Page:Symonds - A Problem in Modern Ethics.djvu/28

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16

III.

LITERATURE—DESCRIPTIVE.

Sexual inversion can boast a voluminous modern literature, little known to general readers. A considerable part of this is pornographic, and need not arrest our attention.^[1] A good deal is descriptive, scientific,

↑ Ancient literature abounds in prose and poetry which are both of them concerned with homosexual love. Only a portion of this can be called pornographic: among the Greeks, the Μοὑσα Παιδικἡ, parts of Lucian, and occasional hints in Athenæus and Aristophanes perhaps deserve the name; among the Romans, the Priapeia, the Satyricon of Petronius, some elegies and satires, certainly do so. Italian literature can show the Rime Burlesche, Beccadelli's Hermaphroditus, the Canti Carnascialeschi, the maccaronic poems of Fidentius, and the remarkably outspoken romance entitled "Alcibiade fanciullo a scolla." Balzac has treated the theme, but with reserve and delicacy. Mirabeau's "Erotika Biblion" is a kind of classic on the subject. In English literature, if we except Shakespeare's Sonnets, George Barnfield's Poems, parts of Marlowe, "Roderick Random," Churchill's Satire "The Times," homosexual passions have been rarely handled, and none of these works are pornographic. In Germany, Count von Platen, Heine's victim, was certainly an Urning; but his homosexual imitations of Persian poetry are pure, though passionate. I am not acquainted with more than the titles of some distinctly pornographic German books. The following appears to be of this sort: "Mannesliebe, oder drei Jahre aus dem Leben eines jungen Mannes."

[1] Ancient literature abounds in prose and poetry which are both of them concerned with homosexual love. Only a portion of this can be called pornographic: among the Greeks, the Μοὑσα Παιδικἡ, parts of Lucian, and occasional hints in Athenæus and Aristophanes perhaps deserve the name; among the Romans, the Priapeia, the Satyricon of Petronius, some elegies and satires, certainly do so. Italian literature can show the Rime Burlesche, Beccadelli's Hermaphroditus, the Canti Carnascialeschi, the maccaronic poems of Fidentius, and the remarkably outspoken romance entitled "Alcibiade fanciullo a scolla." Balzac has treated the theme, but with reserve and delicacy. Mirabeau's "Erotika Biblion" is a kind of classic on the subject. In English literature, if we except Shakespeare's Sonnets, George Barnfield's Poems, parts of Marlowe, "Roderick Random," Churchill's Satire "The Times," homosexual passions have been rarely handled, and none of these works are pornographic. In Germany, Count von Platen, Heine's victim, was certainly an Urning; but his homosexual imitations of Persian poetry are pure, though passionate. I am not acquainted with more than the titles of some distinctly pornographic German books. The following appears to be of this sort: "Mannesliebe, oder drei Jahre aus dem Leben eines jungen Mannes."

[1]