- overtones. These, however, aremerely bits dic). The Turks also cultivated pederastic and scraps to be found over a long period of poetry, drawing upon the earlier rich Is- time. lamic tradition. In India, Hindu poets With the coming of the Renais- avoided it, but Islamic poets, including sance and its rediscovery of the classic Babur, founder of the Mughal dynasty, poetic tradition, homosexual poetry began addressed it. to flourish anew. AntonioBeccadelliwrote Outside Arab Noah Africa, only elegant scurrilities in Latin about two "African" poets are known to have sodomites. Poliziano described the homo- been homosexual, Roy Campbell of mod- sexuality of Orpheus in La Favola di Or- em South Africa, and Rabearivalo of the feo. The sculptor Michelangelo expressed island of Mauritius in the Indian Ocean, his passion for handsome young men in the latter writing in French. There is little sonnets and other forms. The homosexual record of homosexual poetry in Southeast poetry of Italy during this period is vast in Asia, Australia, New Zealand, and the quantity, and much of it, including work Pacific Islands. in the Bernesque and Burchiellesque gen- Although pederasty was wide- res, has never been translated into English. spread in Japan, and often expressed in In England, Richard Barnfield short stories and other works of fiction, composed openly pederastic poems, but the only Japanese poet noted for dealing stopped when he was condemned for this with it is the modem Matsuo Takahashi. ("If it be sin to love a lovely lad, oh then sin China is a different matter. Arthur I"). Shakespeare wrote his famous son- Waley once observed that there were an nets to a youth mysteriously known as enormous number of Chinese poems deal- "Mr. W. H." Christopher Marlowe and ingwithmalefriendships instead of hetero- Michael Drayton both dealt with Edward sexual love. Unfortunately, very few of 11. In France during this period, there were them have been translated into English. some poets who wrote about homosexual- One pederasticpoet has been the subject of ity, especially Denis de Saint-Pavin, the a biography by Waley, Yiian Mei (eight- '(king of Sodom." eenth century). Some homosexual items Most of the seventeenth century appear in New Songs From a Jade Terrace, showed a dearth of homosexual poetry. a anthology of Chinese love poems com- There were poems about beautiful boys piled in ancient times. This has been trans- written by Giambattista Marino in Italy lated intoEnglish, and is the best introduc- and by Don Juan de Arguijo in Spain, but it tion to Chinese homosexual poetry avail- is a long haul until the Restoration in able. As a large portion of all homosexual England, when John Wilmot (LordRoches- verse is probably Chinese, it is to be regret- ter) wrote about pederasty, only to be fol- ted that so little of this heritage is acces- lowed by an even longer silence. sible to Westerners. Modem Times. From the Roman- Europe in the Later Middle Ages tic period, the number of poets increases and the Renaissance. The later Middle until the present day, so that it becomes Ages were a dry period for homosexual more and more difficult to evaluate the poetry. There are sections of Dante's Di- extant material. Numerous poets must vine Comedy and brief passages in remain unmentioned in order to concen- Chaucer's Canterbury Tales which bear trate on some of the more important or on homosexuality; there were brief men- interesting figures. tions of homosexuals in some of the eddas Russia discloses only one poem and sagas of Scandinavia. Some of the by Pushkin, but it does boast Vyacheslav friendships between warriors in medieval Ivanov, Mikhail Kuzmin, and the modern narrative poems seem to have homosexual poetry of Gennady Trifonov. The Nether- 4 POETRY lands and the Scandinavian countries Smith's Love in Earnest (London, 1970J, produced a few minor poets, especially but some overview of this material must Vilhelm Ekelund of Sweden. Spain and be given here. The British public school Latin America gave us Federico Garcia system, along with the sexual segregation Lorca, Porfirio Barba-Jacob, and Luis Cer- at the universities of Cambridge and Ox- nuda. Portugal rejoices in the lyrical ford, stimulated a vast outpouring of love Antdnio Botto and Fernando Pessoa, who poems aimed at (mostlyJ boys. A few of ranks as one of the greatest modernist these compositions, such as those by John poets in any language. Italy claims Pier Addington Symonds and Edward Carpen- Paolo Pasolini, Mario Stefani, and Sandro ter, concerned working-class men in their Penna, all pederastic. Alexandria, Egypt, twenties. The pederastic poets included hosted Constantine Cavafy, a Greek and John Gambril Nicholson, Edward Cracroft arguably the finest openly homosexual poet Lefroy, Frederick Rolfe ("Baron Corvo" J, of the twentieth century. Canada produced Aleister Crowley, EdwinBradford, Edmund E. A. Lacey, Ian Young, and some other John, and many others. A place apart poets. There are also homosexual poems among these writers is reserved for Ralph written in little-known languages such as N. Chubb, who created extraordinary Basque, Lithuanian, and Friulian. privately-printed books illustrated by Britain. Though most of the Brit- himself. ish homosexual poetry has come from This flourishing was somewhat England, itwas a Scot, Lord AlfredDouglas, interrupted by the uproar over the "deca- who created one of themost famous poems dents," especially Oscar Wilde, at the end on this theme, the one which calls it "the of the nineteenth century. This uproar Love that darenot speakitsname." George started with Theodore Wratislaw's poem Gordon, Lord Byron wrote a number of "To a Sicilian Boy" and Douglas' poem covert love poems to his boyfriends, and to (noted above)and culminated with Wilde's him was (falsely) attributed the author- going to prison. However, this poetic ship of Don Leon (ca. 1836], a verse defense movement continued after things had of pederasty which is a masterpiece of its calmed down, producing such lyric mas- kind. The true author may have been terpieces as Edmund John's "The Seven Thomas Love Peacock, but this cannot be Gifts" and Richard Middleton's "The proven. Shelley was also interested in Bathing Boy." James Elroy Flecker trans- homosexuality, as is seen in his transla- lated a Turkish poem, "The Hammam tions of Plato. Alfred Lord Tennyson cre- Name" (name,Turkish for "piece of writ- ated thegreat In Memoriam afterthedeath ing"), into English. of his beloved Hallam, and Queen Victoria This traditional poetry gradually loved it in spite of the condemnation that gave way to modernist poetry, among the came from homophobic critics ("It is bet- practitioners of which may be counted ter to have loved and lost, than never to such homosexuals as WystanHugh Auden, have loved at all."). Thomas Love11 Bed- Thom Gunn, and others. Auden moved does wrote one of the most beautiful of to America and fell in love with young homosexual love-poems, also on the theme Chester Kallman. James Kirkup wrote a of the lost lover, "Dream-pedlary." poem about a Roman soldier who was The latter half of the nineteenth sexually attracted to the naked, dying century and the early twentieth century Christ, and when this was published in saw a tremendous amount of homosexual London's Gay News in 1976, the British (mostly pederastic) poetry produced in government prosecuted the publisher for England. The full details of this golden age violating the law against blasphemy. appear in Brian Reade's Sexual Heretics However, the pornography laws were [London, 1970) and in Timothy dlArch rncanwhile liberalized to the point where POETRY 0

explicit poems could be published, such as America, and no lesbian poetry at all is Auden's pornographic "Platonic Blow." known from Africa, Asia, or Latin Amer- The United States. There were ica. There was a brief flourishingof lesbian some American romantic poems written verse among educated women in England before the Civil War on homoerotic themes, during the seventeenth century ("The such as Henry David Thoreau's "The Matchless Orinda" and some others), but Gentle Boy," which were protected from it is not until Emily Dickinson that the public outrage by the pre-Freudian belief theme reappeared. In England, there had that it was possible for two men or two been "lesbian" poems written by women to love each other in a non-sexual Swinburne (from the male point of view) manner. and Christina Rossetti ("Goblin Market"], Outrage did greet the publication but the apogee of lesbian poetry wasreached of Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass in by the international (partHawaiian, among 1860 with a homosexual section, "Cala. other strains)poet PaulineTam, who wrote mus." Whitman defended himself by in French under the pen-name of RenCe claiming he was heterosexual, but the Vivien, and who had a love affair with poems speak for themselves; a group of Natalie Clifford Barney in Paris. English minor poets called themselves An attentive reading of the lyrics "Calamites" in his honor. Whitman had a of Edna St. Vincent Millay, whowas bisex- tremendous influence on American po- ual, shows them to treat tender feelings for etry in general and on homosexual litera- young women. Some other American les- ture in particular, and he is often mistak- bian poets who should be mentioned are enly considered the only American homo- Amy Lowell, the imagist and literary sexual poet of the nineteenth century, but impresario, and Katherine Lee Bates, a there were a host of minor, now largely professor at Wellesley College. Bates forgotten, versifiers (see Stephen W. Fos- produced Yellow Clover, a sort of lesbian ter, "Beauty's Purple Flame"]. Many of version of In Memoriam, and she also these poets, such as the unlucky James wrote "America the Beautiful," which Bensel, tended to deal with the Ten- almost became the American national nysonian theme of the lover who has died. anthem. The most important of these Germany. Count August von writers was the pederastic George Edward Platen was a homosexual poet who was Woodbeny. Another interesting poet was the victim of a homophobic attack by the highly precocious Cuthbert Wright, Heinrich Heine. Xavier Mayne wrote a whose volume of homosexual verse, One long study of Platen and Platen's sonnets Way of Love (1915), completed when he have been translated into English. There was only sixteen years old, was published appears to have been a tremendous up- both in America and England. George surge of homosexual poetry in Germany at Sylvester Viereck also wrote "decadent" the same time as in England, but very few poems. of these poets have been rendered into After World War I, the chief English, and in any case most of them were modemist poet in America was the homo- minor. In the midst of a vast amount of sexual Hart Crane, who preferred sailors inferior homosexual poetry, there appeared and young Mexican boys. The painter a giant, Stefan George, whose Seventh Marsden Hartley also produced poetry. Ringwaswritten in honor of his boyfriend, Lesbian Poetry in English. After Maximilian Kronberger, a teenager known classical antiquity, little lesbian poetry poetically as Maximin-a quasi-divine worth noting was written until the end of figure who died young. There has not been the nineteenth century in Europe and another German homosexual poet of sirni- 4 POETRY lar stature since George, but there has wide fame in the context of the beat gen- been no dearth of poets, except during the eration. Honesty increased as more and Nazi period. more poets "came out" at the same time France. Charles Baudelaire (along that pornography laws were being struck with Swinburne) introduced intimations down by the courts. There are now numer- of lesbianism into poetry written by men, ous homosexual poets in North America, and founded the "decadent" school of lit- such as Edward Field, Richard Howard, erature, which caused French and English Dennis Kelly, James Merrill, and James poets to explore sexual themes hitherto Schuyler. Of the lesbian poets associated taboo, including homosexuality. Some of with the second wave of feminism possi- these writers seem to have been hetero- bly the most important is Adrienne Rich, sexuals experimenting with "horrifying" author of the volumes Of Woman Born themes, and it must be noted that some of (1976)and The Dream of a Common Lan- the poets who wrote about homosexuality guage (1978). Rich has also been influen- also wrote about necrophilia, for example. tial as a critic. Catherine R. Stimpson has Their aim was to create shudders, not to characterized Rich's major themes as "the express their personal feelings. Isidore analysis of male power over women; the Ducasse, called Lautrbmont, created the rejection of that power; the deconstruction phantasmagoric Les chants de Maldoror of dominant images of women; the need before dying young; this has some pederas- for women to construct their own experi- tic scenes. ence, history, and identity; and the tension Arthur Rimbaud stoppped writ- between two possible futuresu-androgy- ing at the age of twenty, after having had a nous and separatist. Other lesbian poets tempestuous love affair with Paul Ver- have written from the black, Chicana, and laine; both were major poets. Some of their Amcrican Indian experiences.The cultucs poemsdealwithhomosexuality, especially from which these poets stem retain a loy- in the volume Hombreslfemmes. Pierre alty to poetry that has been eroded else- Louys devised Les chansons de Bilitis, a where. volume of lesbian poems supposedly trans- The Present Situation. This flour- lated from the Greek. This book provided ishing of gay literature has taken place at American lesbians with the name of their a time when poetry as such has moved out first organization, theDaughters of Bilitis. of the cultural mainstream. Most of the A host of other French poets at this time public no longer reads poetry at all, its ("fin de sikcle," end of the nineteenth function being usurped in part by popular century) wrote decadent or pseudo-deca- music lyrics, and as a result the writing of dent poems and even song lyrics (Aristide poetry is not financially viable. In a sense, Bruant's songs about boy prostitutes, sung poetry has "gone underground," claimed in the Moulin Rouge).Much of the French by cultural minorities for whom commer- homosexual poetry of the twentieth cen- cial success is not an expected result. In a tury has been produced by writcrs more crude form, it continues to demonstrate famous for other things, such as novels vitality, if not much originality, among (Crevel, Cocteau, and Genet). Contempo- the uneducated, as seen in the emergence rary French poetry in general lacks great of "rap" rhyming, metrical verse from the names, and this is also true of homosexual inner city. But there is little incentive for poetry. highly talented writers to write poetry. Postwar American Poetry. After The rise of the gay liberation World War 11, some new homosexual po- movement stimulated the appearance of etic voices were hcard in America, such as numerous small-circulation publications Paul Goodman, Jack Spicer, and Allen aimed at an cxclusively homosexual or Ginsberg, with the latter attaining world- lesbian audience, and these provide gay POETRY + poets with an outlet for their work, since with the demands of craft and the address- what remains of "mainstream" poetry ing of subject matter of weight and sub- periodicals show little interest in publish- stance. Inasmuch as their work forms part ing homosexual material. The problem is of the literary currents associated with that most of this material is published feminism, it transccnds the lesbianlgay because of its theme rather than its liter- paradigm, and deserves to be addressed in ary merit. Furthermore, it has fostered a a different, larger context. ghettoization of gay literature: homosex- As has been noted, heterosexuals ual writings aimed at an exclusively do not read homosexual poetry. Generally homosexual audience. speaking, male homosexual poems are not Heterosexual Americans do not read by lesbians, and lesbian poems arenot buy or read homosexual poetry, with the read by male homosexuals. This tribalism exception of classics from the past like and subtribalism rob homosexual poetry Whitman. One would think that if homo- of universality. It is perhaps a hopeful sign sexuals can appreciate heterosexual love that similar restrictions that once nar- stories, heterosexuals could relate to rowed the audience for black literature homosexual love stories (or poetry), espe- have been largely overcome-though gain- cially since thousands of hcterosexuals ing the attention of white readers was never noticed that A. E. Housman was accomplished only after a considerable writing about boy and boy, not boy and effort on the part of critics of both races. It girl. But modern homosexual poetry is no may be that the AIDS crisis and the wan- longer about love as a human universal, ing of the sexual revolution have slowed, expressed in homosexual terms; it is spe- but not bloclzed, a similar critical enter- cifically about homosexuality as such. prise on bchalf of gay and lesbian litera- Conclusion. For better or worse, ture. In the 1980s mainstream acceptance this is a prosaic, not a poetic age. Much of has bcen gained for the work of a few gay the current spate of gay male poetry may and lcsbian novelists (e.g., David Leavitt be attributed to the retrospective, nostal- and Rita Mae Brown). The prospects for gic side of homosexual taste, as seen in the poetry of same-sex concerns are probably predilection for antique furniture andgrand dependent on a revival of interest in poetry opera. Formally, howevcr, much of the as such, which would require the deploy- current gay male poetry reflects a shallow ment of factors not now on the horizon. modcrnism of omission-it lacks rhyme, As poetry has been losing its meter, significant imagery. In his exalta- gencral audience, it is being chosen as an tion of everyday expericnce, the pioneeer art form by homosexuals in a sort of cul- of this kind of work was the New York tural "hand-me-down" syndrome; yet even writer Frank O'Hara. Yet despite its seem- among homosexuals it reaches only a very ing casualness, OfHara's poetry shows the small segment of its target audience. Under impress of his study of models from the such circumstances, it is questionable how French tradition. By contrast, much of much longertraditional printed-pageverse current gay male production seems to can survive as a meaningful literary ve- display little acquaintance with the his- hicle for the expression of homoerotic tory of literature. Instead, it is a "home sentiment. Perhaps the futureliesinmixed- brew" purveying, all too frequently, a bald, media combinations, spoken poetry with explicit recitation of some recent sexual sound and/or visual images [as in Laurie expericnce-lurid exhibitionism of a not Andcrson's work) or other sensual dimen- very interesting sort. sions yet to be explored (smell, taste, feel). Lesbian poets, such as Olga Broumas, Judy Grahn, Joan Larkin, and BIULIOCRAPHY. Paula Bennett, My Life a Loaded Gun: Female Creativity and Audre Lorde, are more concerned both Feminist Politics, Boston: Beacon Press, 9 POETRY

1986; Anne Birrell, ed., New Songs from was virtually a protectorate of the great a Iade Terrace, London: Penguin, 1986; powers. Between 1772 and 1795 the coun- Stephen Coote, ed., The Penguin Book of Homosexual Verse, London: Penguin, try was thrice partitioned by Russia, Aus- 1983; Jeannette H. Foster, Sex Variant tria, and Prussia. Under the oppressive Women in Literature, 3d ed., Tallahas- rule of the tsars the Poles twice rebelled, see: Naiad Press, 1985; Stephen Wayne while Catholicism kept agrip on the masses Foster, "Beauty's Purple Flame: Some as a symbol of opposition to the Lutheran Minor American Gay Poets, 1786-1936," Gay Books Bulletin, 7 (19821, 15-17; Prussians and the Orthodox Russians. Na- Barbara Crier. The Lesbian in Literature. tionalism ultimately triumphed in 1918 3d ed., ~allah'assee:Naiad Press, 198 1; with the reconstitution of an independent Robert K. Martin, The Homosexual 'Ire~ublic as one of Woodrow Wilson's Tradition in American Poetry, Austin: Fourteen Points. It was the discussion of University of Texas Press, 1980; Carl Morse and Joan Larkin, eds., Gay el nationality problems in centralEurope that Lesbian Poetrv in Our Time: An introduced the concept of an ethnic or Anthology, New York: St. Martin's religious minority to the English-speaking Press, 1988; Brian Reade, ed., Sexual world. Interwar Poland was racked bv Heretics, New York: Coward-McCann, economic problems and the inability to 1971; Timothy &Arch Smith, Love in find a modus vivendi with the non-Polish Earnest, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1970; Gregory Woods, Articulate components of its population. Once again Plesh: Male Homo-eroticism and partitioned by Nazi Germany and Soviet Modern Poetry, New Haven: Yale Russia in 1939, Poland was restored in University Press, 1987; Ian Young, The 1945 with a new set of boundaries, the Male Homosexual in Literature, 2nd ed., Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1982. eastern territories having been annexed by Stephen Wayne Poster the Soviet Union, with large areas of Prus- sia and Silesia being ceded to the country as compensation for its losses. The Com- POLAND munist regime that long ruled Poland has This major nation of east-central had to cope with constant unrest from a Europe has undergone many vicissitudes. nation unwilling to be a Russian satellite. The western Slavs who occupied the area Religious and Legal Background. of present-day Poland wue first united Although the reception of Latin Christian- under the Piast dynasty and Christianized ity and of the medieval version of Roman beginning in 966. The crown passed to the law entailed the adoption of laws against Jagiello dynasty, under which Poland, sodomy, there is evidence that the anti- having lost its western territories, then Trinitarian sects which found refuge in expanded eastward, so that by 1568 the Poland were influenced by theNicodemites Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth em- and similai trends of thought in Italy to braced not just those two nations but most abandon the notion that homosexual sins of Belorussia and the Ukraine as well. The were the "crime of crimes" which the confluence of the Renaissance and the Scholastic theologians had proclaimed Reformation brought Poland to the zenith them to be. Even if they did not proclaim of its politicalandcultural greatness, while this departure from orthodox Christianity a policy of toleration in religion not only openly, they influenced the Quakers in spared the country the Protestant-catholic western Europe. Their heritage was still wars that ravaged Western Europe but also active in the thought of William Penn who allowed Polish Jewry to enjoy its golden reduced the penalty for buggery to a nomi- age, while dissenting groups such as So- nal one in his law code for the colony of cinians andunitarians foundrefugewithin Pennsylvania (1682). its borders. Decliningfrom the mid-seven- The partition of Poland meant teenth century onward, Poland after 1718 that four separate codes-the German, the