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THEATRE and DRAMA 4 Menting His Antagonist and Kinsman Pen- Pecially Those of Lucius Afranius (Fl

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THEATRE and DRAMA 4 Menting His Antagonist and Kinsman Pen- Pecially Those of Lucius Afranius (Fl + THAILAND of five homoerotic or bisexual publica- homosexuals have flourished. From the tions, led by Mithuna jbi], Mithuna, Jr. ancient Romans until very recently, per- (gay), and Neon (gay), a regular radio pro- formers were distrusted as outcasts, mis- gram broadcast from Bangkok, and the fits in the scheme of things: the outlaw beginnings of gay literary output in the actor and the sexual heretic were often the form of novels and short stories. same individual [and some psychiatrists Attitudeson homosexuality show are fond of equating the actor's egoist marlzed differences by class, relating to exhibitionism with an alleged homosex- power positions. While there appears to be ual love of display]. no "queerbashing" violence directed As homosexuality has become against homosexuality, there seems to be more conspicuous in everyday life, the a considerable amount of coercion, abuse stage, traditionally regarded as the mirror of authority positions, and rape of males. of life, has portrayed it more openly, both Peter Jaclzson comments that "the less- as a subject worthy of dramatic treatment ened resistance to having sex with a man and as an attitude that informs the produc- means that male rape or sexual attacks on tion. men appear to be significantly more com- Ancient Greek Theatre. Greek mon than in the West." As in other cul- classical theatre developed in a culture tures, however, rape of males is a taboo saturated with homoerotic attitudes and subject and is not reported to authorities. behaviors, but owing, perhaps, to deliber- ate excision by Byzantine and monastic BIBLIOGRAPHY. Eric Allyn and John P. librarians, there is little surviving evi- Collins, The Men of Thailand, San Francisco and Bangkok: Bua Luang, 1987; denceof these aspectsin drama. Lost trage- Peter A. Jackson, Male Homosexuality in dies include Aeschylus' Laius (467 B.c.), Thailand, New York: Global Academic about the man thought by the Greeks to Publishers, 1989. have invented pederasty; Niobe, which Geoff Puterbaugh displayed the love-lifeof Niobe's sons; and Myrmidons, concerning Achilles1 grief at the death of his lover Patroclus. This last THEATREAND DRAMA was afavorite of Aristophanes, who quoted As public performance, accessible it frequently. Other lost plays on the to a wide range of spectators, the theatre Myrmidon theme were written by has been more subject to the constraints Philemon (43615-379 B.C.] and Strattis of censorship than any other long-estab- (409-375 B.c.). Sophocles, too, wrote Lov- lished art. It is expected to confirm and ers of Achilles, whose surviving fragment endorse standard social values and to pres- describes the intricate workings of pas- ent the heterodox or the taboo in a manner sion. The oft-dramatised tragedy of the which will incite either derision or revul- house of Labdacus was, in the earlier sion. Consequently, homosexual senti- myths, triggered by Laius' lust-motivated ments, behavior and concerns have, until abduction of the son of his host during his recently, rarely appeared on stage; when foreign exile. Sophocles eschewed this epi- they have, their presentation has often sode, but it was the subject of Euripides' been skewed to the expectations and sen- lost Chrysippus (ca. 409 B.c.), apparently sibilities of convention-bound playgoers. created as a vehicle for his own male favor- At the same time, the practicing ite Agathon (447-4001399 B.c.], who was theatre, in its gregariousness, its opportu- noted for his "aesthetic" way of life. nities for artistic creativity, and its rela- (Another lost Chrysippus was composed tive tolerance, has been, at least from the by Strattis.] Euripides' masterpiece The sixteenth century, both in Western and Bacchae (405 B.c.) depicts the androgy- Eastern cultures, an arena where talented nous god Dionysus unsexing and de- THEATRE AND DRAMA 4 menting his antagonist and kinsman Pen- pecially those of Lucius Afranius (fl. later theus, before he sends him to his doom. second century of our era), credited to have But whereas the love and lust of introduced homosexuality into the genre. man for man was considered worthy of Among the later Greeks, actors were re- tragic treatment, effeminatemanners were spected as artists (Mary Renault's novel the stuff of comedy: Cnesippus was ridi- The Mask of Apollo offers a persuasive culed for inappropriately using a tragic recreation); but inRome, they were legally chorus of effeminates. The successful classified as "infamous," even if popularly comic poet Eupolis (445-ca. 415 B.c.) was regarded as desirable sexual catches. The attracted to this theme; his Those Who Emperors Caligula, Nero, and Trajan often Dye Their Hair (Baptai; 416115 B.c.] sati- took their male bedmates from the ranks rized members of the circle of Alcibiades, of actors, dancers, and mimes; the last who was rumored to have had him became notorious for the indecency of drowned for it. Surviving fragments sug- their performances. To increase the eroti- gest that they were ritual transvestites cism of their shows, the mimes introduced who spoke an obscene lingo of their own women on stage in what had hitherto been in ceremonies worshipping the goddess an exclusively male preserve. Cotytto. Eupolis' The Flatterers (Kolakes) The Orient. In the Oriental the- (431 B.c.), a satire on parasitism with side- atre, women were frequently banned from lights on compliant sexuality, won first the stage, either for religious or moralistic prize over Aristophanes' Peace. reasons; the resultant professional female The comedies of Aristophanes impersonator, the tan of Chi's Peking teem with references to pederasty and Opera, introduced in the reign of Ch'ien cross-dressing. Although his earthy he- Lung (1735-1 7961, and the onnagata of roes have no hesitation in declaring what Japan's Kabuki theatre, replacing boy play- fun it is to watch naked boys at the gymna- ers after 1652, exercised a pseudo-female sium and to fondle their scrotums, the ef- allure. In China actors, no matter what feminate (euryproktos or "broad-ass"J is they played, were frequently prostitutes, mercilessly mocked. In The Clouds (423 sought after by statesmen and scholars: B.c.), for instance, Right Reason rhapso- among the most famous of these actor- dizes on the "moisture and down" that favorites were Chin Feng (fl. 1590), Wei bloom on a youth's genitals "as on quinces" Ch'ang-sheng (fl. 1780), and Ch'en Yin- and wins his argument. Yet Cleisthenes is kuan (fl. 1790).The boy acting-troupes of regularly made a laughingstock for his nineteenth-century China were often lady-like carrying-on, and the central equated with male brothels, and certainly device of the Women's Festival (Thesmo- the boys' looks were regarded as more phoriazousai) (411 B.c.) is to have the pro- important than their talent. But these pe- tagonist disguise himself as a woman, dophilic passions were never reflected in under Cleisthenes' instruction, thus run- the Chinese dramatic repertory. On the ning the danger of being buggered when Kabuki stage, on the other hand, a bisexual captured and bound. love affair is the pivot of Tsuwamono Roman Theatre. Buggery on Tongen Sogo (1697), and a homosexual one compulsion remained a standard comic comprises a subplot in Asakusa Reigenki. topos in the Mediterranean basin. In Roman The most popular Korean enter- comedy, Plautus' characters mistake one tainment form before 1920 was the another for eunuchs and effeminates; his Namsadang, a traveling troupe of variety Casina (ca. 19G180 B.c.), in particular, is performers; a homosexual commune of 40 packed with jokes, puns and equivoca- to 50 males, it has been described as the tions on the theme. Sodomy frequently "voice of the common people" (Young Ja crops up in the farcical fabula togata, es- Kim). The company was divided into sut- 4 THEATRE AND DRAMA dongmo ("butch") and yodongmo Bibbiena's (1470-1520) bawdy La Calan- ("queen") members, the novices serving dria (1513)) but it was a common device in the elders and playing the female roles. commedia dell'arte as well as in comme- Despite Confucian disapproval of ped- dia erudita.Involuntary buggeryremained erasty, the troupe's sexual identity did not a basic joke: in Niccolb Machiavelli's put off village audiences, probably be- (1469-1527)Lo Clizia (1525),oldNicomaco cause its status as an outcast group made is sodomized in his sleep by his servant conventional standards irrelevant to it. Siro. Pietro Aretino's I1 Marescalco (15261 The institutionalized homosexuality of 7)features a pederastic hero, a chief groom the Namsadang raises questions about of the stables who is obliged by his master similar itinerant companiesin ancient and to marry a woman only to find to his great medieval Europe, and has an analogue in relief that the bride is a boy (thisserved as the enforced male bonding of acrobat a source of Ben Jonson's Epicoene, 1609). troupes. Late nineteenth-century com- Although Spanish Golden Age mentators on the circus noted that homo- drama dropped the homosexual references sexualrelationshipswerecommon among when it adapted Italian comedy, it often gymnasts and aerialists, a combination of featured the mujer varonil, a woman in physical contact and the need for trust. men's clothes who takes on the aggressive Bands of mummers and mountebanks role in the love-chase; farcical transves- may have shared such an ethos. tism was not uncommon, as in Lope de TheMiddleAges and Beginnings Vega's (1562-1635) El mes6n de la corte of the Modern Theatre in Europe. Christi- (TheInn of the Court, 1583?)and Monroy anity was antagonistic to the theatre, y Silva's El caballero-duma (The Lady partly on grounds of immorality; Clem- Cavalier), in which two men in drag are ent of Alexandria specifically rebuked the tricked into bed together.
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