Once upon a time, a science-fiction writer by the name of Theodore Sturgeon wrote a story, "The World Well Lost," that did something no other science fiction story had ever done: it presented same-sex attraction as natural and worthy of consideration as something to be found in perfectly normal people. As far as I know, it was, for its time, unique – a harbinger rather than a beginning – in a genre under the control of editors who were zealously protecting the delicate sensibilities of their audience, mostly (to their way of thinking, at least) impressionable boys. And probably a fair number of those boys were like me, young gay boys growing up without an identity that fit who they were.

I was too young to catch that story when it came out, and I also missed Sturgeon's 1960 novel, Venus Plus X, which rang another variation on that idea: in a world where gender has no meaning, who do you fall in love with? I was, by the 1960s, a confirmed science-fiction and fantasy fan, a holdover, perhaps, from my childhood – I grew up on Tom Swift and the Mushroom Planet and Freddy the Pig – but there was always something missing: there was no one like me.

That began to change, in my somewhat circumscribed small-town world, in 1963, with the publication of "Another Rib," a story by Marion Zimmer Bradley and Juanita Colson, writing as John J. Wells. It's a strong story, about a stellar exploration ship with an all-male crew returning home in the company of friendly aliens to discover that earth has been destroyed. As far as they know, they are the last humans alive, faced with one serious problem: how to preserve the species. The aliens are expert surgeons and biochemists, and from their point of view, men and women aren't all that different. To them, the solution is easy, particularly since there are pairs of men aboard who have, in their long journey, become more than friends. (One of the strengths of this story is its sensitive depiction of the relationships between these men, and the startling proposition for the time that yes, men could genuinely love each other.)

Looking back, I recognize Venus Plus X and "Another Rib" as marking the beginning of stage one of what I now see as a two-stage process, and it occurs to me that it's not by chance that "women's lib," "gay lib," and the portrayal of openly gay characters in science fiction and fantasy all went hand in hand, beginning in the 1960s and '70s. These stories are not really "gay" stories – they are feminist stories, centering on challenges to the accepted notions of gender: they were asking "what exactly is a man?" and "what exactly is a woman?" and coming up with answers that unsettled many. I'm not going to dwell much on the political/social context, except to note that a necessary undercurrent here is the growing acceptance of the fact that there are, indeed, alternatives to the traditional binary conceptualization of sex and sexuality. That's what made this history not only possible, but inevitable.

Ursula K. LeGuin pushed things even further with The Left Hand of Darkness (1969), a story that turned accepted notions of sexual identity on their heads. The question here is “What is love?” It relates a journey, both real and metaphorical. The two companions are a “normal” human male and a Gethenian, a member of a human species that is ambisexual, male or female as circumstances, hormones, and pheromones dictate. The two protagonists grow closer and closer until the Gethenian, Estraven, begins to shift, precipitating a crisis that is as much about identity as sexuality. Marion Zimmer Bradley, in The World Wreckers (1971), pursued a similar path in several of the subplots in that story, particularly those focusing on the developing relationships between David Hamilton, a scientist conducting a study of subjects on Darkover, and the chieri Keral; and two of the test subjects, David Conner and Missy Gentry, who is also a chieri, although she doesn’t realize it. The chieri, the original inhabitants of Darkover and remnants of a star-spanning civilization, are fully functional hermaphrodites, who, once again, become male or female as circumstances dictate. As Hamilton and Keral grow more and more attached, Keral, who has been “male” thus far, begins to transition to female, although Hamilton still thinks of him as male, leading to some deep emotional conflicts. In the case of Conner and Missy, who have become lovers, Missy begins to transition to male. As Conner says to Hamilton, “I happen to love Missy – love her. Or him. Or it, if you prefer. Which means I care about what happens to her, whether I bang her or not.” Bradley early on hit on one essential insight that has, regrettably, been unacknowledged in the propaganda of contemporary anti-gay activists: people don’t fall in love with genitals, they fall in love with people. (And if one pays any attention at all to recent studies of sexual behavior among vertebrates, that fact becomes even more obvious: pair bonding isn’t just about boys and girls deciding to spit in God’s eye.)

Joanna Russ, widely regarded as the strongest feminist voice in science fiction, produced a series of challenging books. The one I remember most clearly is And Chaos Died, about a bitter and confused man who finds his grounding not, as might have been the case ten years earlier, by becoming heterosexual, but by learning acceptance of who and what he is. This is a distinct change in attitude from earlier examples – in some cases, not so much earlier, but it must be remembered that, as in any historical process, we are talking here about overlapping realities – there is no date at which everything changes. Thus, Bradley and Sturgeon could write sympathetically about same-sex relationships at the same time that writers such as A. Bertram Chandler, Frank Herbert, and Cordwainer Smith could continue to describe any variation from their idea of "masculine" and "feminine" as negative. In Chandler’s False Fatherland (1968), an all-male culture collapses happily into heterosexuality with the advent of women, while Herbert’s Baron Harkonnen (Dune, 1965) is an unintentional caricature of the jaded degenerate and Smith’s Commander Suzdal (from “The Crime and Glory of Commander Suzdal” (1964)) quite justifiably (in Smith’s eyes, at least) destroys an entire planet because its inhabitants are "degenerate perverts." It’s apparent that we’re talking about a sea-change, gradual, but real.

Samuel R. Delany’s Dhalgren (1974), I think, offers a bridge between the feminist examinations of the social construction of gender and stories depicting gay characters. The protagonist of this often surreal, hallucinatory story, known simply as “the Kid,” is a bisexual wanderer and a poet. Dhalgren confronts basic questions of identity – social, artistic, racial, and sexual – head-on without blinking. (And let us not forget that the core issue all of these writers addressed was identity.) Delany’s later novels create a good bridge between the two stages of the process I’m describing: Triton (1976, later released as Trouble on Triton) follows Bron Helstrom, once a male prostitute on Mars, who emigrates to the almost completely libertarian society on Triton, where he ultimately decides to become a woman. Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand (1984) posits a relationship between the two main characters on the premise that Rat Korga, the sole survivor of disaster on his planet, has been determined to be the “perfect sexual match” for Marq Dyeth, an industrial diplomat. (In spite of its somewhat distanced intellectual underpinnings, it really is a romantic notion – the idea that “Mr. Right” can not only exist, but can be identified scientifically.)

Worth mentioning here, in relation to the ambiguous sexuality depicted in Dhalgren, is Joan Cox’s Star Web (1980), which brings together two men – one supposedly firmly heterosexual, the other perhaps not so much – and a group of humanoid aliens who fall into a night of freewheeling sex that breaks through to the emotional complexities of love and friendship and the blurry line between.

The earliest example that I know personally that depicts recognizably “gay” characters is Marion Zimmer Bradley’s The World Wreckers, noted above. Regis-Rafael Hastur makes an appearance there as a secondary character, along with his liege man and lover, Danilo-Felix Syrtis. Bradley incorporated the beginning of their relationship into The Heritage of Hastur (1975), which once again reflects the focus on identity that was such an integral part of these stories. In the later book, Regis is a teenager who is struggling to suppress his feelings for Danilo, which in turn is hampering the development of his laran, the psychic power of the Comyn aristocracy. It’s only when he finally accepts his feelings that his laran begins to develop naturally. The metaphor here is particularly telling: the suppression of his feelings toward Danilo and the effect of that on his development almost kill him. Danilo's ministrations, given impetus by his own love for Regis, save his life.

A science-fiction series that reads like heroic fantasy is Storm Constantine’s Wraeththu trilogy (The Enchantments of Flesh and Spirit (1987); The Bewitchments of Love and Hate (1988); The Fulfillments of Fate and Desire (1989)), which moves into the territory of same-sex relationships as context rather than issue, a position that left authors free to investigate the relationships rather than the event. In Constantine’s trilogy, the har have supplanted humanity as the dominant species. Sprung from a random mutation, the har are functional hermaphrodites, but because the first generation was created from human males, the psychology is all boy, and goth boy at that. The series is equal parts politics, adventure, and hard-edged romance, with a mystical element that touches on the spiritual aspect of love, all the more subversive because the love is between men.

As same-sex attraction and same-sex relationships became more firmly embedded in speculative fiction as a whole in the 1980s, fantasy seems to have become much more fertile ground for those looking for recognizable gay characters. It’s in that decade that fantasy moves into the picture in a big way, although there were forerunners.

Marion Zimmer Bradley, once again, proved to be somewhat prescient, not only with her Darkover novels (which, while strictly speaking science fiction, read as sword-and-sorcery as much as anything else), but also with her stories of Lythande, the sexually ambiguous magician of Robert Lynn Asprin’s Thieves’ World shared-universe series (began 1978). (Lythande is ultimately revealed as a lesbian.) Thieves’ World also introduced Janet Morris’ creation, Abarsis, the Slaughter Priest, a warrior, founder and leader of the Stepsons, a take-off on the Sacred Band of Thebes (and the parallel is not accidental), and a eunuch, who loves the god-haunted Tempus. It’s a problematic relationship, but only because Tempus is hard-put to love anyone honestly.

It might be helpful here to take a small side trip into the concept of eros in its wider sense, as a driving force in human psychology that shapes and structures relationships, which Graham Jackson explains lucidly and elegantly in his book The Secret Lore of Gardening: Patterns of Male Intimacy (Inner City Books, 1991). Jackson's focus is on the structures of homoeroticism, which is something that pertains, I think, very much to the portrayal of male-male relationships in fantasy. From the Jungian (and Freudian, needless to say) point of view, sex is the driving force for much, if not all, of human emotional life. I think there are other factors involved, but for emotional bonds, sex seems to be fundamental, although moderated by other influences. Given human sexual behaviors, it's not surprising that this would hold true of same-sex relationships, no matter the avowed orientation of the participants. (Freud, you will remember, called human sexuality "polymorphously perverse," while Alfred Kinsey documented that actual sexual behavior among men does not fall neatly into straight/gay columns, from which we can conclude, I think, outside of prison or other coercive environments, it's not out of the question for most men at some point in their lives to feel attraction to other men. I think from these observations we can see the foundation in psychology for the erosion of either/or definitions of sexuality.)

With that in mind, we can go back to The Lord of the Rings for a hint as to the direction that fantasy would take in this regard. There are intense relationships between various male characters, most notably Sam and Frodo, which does not presume a sexual component so much as reveal a reality in which the open expression of affection between men was not so strictly taboo as it has become since, at least in the anglophone West. This is a trend that carries forward all the way to C. J. Cherryh's Fortress series, beginning with the first meeting between Tristen, a Shaping called forth by the wizard Mauryl, and Cefwyn, prince and heir to the kingdom of Ylesuin (Fortress in the Eye of Time, 1995). In essence, Cefwyn and Tristen become lovers in almost every respect but the carnal, such is the intensity of their emotional attachment. When they first meet, Cefwyn feels an attraction to Tristen that is "all but physical," one that shakes his soul to its core. He also thinks to himself later that he could have lived without ever knowing Tristen, and ruled wisely and well, but "his soul would have died long before." (I might also point out that Tristen has an equally intense relationship with Crissand, the atheling of Amefel, and seems to have no interest in women.)

We find a similar focus between the half-brothers Daemon Sadi and Lucivar in Anne Bishop's Black Jewels trilogy (1998-2000): there is a deep and constant love between them (and Sadi at one point offers to have sex with Lucivar) that is not, ultimately, sexual but springs from the same source. (However, in the case of Daemon Sadi and Lucivar, it's problematic whether the offer of sex is a gift or a threat: there is an undercurrent of violence in love between men that crops up in these stories again and again.) And just to demonstrate that science fiction is not out of the picture here, Charles Ingrid's trilogy The Patterns of Chaos (beginning with Radius of Doubt, 1991) portrays a similarly intense emotional bond between two men, one human and one alien.

However, lest anyone start to think that male/male relationships in fantasy and science fiction are purely platonic, rest assured: these are much lustier genres than that.

One of the high points of contemporary fantasy is Ellen Kushner's Swordspoint (1987), the core of which is the relationship between Richard St Vier, a swordsman, and his "young gentleman," Alec (who, as it turns out, really is a gentleman, and a very important one). They are not easy men, and the relationship is fairly tempestuous. Kushner's focus is on the dynamics of the emotional context between the two, and she displays a sure eye for the realities of love between two difficult people.

One thing I've noticed, as more and more women have been writing speculative fiction, particularly fantasy, and more men have begun writing about same-sex relationships in these genres, is that there seems to be a sort of bifurcated emphasis. One thing that is readily apparent in writers such as Bishop and Kushner, and can be found in the work of other women writing fantasy, even if it doesn't concern same-sex relationships or gay characters, is a sensual quality to the writing. This goes back as far as the early works of Tanith Lee, who, while she did at least once portray a same-sex relationship, was much more notable for what I've called in the past a "lunar" quality in her writing: heavily sensual, evocative, and highly erotic. This quality also shows up in Bishop's Black Jewels, in which the really sexy characters are the men – they are, one and all, seductively beautiful and very dangerous – and equally so in Kushner's collaboration with Delia Sherman, The Fall of the Kings, which includes a stunning portrayal of the anger and violence that sometimes seem to be an integral part of men's loving. (The next time someone advances the ridiculous proposition that it's women who are hormonally driven, I have a one-word response for you: "testosterone.")

Men investigating the nuances of love between men seem to focus more on the emotional and physical intricacies than on the sensuality. And, with the idea of male couples having become part of the furniture, so to speak (and I should note that in my experience the overwhelming majority of these stories, whether written by women or men, focus on male couples), the stories become more about the development of the relationship, the emotional bonding between men that leads to love. A very strong case in point is Robin Wayne Bailey's Shadowdance (1996). Innowen, who has never had the use of his legs, is both blessed and cursed by a mysterious witch: he can walk between sunset and sunrise, but must dance for any who ask – and his dancing sometimes calls forth unlooked-for consequences. The story is again a journey, as Innowen meets Razkilli, who becomes his companion and even his bearer, carrying him on their way, and we see the slow growth of trust, regard, affection and desire that finally results in the realization that for each of them, the other has become the most important person in the world.

Acceptance of gay and lesbian characters as part of the toolbox for writers of fantasy and science fiction opened up new avenues of exploration. There were some new ways to look at some of the commonalities of human experience, and also the chance to investigate some questions with a more specific focus.

Rebecca M. Meluch's Sovereign (1979) is a poetic, powerful story about a young, very human alien, a king in his own world, who falls in love with a man of Earth. It poses some interesting questions about the relationships between gay men and their fathers, as well as about the foundations of love between men. Another perspective comes into play in Tanya Huff's Blood series (began 1991), and later in a continuation, the Smoke series (began 2004), with the relationship between Tony Foster, a Toronto street kid who later turns out to be a wizard, and Henry Fitzroy, a 400+ year-old vampire who writes romance novels: the issues here are endemic to male-male relationships of any sort, involving control, dominance, and possessiveness. The Smoke series, by the way, marks another milestone in the portrayal of gays in fantasy: it's a supernatural adventure/comedy, marked by Huff's very contemporary sensibility and a lot of attitude, with a decidedly satirical bent.

One element of male-male relationships that invariably sparks controversy in the real world is that of age differences. Two writers in my experience have given us notable examinations here, from opposite sides of the court.

Jim Grimsley's Kirith Kirin (2000) is narrated by Jessex, who is fourteen when he is taken by his uncle Sivisal to serve the Prince in Arthen Forest, Kirith Kirin. When the two actually meet, it is love at first sight, or possibly before: Jessex' arrival is the result of a prophetic dream by Kirith Kirin's friend, a magician. There is, of course, a problem: Jessex won't be an adult until he reaches sixteen, and while romantic liaisons between men (and between women) carry no particular stigma, there is strong disapproval of relationships between adults and "children." Jessex, however, although a somewhat retiring character at this stage, has his own ideas on that score.

Lynn Flewelling, in Luck in the Shadows (1996), the beginning of her Nightrunners series, tells the other side of the story with a twist: Seregil, one of the long-lived Aurienfaie, rescues the orphaned youth Alec from prison when Alec is sixteen. The difficulty, as Seregil sees it, is his own age and outcast status against Alec's youth and innocence. And as young as Alec is, Seregil is faced with the certain knowledge that he will outlive Alec by at least a couple of centuries. Given Seregil's conflicts, it is perhaps no surprise that, as Jessex does in Kirith Kirin, it is Alec who takes the decisive step.

It's worth noting here that there is a certain element of dodging in both these stories: while Seregil and Kirith Kirin are both substantially older than their lovers, each has the vitality and appearance – and some of the behaviors – of a young man in his twenties. As in the relative ages of Tony and Henry in Huff's two series, the realities of a substantial age difference are absent.

As we hit the turn of the century, both science fiction and fantasy have incorporated same-sex characters into their arsenals. I've focused on same-sex couples because the overwhelming majority of the stories involved have been about couples, and in fact mostly concerned with courtship. One of the few exceptions is Stephen Harper's Silent Empire series (beginning with Dreamers, 2001), and Kendi Weaver, the protagonist, is busily looking for a boyfriend. (One notable feature of Kendi's trials and travails: assimilation is not all it's cracked up to be – it’s become that much harder to find a guy who might be interested.)

In tandem with the increasing visibility of gay and lesbian characters in fantasy and science fiction is the rise of a subgenre, or perhaps cross-genre: gay-oriented science fiction and fantasy, that is, stories aimed specifically at a gay audience. The earliest example in my library is George Nader's Chrome (1978). One can now find novels and anthologies in this area with little trouble. These are often sexually explicit (but not always), and while balancing between sf and gay fiction, also edge into erotica.

A final comment: I think perhaps even more noteworthy than the increase in sympathetic portrayals of gay characters in science fiction and fantasy is the fact that I can't remember a story published in the last twenty years that has portrayed a "homosexual" as The Bad Guy. And that says a lot.

                  

 

Robert M. Tilendis is an artist and writer living in Chicago and traveling the world by means of the Internet. He is a reviewer of just about anything that can be reviewed, but focuses mainly on books, music, and art. He is grossly overeducated, and somehow manages to find more to learn. He spends entirely too much time thinking. He is very happy at this point to have found a job that stays put when he leaves for the day.

His online presence is multivalent. His photographs and bibliographies (alas, sadly in need of an update) are at a/k/a Hunter, his political and social commentary at Hunter at Random, and his online journal at Booklag. His reviews of books, music, and the occasional frying pan can be found at Green Man Review, Epinions, and Rambles. He can be reached via e-mail.