Historic Lesbian and Gay books, art and films for teens

[WandsOut]

Any recommendations on these?
Poetry, novels, films, art... fashion designers etc

Ideally non captured of course!

'Oranges are not the only fruit', book by Jeanette Winterson, though I don't know how historic you mean,

Nineteen year old teens, anything they want.

Thirteen year old teens maybe a narrower range.

Try Sarah Waters books

I was originally thinking period drama, but actually anything up to the 90's will work. The problem is finding things that aren't over sexualised which given the writing is usually about sexuality can be tricky, but also looking for things for a group of young people to watch without too much embarrassment!

Oranges was wonderful. The book and the series. Charlotte Coleman was a singular gift to the acting world.

Yes thinking more the under 16's so could also be inspirational figures, sportspeople (we've been watching docs about Martina Navratilova for example) fashion designers, singers etc

Also "If these walls could talk 2", a film featuring 3 lesbian couples in different time periods

If they have a tolerance for mystery series with historical settings, Murdoch Mysteries (1890s to 1910s Canada) has gay and lesbian recurring characters - who inevitably face nasty prejudice and suffer angst, but are still regarded as goodies not baddies, and have happy times too. So far no trans, and fairly family-viewing friendly. It's possibly a few seasons in before we get to know some peoples 'secret'.

Basically my child's friend group (some LGB, some straight) want to explore LGB history but of course it's all been queered now. Generally they are a shy bunch of sixteen year olds.

Resources at the school tend to be put in by LGBT Youth Scotland etc and there's Juno Dawson in the book section :(

So they want alternatives for now and as they get older which represent stories about love or learning about discrimination and not just the focus on sex.

I'm bisexual but the representation of bi and lesbian women in films often runs to the over sexualised in a way that it wouldn't in a regular rom com for example, but that's another aspect that I think ends up blurring the lines of comfort and discomfort for young and anxious L/B women.

Murdoch Mysteries would be quite good I think. There's plenty of early feminism, racism, prejudice against indigenous people, anti-Catholicism, so the struggles of the lesbian, gay and bisexual characters don't happen in a vacuum, the central focus is on solving crimes and tracking down criminals and there's a great sense of a world that is rapidly changing - motor cars, airplanes, movies, medical advances . . .

Would the poetry of Wu Zao/Tsau be too sexual? There's nothing explicit, just lots of angsty yearning which might appeal to teens!

Have a look at For the Courtesan Ch'ing Lin https://www.ronnowpoetry.com/contents/wutsao/FortheCourtesan.html

Oh wow.
That's so beautiful.

Her books are so vivid you can see them - definitely a recommendation when they get older.

That's a good idea. Episodes of things that be very revealing about attitudes of the time.

Frost in May by Antonia White?

The Naked Civil Servant and I, Clavdivs were brilliant BBC adaptations of the books by (respectively) Quentin Crisp and Rupert Graves. Both star John Hurt.

I think current 16 year olds might enjoy them.

Classical poetry includes the works attributed to Sappho, and the poems of Catullus (check which translation you acquire of the latter).

Maybe not old enough to count as historic but
But I'm A Cheerleader (film).
Sugar Rush (TV series).

Edit: These are definitely for older teens not younger ones!

I found it very hard as a teen growing up in a heteronormative world where most of the stories, music and television featured main straight characters doing straight things like lusting after boys. I tended to stick to adventure stories and murder mysteries!

I saw the Naked Civil Servant in my early teens with my very open minded dad.
We ended up having a really good discussion about homophobia in England afterwards and it was a really compassionate and brilliantly acted film.
There was a second one too. I should dig that out.
John Hurt was a wonderful actor. They might like more it too because they know him from Harry Potter and they've just recently watched The Elephant Man. It's also very witty.

The film Victim starring Dirk Bogarde. It helped change the law on homosexuality.

I'd actually recommend reading the Quentin Crisp autobiographies, they're even funnier than the adaptation and give much more of an insight into what it was like to be a gay man when being one was still illegal. I'd add, for a corresponding insight into what life was like for lesbians in almost the same period, The Microcosm by Maureen Duffy (both 40s, 50s, 60s London). For U.S. novels of the same 40s to 70s vintage I'd include anything by James Baldwin, especially Go Tell It On The Mountain and Giovanni's Room (which of course also offer profound insights into black lives in Harlem/U.S. and the early civil rights and gay liberation movements). Patience and Sarah by Isabel Miller (Alma Routsong) and The Price of Salt by Claire Morgan (Patricia Highsmith) - with a small side note about why both women felt impelled to name change! And speaking of killing two birds with one stone you could include Jeanette Winterson's The Passion for interesting sidelights on the Napoleonic Wars and Postmodernism/Magic Realism. Curious Wine by Katherine V. Forrest is an enchanting love story that manages a happy ending for its protagonists whilst delineating how they conduct their affair in a completely closeted fashion.

Historic movies that aren’t oversexualised:
Farewell my Concubine. Amazing epic Chinese story set over fifty years.
Portrait of a Lady on Fire -sex is minimal and historic drug taking but great one to discuss the nature of the female gaze v male gaze.
Carol - fifties based in Patricia Highsmith’s Price of Salt
Far from Heaven- worth double billing with Carol as also Todd Haynes movie based on Douglas Sirk’s technicolor melodramas
The Hours- worth watching along with Mrs Dalloway
Orlando-Sally Potter’s fantastic ride through gender bending gallop of Woolf’s novel.
The Favourite- also terrific because Emma Stone, Olivia Coleman and Rachel Weisz knocking themselves out to steal scenes from one another.
Reaching for the Moon - American poet Elizabeth Bishop meets her match in Brazilian poet/architect Mercedes de Acosta.

For learning to read subtext - Calamity Jane is quite a strong contender for lesbian context and can cause hours of debate.

Books - historical anything by Emma Donaghue. Under rated older writers sometimes forgotten, Mary Renault, Antonia White, Katherine Mansfield, Sylvia Townsend Warner, Ann Marie MacDonald
Poets- May Sarton, Charlotte Mew, Valentine Ackland, UA Fanthorpe

For historical context on lesbian culture cannot recommend highly enough Lilian Faderman’s Odd Girls & Twilight Lovers.

ETA when I realised I might not be straight back in the Dark Ages I went to our local library and many of the above writer stayed with me. I have a thing for historical movies so these are all favourites.

For just how grim it was to be gay in the past, I think The Killing of Sister George is a superb example as it does read in the closeted life, predatory older lesbian cliche and has a scene filmed in the Gateways club an actual real underground lesbian club in London.

I saw a really good one today when browsing a book shop but cannot remember the title- it's set in (I think) Victorian times and the two girls end up emigrating to Australia with their families. Maybe someone else will know what I'm talking about- I think it was written a while ago and is quite well known.

Anything [? I haven't actually read everything by her so that's not a 100% seal of approval] by Diana Souhami.
Here's a list from Wikipedia, a lot of them about lesbians:

• A woman's place : the changing picture of women in Britain. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books. 1986. ISBN 9780140086096.
• Gluck, 1895-1978 : her biography. Hammersmith: Pandora. 1988. ISBN 978-0863582363.
• Gertrude and Alice. Hammersmith: Pandora. 1991. ISBN 9780044408338.
• Bakst : the Rothschild panels of the Sleeping beauty. London: Philip Wilson. 1992. ISBN 9780856674198.
• Greta and Cecil. London: Jonathan Cape. 1994. ISBN 9780297643647.
• Mrs Keppel and Her Daughter. London: Harper Collins. 1996. ISBN 9780002556453.
• The Trials of Radclyffe Hall. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. 1998. ISBN 9780297818250.
• Selkirk's Island. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. 2001. ISBN 9780297643852.
• Wild girls : Natalie Barney and Romaine Brooks. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. 2004. ISBN 9780297643869.
• Coconut Chaos. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. 2007. ISBN 9780297847878.
• Edith Cavell. London: Quercus. 2010. ISBN 9781849163613.
• Murder at Wrotham Hill. London: Quercus. 2012. ISBN 9780857382832.
• Gwendolen. London: Quercus. 2014. ISBN 9781782063520.
• No Modernism without Lesbians. London: Head of Zeus. 2020. ISBN 9781786694874.

This is fiction but I believe it is based on a real couple:
Patience and Sarah by Isabel Miller. Published around 1970, so predates a lot of the 'politics'*; I remember it as sweet and charming - and there's nothing wrong with that, right?😘

*yes yes I know the personal is political - but you know what I mean!

Books -

The Well Of Loneliness by Radclyffe Hall. Very interesting for lesbian historical context, although profoundly depressing.

Rubyfruit Jungle by Rita Mae Brown. A semi-autobiographical lesbian coming-of-age tale published in the early ‘70s. Some sexual content, nothing today’s teens would be phased by. Not depressing.

The Diaries of Anne Lister - another good one for historical context, also made into a dramatisation by the BBC (I think).

Films (not really my thing) - the one that came to mind first was Milk, about the life of Harvey Milk.

A second vote for Rubyfruit Jungle, which is genuinely funny and very optimistic. Anything about Virginia Woolf's relationship with Vita Sackville-West.
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