Gay science fiction
Encyclopedia
LGBT themes in speculative fiction refer to the incorporation of homosexual themes into science fiction
, fantasy
, horror fiction
and related genres, which together constitute speculative fiction
(SF). Such elements may include a lesbian
, gay
, bisexual, transsexual, or transgender
(LGBT
) character as the protagonist or a major character, or exploration of varieties of sexual experience
that deviate from the conventional.
Science fiction and fantasy have traditionally been puritanical genres aimed at a male readership, and can be more restricted than non-genre literature by their conventions of characterisation and the effect that these conventions have on depictions of sexuality and gender. However, speculative fiction also gives authors and readers the freedom to imagine societies that are different from real-life cultures. This freedom makes speculative fiction a useful means of examining sexual bias, by forcing the reader to reconsider his or her heteronormative cultural assumptions. It has also been claimed that LGBT readers identify strongly with the mutant
s, aliens, and other outsider characters found in speculative fiction
Before the 1960s, explicit sexuality of any kind was rare in speculative fiction, as the editors who controlled what was published attempted to protect their perceived key market of adolescent male readers. As the readership broadened, it became possible to include characters who were undisguised homosexuals, though these tended to be villains, and lesbians remained almost entirely unrepresented. In the 1960s, science fiction and fantasy began to reflect the changes prompted by the civil rights movement
and the emergence of a counterculture
. New wave
and feminist science fiction
authors realised cultures in which homosexuality, bisexuality and a variety of gender models were the norm, and in which sympathetic depictions of alternative sexuality were commonplace.
From the 1980s onwards, homosexuality gained much wider mainstream acceptance, and was often incorporated into otherwise conventional speculative fiction stories. Works emerged that went beyond simple representation of homosexuality to explorations of specific issues relevant to the LGBT community. This development was helped by the growing number of openly gay or lesbian authors and their early acceptance by speculative fiction fandom
. Specialist gay publishing presses and a number of awards recognising LGBT achievements in the genre emerged, and by the twenty-first century blatant homophobia
was no longer considered acceptable by most readers of speculative fiction. There was a concurrent increase in representation of homosexuality within non-literary forms of speculative fiction. The inclusion of LGBT themes in comic books, television and film continues to attract media attention and controversy, while the perceived lack of sufficient representation, along with unrealistic depictions, provokes criticism from LGBT sources.
As genres of popular literature, science fiction and fantasy often seem more constrained than non-genre literature by their conventions of characterisation and the effects that these conventions have on depictions of sexuality and gender. Science fiction in particular has traditionally been a puritanical genre oriented toward a male readership. Sex is often linked to disgust in SF and horror, and plots based on sexual relationships have mainly been avoided in genre fantasy narratives. On the other hand, science fiction and fantasy can also provide more freedom than realistic
literature to imagine alternatives to the default assumptions of heterosexuality and masculinity that permeate many cultures. Homosexuality is now an accepted and common feature of science fiction and fantasy literature, its prevalence due to the influence of lesbian-feminist and gay liberation movements.
In speculative fiction, extrapolation allows writers to focus not on the way things are (or were), as non-genre literature does, but on the way things could be different. It provides science fiction with a quality that science fiction critic Darko Suvin
has called "cognitive
estrangement": the recognition that what we are reading is not the world as we know it, but a world whose differences force us to reconsider our own with an outsider's perspective. When the extrapolation involves sexuality or gender, it can force the reader to reconsider his or her heteronormative cultural assumptions; the freedom to imagine societies different from real-life cultures makes SF an effective tool for examining sexual bias. In science fiction, such estranging features include technologies that significantly alter sex or reproduction. In fantasy, such features include figures such as mythological
deities and heroic archetypes, who are not limited by preconceptions of human sexuality and gender, allowing them to be reinterpreted. SF has also depicted a plethora of alien methods of reproduction and sex, some of which can be viewed as homo- or bisexual through a human binary-gender
lens.
In spite of the freedom offered by the genres, gay characters often remain contrived and stereotypical, and most SF stories take for granted the continuation of heteronormative institutions. Alternative sexualities have usually been approached allegorically
, or by including LGBT characters in such a way as to not contradict mainstream society's assumptions about gender role
s. Works that feature gay characters are more likely to be written by women writers, and to be viewed as being aimed at other women or girls; big-name male writers are less prone to explore gay themes.
Speculative fiction has traditionally been "straight"; Samuel R. Delany has written that the science fiction community is predominantly made up of white male heterosexuals, but that the proportion of minorities, including gay people, is generally higher than found in a "literary" group. The inclusion of homosexuality in SF has been described in Science Fiction Culture as "sometimes lagging behind the general population, sometimes surging ahead". Nicola Griffith
has written that LGBT readers tend to identify strongly with the outsider status of mutants, aliens, and characters who lead hidden or double lives in science fiction. In comparison, Geoff Ryman
has claimed that the gay and SF genre markets are incompatible, with his books being marketed as one or the other, but never both, and David Seed said that SF purists have denied that SF that focuses on soft science fiction
themes and marginalised groups (including "gay SF") is "real" science fiction. Gay and lesbian science fiction have at times been grouped as distinct subgenres of SF, and have some tradition of separate publishers and awards.
True History
by the Greek writer Lucian
(A.D. 120–185) has been called the earliest surviving example of science fiction and the first ever "gay science fiction story". The narrator is suddenly enveloped by a typhoon and swept up to the moon, which is inhabited by a society of men that are at war with the sun. After the hero distinguishes himself in combat, the king gives him his son the prince in marriage. The all male society reproduces (male children only) by giving birth from the thigh or by growing a child from a plant produced by planting the left testicle
in the moon's soil.
In other proto-SF works, sex itself, of any type, was equated with base desires or "beastliness", as in Gulliver's Travels
, which contrasts the animalistic and overtly sexual breasts with the reserved and intelligent Houyhnhnms. The frank treatment of sexual topics of pre-nineteenth century literature was abandoned in most speculative fiction, although Wendy Pearson has written that issues of gender and sexuality have been central to SF since its inception but were ignored by readers and critics until the late twentieth century. Early works that contained LGBT themes and showed the gay characters to be morally impure include the first lesbian vampire
story "Carmilla
" (1872) by Sheridan Le Fanu
and The Picture of Dorian Gray
(1890) by Oscar Wilde
, which shocked contemporary readers with its sensuality and overtly homosexual characters.
An Anglo-American Alliance
, a 1906 novel by Gregory Casparian, was the first SF-themed novel to openly portray a lesbian romantic relationship.
During the pulp
era, explicit sexuality of any kind was rare in genre science fiction and fantasy. For many years, the editors who controlled what was published felt that they had to protect the adolescent male readership that they identified as their principal market. Although the covers of some 1930s pulp magazines showed scantily clad women menaced by tentacled aliens, the covers were often more lurid than the magazines' contents. In such a context, writers like Edgar Pangborn
, who featured passionate male friendships in his work, were exceptional; almost until the end of their careers, including so much as a kiss would have been too much. Implied or disguised sexuality was as important as that which was openly revealed. As such, genre SF reflected the social mores of the day, paralleling common prejudices; This was particularly true of pulp fiction, more so than literary works of the time.
As the demographics of the readership broadened, it became possible to include characters who were more or less undisguised homosexuals, but these, in accordance with the attitudes of the times, tended to be villains: evil, demented, or effeminate stereotypes. The most popular role for the homosexual was as a 'decadent slaveholding lordling' whose corrupt tyranny was doomed to be overthrown by the young male heterosexual hero. During this period, lesbians were almost entirely unrepresented as either heroes or villains.
One of the earliest examples of genre science fiction that involves a challenging amount of unconventional sexual activity is the early novel Odd John
(1935), by Olaf Stapledon
. John is a mutant
with extraordinary mental abilities who will not allow himself to be bound by many of the rules imposed by the ordinary British society of his time. The novel strongly implies that he seduces an older boy who becomes devoted to him but also suffers from the affront that the relationship creates to his own morals.
In the Golden Age of Science Fiction
, the genre "resolutely ignored the whole subject" of homosexuality, according to Joanna Russ. As the readership for science fiction and fantasy began to age in the 1950s, however, writers like Philip Jose Farmer
and Theodore Sturgeon
were able to introduce more explicit sexuality into their work. Until the late 1960s, however, few other writers depicted alternative sexuality or revised gender roles, or openly investigated sexual questions. The majority of LGBT characters were depicted as caricatures, such as "man-hating amazons", and attempts at portraying homosexuals sympathetically or non-stereotypically were met with hostility.
Sturgeon wrote many stories during the Golden Age of Science Fiction that emphasised the importance of love, regardless of the current social norms. In his short story "The World Well Lost
" (1953), first published in Universe magazine, homosexual alien fugitives and unrequited (and taboo) human homosexual love are portrayed. The tagline for the Universe cover was "[His] most daring story"; its sensitive treatment of homosexuality was unusual for science fiction published at that time, and it is now regarded as milestone in science fiction's portrayal of homosexuality. According to an anecdote related by Samuel R. Delany, when Sturgeon first submitted the story, the editor (John W. Campbell
) not only rejected it but phoned every other editor he knew and urged them to reject it as well. Sturgeon would later write Affair with a Green Monkey, which examined social stereotyping of homosexuals, and in 1960 published Venus Plus X
, in which a single-gender society is depicted and the protagonist's homophobia portrayed unfavourably.
Images of homosexual male societies remained strongly negative in the eyes of most SF authors. For example, when overpopulation drives the world away from heterosexuality in Charles Beaumont
's short story "The Crooked Man" (1955), first published in Playboy
, inhumane homosexuals begin to oppress the heterosexual minority. In Anthony Burgess
's The Wanting Seed
(1962) homosexuality is required for official employment; Burgess treats this as one aspect of an unnatural state of affairs which includes violent warfare and the failing of the natural world.
Although not usually identified as a genre writer, William S. Burroughs
produced works with a surreal narrative that estranged the action from the ordinary world as science fiction and fantasy do. In 1959 he published Naked Lunch
, the first of many works such as The Nova Trilogy
and The Wild Boys
in which he linked drug use and homosexuality as anti-authoritarian activities.
," a movement more sceptical of technology, more liberated socially, and more interested in stylistic experimentation. New Wave writers were more likely to claim an interest in "inner space" instead of outer space. They were less shy about explicit sexuality and more sympathetic to reconsiderations of gender roles and the social status of sexual minorities. Under the influence of New Wave editors and authors such as Michael Moorcock
(editor of the influential New Worlds
), sympathetic depictions of alternative sexuality and gender multiplied in science fiction and fantasy, becoming commonplace. The introduction of gay imagery has also been attributed to the influence of lesbian-feminist and gay liberation movements in the 1960s. In the 1970s, lesbians and gay men became a more visible presence in the SF community and as writers; notable gay authors included Joanna Russ
, Thomas M. Disch
and Samuel R. Delany
.
Feminist SF authors imagined cultures in which homo- and bisexuality and a variety of gender models were the norm. Joanna Russ
's The Female Man
(1975) and the award winning story "When It Changed
", showing a female-only lesbian society that flourished without men, were enormously influential. Russ is largely responsible for introducing radical lesbian feminism into science fiction; she has stated that being openly lesbian was bad for her career and sales. Similar themes are explored in James Tiptree Jr.'s award-winning "Houston, Houston, Do You Read?
", which presents a female-only society after the extinction of men from disease. The society lacks stereotypically "male" problems such as war, but is stagnant. The women reproduce via cloning and consider men to be comical. Tiptree was a closeted bisexual woman writing secretly under a male pseudonym, and explored the sexual impulse as her main theme.
Other feminist utopias do not include lesbianism: Ursula K. Le Guin
's The Left Hand of Darkness
(1969) depicts trans-species
sexuality, in which individuals are neither "male" nor "female" but can have both male and female sexual organs and reproductive abilities, making them in some senses bisexual. In The Language of the Night, a collection of Le Guin's criticism, she admits to having "quite unnecessarily locked the Gethenians into heterosexuality ... the omission [of the homosexual option] implies that sexuality is heterosexuality. I regret this very much." Le Guin often explores alternative sexuality in her works, and has subsequently written many stories that examine the possibilities SF allows for non-traditional homosexuality, such as the bisexual bonding between clones in "Nine Lives
". Sexual themes and fluid genders also figure in the works of John Varley
, who came to prominence in the 1970s. Many of his stories contain mentions of same-sex love and gay and lesbian characters. In his "Eight Worlds
" suite of stories and novels, humanity has achieved the ability to change sex on a whim. Homophobia is shown to initially inhibit uptake of this technology, as in his story "Options", as it engenders drastic changes in relationships, with bisexuality eventually becoming the norm for society. His Gaea trilogy
features lesbian protagonists, and almost all the characters are to some degree bisexual.
Samuel R. Delany
was one of the first openly gay science fiction authors; in his earliest stories the gay sexual aspect appears as a "sensibility", rather than in overt sexual references. In some stories, such as Babel-17
(1966), same-sex love and same-sex intercourse are clearly implied but are given a kind of protective colouration because the protagonist is a woman who is involved in a three-person marriage with two men. The affection all three characters share for each other is in the forefront, and sexual activity between or among them is not directly described. In Dhalgren
(1975), his most famous science fiction novel, Delany peoples his large canvas with characters of a wide variety of sexualities. Once again, sexual activity is not the focus of the novel although there are some of the first explicitly described scenes of gay sex in SF and Delany depicts characters with a wide variety of motivations and behaviours.
Delany's Nebula
-winning short story "Aye, and Gomorrah
" posits the development of neutered human astronauts and then depicts the people who become sexually oriented toward them. By imagining a new gender and resultant sexual orientation, the story allows readers to reflect on the real world while maintaining an estranging distance. Further award winning stories featuring gay characters, such as "Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones
", were to follow, all collected in Delany's short story retrospective Aye, and Gomorrah, and other stories
. Delany faced censorship from book distribution companies for treatment of these topics. In later works, gay themes become increasingly central to Delany's works, attracting controversy, and some blur the line between science fiction and gay pornography.
Delany's SF series Return to Neveryon
was the first novel from a major US publisher to deal with the impact of AIDS
, and he later won the William Whitehead Memorial Award for lifetime achievement in gay and lesbian writing.
Other big name SF authors approached LGBT themes in individual works: In Time Enough for Love
(1973) by Robert A. Heinlein
, the main character argues strongly for the future liberty of homosexual sex, but sex for the purpose of procreation remains held as the ideal. The female bisexuality in Stranger in a Strange Land
(1961) has been described as mere titilation and male homosexuality in the same work was a "wrongness" deserving pity. Heinlein's use of sexuality is discussed in an essay entitled "The Embarrassments of Science Fiction" by SF writer Thomas Disch. Disch was publicly gay from 1968; this came out occasionally in his poetry and particularly in his novel On Wings of Song
(1979). His other major SF novels also contained bisexual characters: in his mosaic novel 334
, gay people are referred to as "republicans" in contrast to the straight "democrats". However, he did not try to write to a particular community: "I'm gay myself, but I don't write 'gay' literature."
Elizabeth Lynn
is an openly lesbian science fiction and fantasy writer who has written numerous works featuring positive gay protagonists. Her Chronicles of Tornor novels (1979–80), the first of which won the World Fantasy Award, were among the first fantasy
novels to have gay relationships as an unremarkable part of the cultural background, and included explicit and sympathetic depictions of same-sex love; the third novel is of particular lesbian interest. Her SF novel A Different Light (1978) featured a same-sex relationship between two men, and inspired the name of the LGBT bookstore and chain "A Different Light". The "magical lesbian tale" "The Woman Who Loved the Moon" also won a World Fantasy Award and is the title story in the Lynn's The Woman Who Loved the Moon, a collection also containing other gay speculative fiction stories.
, Geoff Ryman
, Nicola Griffith
and Melissa Scott. In the 1980s, blatant homophobia was no longer considered acceptable to most readers. However, depictions of unrealistic lesbians continue to propagate for the titillation of straight men in genre works. In the 1990s, stories depicting alternative sexualities experienced a resurgence.
Cyberpunk
, a genre arising in the mid 1980s, has been seen as heteronormative and masculine to a large extent, although feminist and "queer
" interpretations are mooted by some critics. Melissa Scott, a lesbian writer, has written several cyberpunk works that prominently feature LGBT characters, including Lambda-award winning Trouble and Her Friends
(1994) and Shadow Man (1995), the latter having also been inducted into the Gaylactic Spectrum Hall of Fame. Scott has reported that reviewers called some of these works "too gay" for mixing cyberpunk clichés with political themes. Many of Scott's other SF works also contain LGBT themes; she said that she chooses to write about gay themes using SF because these genres allow her to explore situations in which LGBT people are treated better or worse than in reality, and that it also gives an estranging distance for readers averse to such themes, who might otherwise feel accused of similar discriminatory practices as those in the books.
Uranian Worlds, by Eric Garber and Lyn Paleo, was compiled in 1983 and is an authoritative guide to science fiction literature featuring gay, lesbian, transgender, and related themes. The book covers science fiction literature published before 1990 (2nd edition, 1990), providing a short review and commentary on each piece.
A number of LGBT-themed anthologies of speculative short fiction have been published since the 1980s, the first being the science fiction-themed Kindred Spirits (1984), edited by Jeffrey M. Elliot. These anthologies often focus on particular sexual identities, such as the New Exploits of Lesbians series with titles in the fantasy (Magical lesbians, Fairy-tale lesbians) and horror (Twilight lesbians) areas. Others are grouped around particular genres, such as the award-winning Bending the Landscape
series edited by Nicola Griffith and Stephen Pagel, in which each of the three volumes focus upon science fiction, fantasy or horror; or the horror-oriented Queer Fear anthologies, edited by Michael Rowe
.
Gay characters became common enough that Diana Wynne Jones
' The Tough Guide to Fantasyland
contains an entry on gay mages as a fantasy cliche. Such characters are found in Mercedes Lackey
's works, such as the Lambda award winning The Last Herald Mage trilogy (1989), in which the protagonists are gay and have magical powers. Their relationships are an integral part of the story, which takes places in the fictional country
of Valdemar. Much of the extended series provides non-heterosexual role-models for younger readers.
David Gerrold
is an openly-gay science fiction writer with a number of LGBT themed works. The Man Who Folded Himself
examines the narcissistic love of a time-traveler who has gay orgies with alternate versions of himself, including female and lesbian versions. Gerrold's multi-award winning Jumping Off the Planet (2000) is the first book in a young adult series, in which a father kidnaps his three sons and goes to the moon; one son is gay, and rejected from college as he is ineligible for a scholarship available to straight people who agree to have their sexual orientation changed to prevent overpopulation. Gerrold received a Nebula award
for a semi-autobiographical short story "The Martian Child
" (1994), in which a gay man adopts a child. The story was later expanded to book length, and a feature film
was produced in which the protagonist was straight, causing criticism.
Geoff Ryman has produced a string of award-winning novels and short stories that prominently feature LGBT characters: The Child Garden
s (1989) protagonist cannot conform to the future society due to her resistance to genetic manipulation and her lesbian nature, which leads her into a relationship to a similarly outcast lesbian polar-bear. Lust follows a gay man who finds that his sexual fantasies are magically coming true. Was
(1992) includes a gay actor with AIDS and a mentally-challenged abused child, linked by their connection to The Wizard of Oz books
and film
.
In a Locus magazine interview Ryman claimed that the gay and SF genre markets are incompatible: “In 1990, if you had asked me which was the worst thing to be labeled as, gay or an SF writer, I'd have said gay: kills you stone-dead in the market. Then Was came out.... They had it in the gay section of bookstores and they had stuff in gay magazines, but they didn't say SF — at which point I realized that being a science fiction writer is worse than being gay."
The post-publication revelation that Dumbledore
, a secondary character in the Harry Potter series, was gay caused some controversy, in spite of his sexuality never having been shown in the books.
Tierra del Fuego, Colony Ship, by Caron Cro, is an adventure set in 2088 aboard the first colony ship with a mission to inhabit a distant planet. Lesbian characters include the ship's systems engineer, the primatologist, the coroner and an M.D. fertility specialist. The women use their expertise, along with their courage and athleticism, to save the ship from adversaries who believe the ship's bill of rights for animals, recognition of same sex partners, and population growth through randomly assigned embryos representing ethnicities of Earth represent affronts to their religions.
The Nightrunner Series, by Lynn Flewelling
, is a fantasy series about a spy/thief and his protégé who become embroiled in political intrigues and magical mysteries in the fictional land of Skala. The two main male characters, Seregil and Alec, eventually form a romantic relationship by the ending of the second book, Stalking Darkness
.
It's Always Spring Break Somewhere In The Galaxy, a comic science fiction adventure by Raven c.s. McCracken, features a rock and roll band made up of college-age technical prodigies who invent interstellar space travel. Two of the four main characters, Lisa and Christine, have an ongoing tangled romantic/sexual relationship throughout the book.
(CCA), which imposed de facto
censorship
on comics sold through news stands in the United States, forbade any suggestion of homosexuality. Artists had to drop subtle hints while not stating directly a character's orientation. Overt gay and lesbian themes were first found in underground and alternative
titles which did not carry the CCA's seal of approval.
The CCA came into being in response to Fredric Wertham's Seduction of the Innocent
, in which comic book creators were accused of attempting to negatively influence children with images of violence and sexuality, including subliminal homosexuality. Wertham claimed Wonder Woman's strength and independence made her a lesbian
, and stated that "The Batman type of story may stimulate children to homosexual fantasies."
In recent years the number of LGBT characters has increased greatly in mainstream superhero comics; however, LGBT characters continue to be relegated to supporting roles, and generate criticism for the treatment gay characters receive.
’s Northstar
was the first major gay character in the Marvel universe and remains the most famous gay character in mainstream comics. Created by Marvel comics
in 1979 as a member of the original Alpha Flight superhero team, Northstar's sexual identity was hinted at early in his history, in 1983 in issues 7 and 8 of Alpha Flight, but not openly stated; his apparent lack of interest in women was chalked up to his obsessive drive to win as a ski champion. The character was finally revealed to be gay in 1992's Alpha Flight issue 106 and his outing made national headlines.
In 2002, Marvel Comics
revived The Rawhide Kid in their Marvel MAX
imprint, introducing the first openly gay comic book character to star in his own magazine. The first edition of the Rawhide Kid’s gay saga was called Slap Leather. According to a CNN. com article, the character’s sexuality is conveyed indirectly, through euphemisms and puns, and the comic’s style is campy. Conservative groups quickly protested the gay take on the character and claimed that children would be corrupted by it, and the covers carried an "Adults only" label.
Marvel's policy had stated that all series emphasizing solo gay characters must carry an "Adults Only" label, in response to conservative protests. But in 2006, Marvel editor-in-chief Joe Quesada
claimed that this policy was no longer in force, and Marvel received GLAAD’s 2005 Best Comic Book Award for its superhero comic book Young Avengers
, which included gay characters but was published as a mainstream book with no warning label.
, a superhero debuting in 1941, is thought by some to be an early example, with his pink or transparent costume. Writer Roy Thomas penned thought balloons that suggested Firebrand had been involved in a gay relationship with his sidekick and bodyguard Slugger Dunn, although these hints never moved beyond subtext. A more modern example is the violent vigilante superhero Midnighter
. The Batman-like Midnighter was shown as being in a relationship with the Superman-like Apollo during their time as members of the superhero team The Authority. Midnighter and Apollo
are now married and have an adopted daughter — Midnighter has gone on to star in his own title. In 2006, DC Comics
could still draw widespread media attention by announcing a new, lesbian incarnation of the well-known character Batwoman
, even though openly lesbian minor characters such as Gotham City
police officer Renee Montoya
already existed in the franchise.
In addition to true LGBT characters, there has been controversy over various homosexual interpretations of the most famous superhero comic book characters. Batman
's relationship with Robin
has famously come under scrutiny, in spite of the majority of creators associated with the creator denying that the character is gay. Psychologist Fredric Wertham, who in Seduction of the Innocent asserted that "Batman stories are psychologically homosexual", claimed to find a "subtle atmosphere of homoeroticism which pervades the adventures of the mature 'Batman' and his young friend 'Robin'". It has also been claimed that Batman is interesting to gay audiences because "he was one of the first fictional characters to be attacked on the grounds of his presumed homosexuality," and "the 1960s TV series remains a touchstone of camp." Frank Miller
has described the relationship between Batman and the Joker as a "homophobic nightmare", he views the character as sublimating his sexual urges into crime fighting.
Some continue to play off the homosexual interpretations of Batman. One notable example occurred in 2000, when DC Comics refused to allow permission for the reprinting of four panels (from Batman #79, 92, 105 and 139) to illustrate Christopher York's paper All in the Family: Homophobia and Batman Comics in the 1950s. Another happened in the summer of 2005, when painter Mark Chamberlain displayed a number of watercolors depicting both Batman and Robin in suggestive and sexually explicit poses. DC threatened both artist and the Kathleen Cullen Fine Arts gallery with legal action if they did not cease selling the works and demanded all remaining art, as well as any profits derived from them.
and Yuri (also known as Boys' Love and Girls' Love, respectively, as well as Shōnen-ai and Shōjo-ai in the West, although these are not used in Japan due to pedophilic undertones) are Japanese genres which have homosexual romance themes, across a variety of media. Yaoi and yuri have spread beyond Japan: both translated and original yaoi and yuri is now available in many countries and languages. The characters of yaoi and yuri do not tend to self-identify as homosexual or bisexual. As with much manga and anime, SF and fantasy tropes and environments are common: For example Ai no Kusabi
, a 1980s yaoi light novel series described as a "magnum opus" of the Boys Love genre, involves a science fictional caste system. Simoun
has been described as being "a wonderful sci fi series" which does not have to rely on its yuri content to appeal to the audience.
Yaoi has been criticised for stereotypical and homophobic portrayals of its characters, and failing to address gay issues. Homophobia
, when it is presented as an issue at all, is used as a plot device to "heighten the drama", or to show the purity of the leads’ love. Matt Thorn has suggested that as BL is a romance narrative, having strong political themes may be a "turn off" to the readers. Critics state that the genre challenges heteronormativity via the "queer" bishōnen
.
There is also a style of manga called Bara
, which is typically written by gay men for a gay male adult audience. Bara often has more realistic themes than yaoi and is more likely to acknowledge homophobia and the taboo nature of homosexuality in Japan. While western commentators sometimes group bara and yaoi together, writers and fans consider them separate genres.
, but from the 1930s until 1968 the film industry in the US followed the Production Code
, a set of censorship guidelines written by a Jesuit
priest. The code spelled out what was morally acceptable
for a public audience; references to sexual "perversions" such as homosexuality were forbidden. Virtually all motion pictures produced in the United States adhered to the code, and similar censorship was common in other countries, for example an early version of the first lesbian vampire
film Dracula's Daughter
, a film described in The Celluloid Closet
as presenting "homosexuality as a predatory weakness", was rejected by the British Board of Film Censors in 1935, who said in part "...Dracula's Daughter would require half a dozen ... languages to adequately express its beastliness.". Horror author Anne Rice
has named Dracula's Daughter as a direct inspiration for her own homoerotic vampire fiction, naming a bar in her novel Queen of the Damned "Dracula's Daughter" in honor of the film.
Films produced under such censorship could only introduce homosexuality as a disguised undercurrent, and still flirted with controversy in doing so, such as in the cult horror film White Zombie
.
The less stringent rules of the post-Hayes film industry allowed sexuality to be more open, and cinema as a whole became more sexually explicit from the 1980s in particular, but aimed to purely to entertain rather than exploring underlying sexual dynamics. Much of the sex in speculative fiction film is merely intended to titillate; a review of fantasy films identified 10-15% as softcore pornography. but it remained rare to see gay characters in speculative fiction films. Horror films, that had sex as one of their major preoccupations, continued to be more leniently censored, due to the perception of being unserious and lightweight. Vampires in particular have been described as obvious erotic metaphors and as a result, numerous vampire films since the 1970s strongly imply or explicitly show lesbianism, following the inspiration of lesbian vampire
story Carmilla
. The prototypical hollywood vampire, Dracula
, was shown to be openly gay in the spoof film Does Dracula Suck? in 1969.
Gay genre films remain rare, and science fiction films' inclusion of gay characters continues to relegate them to supporting roles, such as the "stereotypical, limp-wristed, frantic homosexual" minor character in the 1996 blockbuster Independence Day
, a film whose main theme has been described as being the anxiety surrounding male friendships and homosexual panic. It is also interesting to note that the film's director, Roland Emmerich
, is openly gay. Still in this bleak panorama there are some curious cases like Cthulhu (2007) a horror/thriller film based on the works of H. P. Lovecraft
, in which the main character is gay but it isn't the main thing, although it is important in the development of the character's psychology. The film is plagued with monsters and disturbing happenings. Also, in V for Vendetta
there are two secondary characters - one gay, one lesbian - shown as victims of the totalitarian dystopia
.
LGBT characters began appearing on television with increasing frequency only in the 1990s. The Xena: Warrior Princess
fantasy television series introduced its main characters, Xena
and Gabrielle
, as close companions; fan speculation about lesbian overtones led to them becoming lesbian icons, although the lesbian content remained at the subtext
level. The series has been cited as "trail-blazing" and breaking down barriers, allowing the production of subsequent programming such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which introduced a number of LGBT characters. The most famous is the major character, Willow
and her partners Tara
and Kennedy. Although praised for their "healthy relationship" and being the first lesbian relationship between major characters on prime-time television, others criticised the use of witchcraft as a metaphor for lesbian sex. Tara's death directly after reconciliatory sex with Willow caused an outcry amongst the LGBT community, who saw it as a "homophobic cliché". Andrew Wells
, a recurring villain and eventual ally, was strongly implied to be gay, although closeted. The series was influential on subsequent television speculative fiction, including Torchwood. The series won a number of LGBT themed awards, and was regarded as groundbreaking in its portrayal of gay youth.
Torchwood
is a British science fiction drama television programme, part of the long-running Doctor Who
franchise, which began airing in 2006 on BBC Three
. The series explores several themes
in its narrative, in particular LGBT
themes. Various characters are portrayed as sexually fluid; through those characters, the series examines homosexual
and bisexual
relationships. Although the nature of their sexual flexibility is not explicitly discussed, the characters offer varying perspectives on orientation, with The Sun
describing all of the characters on Torchwood as bisexual.
Series creator Russell T Davies has said that he hopes to defy audience expectations of monosexual
characters: "Without making it political or dull, this is going to be a very bisexual programme. I want to knock down the barriers so we can't define which of the characters is gay. We need to start mixing things up, rather than thinking, 'This is a gay character and he'll only ever go off with men.'"
Davies has also described Jack Harkness
as omnisexual: "He'll shag anything with a hole. Jack doesn't categorise people: if he fancies you, he'll do it with you."
The inclusion of significant LGBT characters in modern speculative fiction television series has not been universal. For example the Star Trek
franchise's lack of same-sex relationships has long been a sore spot with LGBT fandom, some of whom have organised boycotts against the franchise to protest its failure to include LGBT characters. They also point out that Gene Roddenberry
had made statements in later life favourable to acceptance of homosexuality and the portrayal of same-sex relationships in Star Trek, but that the franchise's coverage has remained meagre.
Within the Star Trek canon
, there have been no officially recognized LGBT characters in the television spin-off
s. The International Review of Science Fiction ran a feature entitled "Prisoners of Dogma and Prejudice: Why There Are no G/L/B/T Characters in Star Trek: Deep Space 9" However, gender identity
has occasionally been treated as an "issue" within the new Star Trek series, to be dealt with as a theme in individual episodes, such as the 1995 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
episode "Rejoined", which was the first episode of the show to feature a same-sex relationship and romantic same-sex kiss between women. Subsequently, the Star Trek franchise has portrayed a few same-sex kisses, but always in the context of either the evil "mirror universe" ("The Emperor's New Cloak") or body possession ("Warlord
" and others), and often for comedic purposes between otherwise heterosexual characters. In a 2000 Fandom interview, Star Trek screenwriter Ronald D. Moore
suggested that the reason why no gay characters existed in the television franchise was because someone wanted it that way, and no amount of support from fans, cast or crew was going to make any difference. In recent years, a few of the Star Trek novels and comics, which are officially licensed but not considered canon
, have featured serious direct same-sex relationships, including portraying a minor canon character as gay.
- Kirk/Spock
being the earliest example. Slash cannot be commercially distributed due to copyright, and up until the 1990s was either undistributed or published in zine
s. With the advent of the internet, the slash fiction community of fans and writers began to cluster at sites such as fanfiction.net, and websites and fanzines dedicated to popular speculative fiction franchises such as X-files and Star Trek have become common. The use of characters from major SF franchises in "gay readings" has caused legal action: LucasFilm has sent cease and desist orders to prevent gay reinterpretations of Star Wars
characters, and Anne Rice is notorious for attempts to stop production of slash fiction based on her Vampire Chronicles characters, although many of the characters are bisexual in canon
. Slash fiction has been described as important to the LGBT community and the formation of queer identities, as it represents a resistance to the expectation of compulsory heterosexuality, but has also been noted as being unrepresentative of the gay community, being more a medium to express feminist dissatisfactions with SF. According to polls, most of slash fandom is made up of heterosexual women with a college degree. These demographics are older than the yaoi fans and they tend to be more easily disturbed about slash depicting underage sexuality, but this is becoming less true due to the popularity of Harry Potter
-inspired slash fiction.
Femslash
is a subgenre of slash fiction which focuses on romantic and/or sexual relationships between female fictional characters, Typically, characters featured in femslash are heterosexual in the canon universe; however, similar fan fiction about lesbian characters are commonly labeled as femslash for convenience. There is less femslash than there is slash based on male couples - it has been suggested that heterosexual female slash authors generally do not write femslash, and that it is rare to find a fandom with two sufficiently engaging female characters. Janeway/Seven is the main Star Trek femslash pairing, as only they have "an on-screen relationship fraught with deep emotional connection and conflict". There is debate about whether fanfiction about canon lesbians such as Willow and Tara of Buffy the Vampire Slayer counts as "slash", their relationship storylines are more coy than heterosexual ones, which entices Willow/Tara femslash authors to fill in the gaps in the known relationship storyline. It is "relatively recently" that male writers have begun writing femslash.
There has been a long history of tolerance of LGBT people in SF fandom. The presence of gay members was noted by attendees of early conventions, but generally not discussed — the idea that gay or lesbian members would seek recognition within the SF community was "unthinkable," and an accusation in the 1940s by a fanzine editor that the Los Angeles Science Fiction Association was "full of gay members" caused a scandal in fan circles. Prominent SF fan Forrest Ackerman is regarded as one of the first members of fandom to openly support the gay and lesbian movements. He was known for writing early lesbian fiction and aided in the publication of The Ladder, the journal of the recently formed lesbian group the Daughters of Bilitis
. He claims the group named him an honorary lesbian for his support, and to have pseudonymously written the earliest work of "lesbian SF" in 1947 in Vice Versa, the lesbian fanzine edited by Lisa Ben.
As the number of works featuring LGBT characters increased, so did the visibility of LGBT fans. At least as early as the 1980 Worldcon
(Noreascon Two
), there were gatherings of gay and gay-friendly members of the SF community, including Samuel R. Delany
, Marion Zimmer Bradley
and Melissa Scott. However, such meetings did not necessarily indicate whole-hearted acceptance within the fan community, and gay and lesbian fans were not regarded as a unified interest group. Informal gatherings at conferences and the attempted creation of a newsletter for LGBT fans drew little notice.
Networking between gay fans continued, finally coalescing at the 1986 Worldcon into a plan of action. This led to the first Gaylaxicon
science fiction convention
being held in 1988 and subsequently to the creation of the Gaylactic Network
and the Gaylactic Spectrum Awards
by the science fiction community
. Gay-themed discussions are now a staple at conventions such as WisCon
; for example, WisCon 30 featured a panel discussing "Why Women Write About Gay Men", and the 38th World Science Fiction Convention in Boston had a discussion panel entitled "The Closed Open Mind — Homophobia in Science Fiction and Fantasy Stories".
Other SF authors, such as Orson Scott Card
, have been criticised by the LGBT community for their works or opinions, which have been described as homophobic.
Some lesbian science fiction is targeted specifically to a lesbian audience, rather than science fiction fans, and published by small feminist or lesbian presses such as Bella Books
. A notable author writing science fiction published by lesbian presses is Katherine V. Forrest
.
A number of awards exist that recognise works at the intersection of LGBT and speculative fiction:
Collected in In a Glass Darkly
.
Collected in A Saucer of Loneliness
.
Collected in Her Smoke Rose Up Forever
.
Collected in The Wind's Twelve Quarters
.
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
, fantasy
Fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
, horror fiction
Horror fiction
Horror fiction also Horror fantasy is a philosophy of literature, which is intended to, or has the capacity to frighten its readers, inducing feelings of horror and terror. It creates an eerie atmosphere. Horror can be either supernatural or non-supernatural...
and related genres, which together constitute speculative fiction
Speculative fiction
Speculative fiction is an umbrella term encompassing the more fantastical fiction genres, specifically science fiction, fantasy, horror, supernatural fiction, superhero fiction, utopian and dystopian fiction, apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, and alternate history in literature as well as...
(SF). Such elements may include a lesbian
Lesbian
Lesbian is a term most widely used in the English language to describe sexual and romantic desire between females. The word may be used as a noun, to refer to women who identify themselves or who are characterized by others as having the primary attribute of female homosexuality, or as an...
, gay
Gay
Gay is a word that refers to a homosexual person, especially a homosexual male. For homosexual women the specific term is "lesbian"....
, bisexual, transsexual, or transgender
Transgender
Transgender is a general term applied to a variety of individuals, behaviors, and groups involving tendencies to vary from culturally conventional gender roles....
(LGBT
LGBT
LGBT is an initialism that collectively refers to "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" people. In use since the 1990s, the term "LGBT" is an adaptation of the initialism "LGB", which itself started replacing the phrase "gay community" beginning in the mid-to-late 1980s, which many within the...
) character as the protagonist or a major character, or exploration of varieties of sexual experience
Human sexual behavior
Human sexual activities or human sexual practices or human sexual behavior refers to the manner in which humans experience and express their sexuality. People engage in a variety of sexual acts from time to time, and for a wide variety of reasons...
that deviate from the conventional.
Science fiction and fantasy have traditionally been puritanical genres aimed at a male readership, and can be more restricted than non-genre literature by their conventions of characterisation and the effect that these conventions have on depictions of sexuality and gender. However, speculative fiction also gives authors and readers the freedom to imagine societies that are different from real-life cultures. This freedom makes speculative fiction a useful means of examining sexual bias, by forcing the reader to reconsider his or her heteronormative cultural assumptions. It has also been claimed that LGBT readers identify strongly with the mutant
Mutant (fictional)
The concept of a mutant is a common trope in comic books and science fiction. The new phenotypes that appear in fictional mutations generally go far beyond what is typically seen in biological mutants, and often result in the mutated life form exhibiting superhuman abilities or qualities.-Marvel...
s, aliens, and other outsider characters found in speculative fiction
Before the 1960s, explicit sexuality of any kind was rare in speculative fiction, as the editors who controlled what was published attempted to protect their perceived key market of adolescent male readers. As the readership broadened, it became possible to include characters who were undisguised homosexuals, though these tended to be villains, and lesbians remained almost entirely unrepresented. In the 1960s, science fiction and fantasy began to reflect the changes prompted by the civil rights movement
Civil rights movement
The civil rights movement was a worldwide political movement for equality before the law occurring between approximately 1950 and 1980. In many situations it took the form of campaigns of civil resistance aimed at achieving change by nonviolent forms of resistance. In some situations it was...
and the emergence of a counterculture
Counterculture
Counterculture is a sociological term used to describe the values and norms of behavior of a cultural group, or subculture, that run counter to those of the social mainstream of the day, the cultural equivalent of political opposition. Counterculture can also be described as a group whose behavior...
. New wave
New Wave (science fiction)
New Wave is a term applied to science fiction produced in the 1960s and 1970s and characterized by a high degree of experimentation, both in form and in content, a "literary" or artistic sensibility, and a focus on "soft" as opposed to hard science. The term "New Wave" is borrowed from the French...
and feminist science fiction
Feminist science fiction
Feminist science fiction is a sub-genre of science fiction which tends to deal with women's roles in society. Feminist science fiction poses questions about social issues such as how society constructs gender roles, the role reproduction plays in defining gender and the unequal political and...
authors realised cultures in which homosexuality, bisexuality and a variety of gender models were the norm, and in which sympathetic depictions of alternative sexuality were commonplace.
From the 1980s onwards, homosexuality gained much wider mainstream acceptance, and was often incorporated into otherwise conventional speculative fiction stories. Works emerged that went beyond simple representation of homosexuality to explorations of specific issues relevant to the LGBT community. This development was helped by the growing number of openly gay or lesbian authors and their early acceptance by speculative fiction fandom
Science fiction fandom
Science fiction fandom or SF fandom is a community or "fandom" of people actively interested in science fiction and fantasy and in contact with one another based upon that interest...
. Specialist gay publishing presses and a number of awards recognising LGBT achievements in the genre emerged, and by the twenty-first century blatant homophobia
Homophobia
Homophobia is a term used to refer to a range of negative attitudes and feelings towards lesbian, gay and in some cases bisexual, transgender people and behavior, although these are usually covered under other terms such as biphobia and transphobia. Definitions refer to irrational fear, with the...
was no longer considered acceptable by most readers of speculative fiction. There was a concurrent increase in representation of homosexuality within non-literary forms of speculative fiction. The inclusion of LGBT themes in comic books, television and film continues to attract media attention and controversy, while the perceived lack of sufficient representation, along with unrealistic depictions, provokes criticism from LGBT sources.
Critical analysis
Realism (arts)
Realism in the visual arts and literature refers to the general attempt to depict subjects "in accordance with secular, empirical rules", as they are considered to exist in third person objective reality, without embellishment or interpretation...
literature to imagine alternatives to the default assumptions of heterosexuality and masculinity that permeate many cultures. Homosexuality is now an accepted and common feature of science fiction and fantasy literature, its prevalence due to the influence of lesbian-feminist and gay liberation movements.
In speculative fiction, extrapolation allows writers to focus not on the way things are (or were), as non-genre literature does, but on the way things could be different. It provides science fiction with a quality that science fiction critic Darko Suvin
Darko Suvin
Darko Ronald Suvin, FRSC is a Yugoslav-born academic and critic of Jewish descendance, who became a Professor at McGill University in Montreal — now emeritus...
has called "cognitive
Cognition
In science, cognition refers to mental processes. These processes include attention, remembering, producing and understanding language, solving problems, and making decisions. Cognition is studied in various disciplines such as psychology, philosophy, linguistics, and computer science...
estrangement": the recognition that what we are reading is not the world as we know it, but a world whose differences force us to reconsider our own with an outsider's perspective. When the extrapolation involves sexuality or gender, it can force the reader to reconsider his or her heteronormative cultural assumptions; the freedom to imagine societies different from real-life cultures makes SF an effective tool for examining sexual bias. In science fiction, such estranging features include technologies that significantly alter sex or reproduction. In fantasy, such features include figures such as mythological
Mythology
The term mythology can refer either to the study of myths, or to a body or collection of myths. As examples, comparative mythology is the study of connections between myths from different cultures, whereas Greek mythology is the body of myths from ancient Greece...
deities and heroic archetypes, who are not limited by preconceptions of human sexuality and gender, allowing them to be reinterpreted. SF has also depicted a plethora of alien methods of reproduction and sex, some of which can be viewed as homo- or bisexual through a human binary-gender
Gender binary
The gender binary is the classification of sex and gender into two distinct and disconnected forms of masculine and feminine. It is one general type of a gender system. It can describe a social boundary that discourages people from crossing or mixing gender roles, or from creating other third ...
lens.
In spite of the freedom offered by the genres, gay characters often remain contrived and stereotypical, and most SF stories take for granted the continuation of heteronormative institutions. Alternative sexualities have usually been approached allegorically
Allegory
Allegory is a demonstrative form of representation explaining meaning other than the words that are spoken. Allegory communicates its message by means of symbolic figures, actions or symbolic representation...
, or by including LGBT characters in such a way as to not contradict mainstream society's assumptions about gender role
Gender role
Gender roles refer to the set of social and behavioral norms that are considered to be socially appropriate for individuals of a specific sex in the context of a specific culture, which differ widely between cultures and over time...
s. Works that feature gay characters are more likely to be written by women writers, and to be viewed as being aimed at other women or girls; big-name male writers are less prone to explore gay themes.
Speculative fiction has traditionally been "straight"; Samuel R. Delany has written that the science fiction community is predominantly made up of white male heterosexuals, but that the proportion of minorities, including gay people, is generally higher than found in a "literary" group. The inclusion of homosexuality in SF has been described in Science Fiction Culture as "sometimes lagging behind the general population, sometimes surging ahead". Nicola Griffith
Nicola Griffith
Nicola Griffith is a British science fiction author, editor and essayist. Griffith is a 1988 alumnus of the Michigan State University Clarion science fiction writing workshop and has won a Nebula Award, the James Tiptree, Jr Award, the World Fantasy Award and six Lambda Literary Awards. She also...
has written that LGBT readers tend to identify strongly with the outsider status of mutants, aliens, and characters who lead hidden or double lives in science fiction. In comparison, Geoff Ryman
Geoff Ryman
Geoffrey Charles Ryman is a writer of science fiction, fantasy and surrealistic or "slipstream" fiction.Ryman currently lectures in Creative Writing for University of Manchester's English Department. His most recent full-length novel, The King's Last Song, is set in Cambodia, both at the time of...
has claimed that the gay and SF genre markets are incompatible, with his books being marketed as one or the other, but never both, and David Seed said that SF purists have denied that SF that focuses on soft science fiction
Soft science fiction
Soft science fiction, or soft SF, like its complementary opposite hard science fiction, is a descriptive term that points to the role and nature of the science content in a science fiction story...
themes and marginalised groups (including "gay SF") is "real" science fiction. Gay and lesbian science fiction have at times been grouped as distinct subgenres of SF, and have some tradition of separate publishers and awards.
Proto-SF
True History
True History or True Story is a travel tale by the Greek-speaking Syrian author Lucian of Samosata, the earliest known fiction about travelling to outer space, alien life-forms and interplanetary warfare. Written in the 2nd century, the novel has been referred to as "the first known text that...
by the Greek writer Lucian
Lucian
Lucian of Samosata was a rhetorician and satirist who wrote in the Greek language. He is noted for his witty and scoffing nature.His ethnicity is disputed and is attributed as Assyrian according to Frye and Parpola, and Syrian according to Joseph....
(A.D. 120–185) has been called the earliest surviving example of science fiction and the first ever "gay science fiction story". The narrator is suddenly enveloped by a typhoon and swept up to the moon, which is inhabited by a society of men that are at war with the sun. After the hero distinguishes himself in combat, the king gives him his son the prince in marriage. The all male society reproduces (male children only) by giving birth from the thigh or by growing a child from a plant produced by planting the left testicle
Testicle
The testicle is the male gonad in animals. Like the ovaries to which they are homologous, testes are components of both the reproductive system and the endocrine system...
in the moon's soil.
In other proto-SF works, sex itself, of any type, was equated with base desires or "beastliness", as in Gulliver's Travels
Gulliver's Travels
Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World, in Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships, better known simply as Gulliver's Travels , is a novel by Anglo-Irish writer and clergyman Jonathan Swift that is both a satire on human nature and a parody of...
, which contrasts the animalistic and overtly sexual breasts with the reserved and intelligent Houyhnhnms. The frank treatment of sexual topics of pre-nineteenth century literature was abandoned in most speculative fiction, although Wendy Pearson has written that issues of gender and sexuality have been central to SF since its inception but were ignored by readers and critics until the late twentieth century. Early works that contained LGBT themes and showed the gay characters to be morally impure include the first lesbian vampire
Lesbian vampire
Lesbian vampirism is a trope in 20th century exploitation film that has its roots in Joseph Sheridan le Fanu's novella Carmilla about the predatory love of a female vampire for a young woman :...
story "Carmilla
Carmilla
Carmilla is a Gothic novella by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu. First published in 1872, it tells the story of a young woman's susceptibility to the attentions of a female vampire named Carmilla...
" (1872) by Sheridan Le Fanu
Sheridan Le Fanu
Joseph Thomas Sheridan Le Fanu was an Irish writer of Gothic tales and mystery novels. He was the leading ghost-story writer of the nineteenth century and was central to the development of the genre in the Victorian era....
and The Picture of Dorian Gray
The Picture of Dorian Gray
The Picture of Dorian Gray is the only published novel by Oscar Wilde, appearing as the lead story in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine on 20 June 1890, printed as the July 1890 issue of this magazine...
(1890) by Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde
Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish writer and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s...
, which shocked contemporary readers with its sensuality and overtly homosexual characters.
An Anglo-American Alliance
An Anglo-American Alliance
An Anglo-American Alliance: A Serio-Comic Romance and Forecast of the Future is a 1906 novel written and illustrated by Gregory Casparian and published by Mayflower Presses. A reviewer for io9 has called it "the first lesbian science fiction novel"....
, a 1906 novel by Gregory Casparian, was the first SF-themed novel to openly portray a lesbian romantic relationship.
The pulp era (1920–30s)
Pulp magazine
Pulp magazines , also collectively known as pulp fiction, refers to inexpensive fiction magazines published from 1896 through the 1950s. The typical pulp magazine was seven inches wide by ten inches high, half an inch thick, and 128 pages long...
era, explicit sexuality of any kind was rare in genre science fiction and fantasy. For many years, the editors who controlled what was published felt that they had to protect the adolescent male readership that they identified as their principal market. Although the covers of some 1930s pulp magazines showed scantily clad women menaced by tentacled aliens, the covers were often more lurid than the magazines' contents. In such a context, writers like Edgar Pangborn
Edgar Pangborn
Edgar Pangborn was an American mystery, historical, and science fiction author.-Life:Edgar Pangborn was born in New York City on February 25, 1909, to Harry Levi Pangborn, an attorney and dictionary editor, and Georgia Wood Pangborn, a noted writer of supernatural fiction...
, who featured passionate male friendships in his work, were exceptional; almost until the end of their careers, including so much as a kiss would have been too much. Implied or disguised sexuality was as important as that which was openly revealed. As such, genre SF reflected the social mores of the day, paralleling common prejudices; This was particularly true of pulp fiction, more so than literary works of the time.
As the demographics of the readership broadened, it became possible to include characters who were more or less undisguised homosexuals, but these, in accordance with the attitudes of the times, tended to be villains: evil, demented, or effeminate stereotypes. The most popular role for the homosexual was as a 'decadent slaveholding lordling' whose corrupt tyranny was doomed to be overthrown by the young male heterosexual hero. During this period, lesbians were almost entirely unrepresented as either heroes or villains.
One of the earliest examples of genre science fiction that involves a challenging amount of unconventional sexual activity is the early novel Odd John
Odd John
Odd John: A Story Between Jest and Earnest is a 1935 science fiction novel by the British author Olaf Stapledon. The novel explores the theme of the Übermensch in the character of John Wainwright, whose supernormal human mentality inevitably leads to conflict with normal human society and to the...
(1935), by Olaf Stapledon
Olaf Stapledon
William Olaf Stapledon was a British philosopher and author of several influential works of science fiction.-Life:...
. John is a mutant
Mutant (fictional)
The concept of a mutant is a common trope in comic books and science fiction. The new phenotypes that appear in fictional mutations generally go far beyond what is typically seen in biological mutants, and often result in the mutated life form exhibiting superhuman abilities or qualities.-Marvel...
with extraordinary mental abilities who will not allow himself to be bound by many of the rules imposed by the ordinary British society of his time. The novel strongly implies that he seduces an older boy who becomes devoted to him but also suffers from the affront that the relationship creates to his own morals.
The Golden Age (1940–50s)
Golden Age of Science Fiction
The first Golden Age of Science Fiction — often recognized as the period from the late 1930s through the 1950s — was an era during which the science fiction genre gained wide public attention and many classic science fiction stories were published...
, the genre "resolutely ignored the whole subject" of homosexuality, according to Joanna Russ. As the readership for science fiction and fantasy began to age in the 1950s, however, writers like Philip Jose Farmer
Philip José Farmer
Philip José Farmer was an American author, principally known for his award-winning science fiction and fantasy novels and short stories....
and Theodore Sturgeon
Theodore Sturgeon
Theodore Sturgeon was an American science fiction author.His most famous novel is More Than Human .-Biography:...
were able to introduce more explicit sexuality into their work. Until the late 1960s, however, few other writers depicted alternative sexuality or revised gender roles, or openly investigated sexual questions. The majority of LGBT characters were depicted as caricatures, such as "man-hating amazons", and attempts at portraying homosexuals sympathetically or non-stereotypically were met with hostility.
Sturgeon wrote many stories during the Golden Age of Science Fiction that emphasised the importance of love, regardless of the current social norms. In his short story "The World Well Lost
The World Well Lost
"The World Well Lost" is a science-fiction short story by Theodore Sturgeon, first published in the June 1953 issue of Universe. It has been reprinted several times, for instance in Sturgeon's collections E Pluribus Unicorn, Starshine, and A Saucer of Loneliness...
" (1953), first published in Universe magazine, homosexual alien fugitives and unrequited (and taboo) human homosexual love are portrayed. The tagline for the Universe cover was "[His] most daring story"; its sensitive treatment of homosexuality was unusual for science fiction published at that time, and it is now regarded as milestone in science fiction's portrayal of homosexuality. According to an anecdote related by Samuel R. Delany, when Sturgeon first submitted the story, the editor (John W. Campbell
John W. Campbell
John Wood Campbell, Jr. was an influential figure in American science fiction. As editor of Astounding Science Fiction , from late 1937 until his death, he is generally credited with shaping the so-called Golden Age of Science Fiction.Isaac Asimov called Campbell "the most powerful force in...
) not only rejected it but phoned every other editor he knew and urged them to reject it as well. Sturgeon would later write Affair with a Green Monkey, which examined social stereotyping of homosexuals, and in 1960 published Venus Plus X
Venus Plus X
Venus Plus X is a science fiction novel written by Theodore Sturgeon, published in 1960. David Pringle included it in his book Science Fiction: The 100 Best Novels....
, in which a single-gender society is depicted and the protagonist's homophobia portrayed unfavourably.
Images of homosexual male societies remained strongly negative in the eyes of most SF authors. For example, when overpopulation drives the world away from heterosexuality in Charles Beaumont
Charles Beaumont
Charles Beaumont was a prolific American author of speculative fiction, including short stories in the horror and science fiction subgenres. He is remembered as a writer of classic Twilight Zone episodes, such as "The Howling Man", "Miniature", and "Printer's Devil", but also penned the...
's short story "The Crooked Man" (1955), first published in Playboy
Playboy
Playboy is an American men's magazine that features photographs of nude women as well as journalism and fiction. It was founded in Chicago in 1953 by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother. The magazine has grown into Playboy Enterprises, Inc., with...
, inhumane homosexuals begin to oppress the heterosexual minority. In Anthony Burgess
Anthony Burgess
John Burgess Wilson – who published under the pen name Anthony Burgess – was an English author, poet, playwright, composer, linguist, translator and critic. The dystopian satire A Clockwork Orange is Burgess's most famous novel, though he dismissed it as one of his lesser works...
's The Wanting Seed
The Wanting Seed
The Wanting Seed is a dystopian novel by the English author Anthony Burgess, written in 1962.-Theme:Although the novel addresses many societal issues, the primary subject is overpopulation and its relation to culture. Religion, government, and history are also addressed...
(1962) homosexuality is required for official employment; Burgess treats this as one aspect of an unnatural state of affairs which includes violent warfare and the failing of the natural world.
Although not usually identified as a genre writer, William S. Burroughs
William S. Burroughs
William Seward Burroughs II was an American novelist, poet, essayist and spoken word performer. A primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodernist author, he is considered to be "one of the most politically trenchant, culturally influential, and innovative artists of the 20th...
produced works with a surreal narrative that estranged the action from the ordinary world as science fiction and fantasy do. In 1959 he published Naked Lunch
Naked Lunch
Naked Lunch is a novel by William S. Burroughs originally published in 1959. The book is structured as a series of loosely-connected vignettes. Burroughs stated that the chapters are intended to be read in any order...
, the first of many works such as The Nova Trilogy
The Nova Trilogy
The Nova Trilogy, The Nova Epic or The Cut-up Trilogy is a name commonly given by critics to a series of three experimental prose novels by William S. Burroughs...
and The Wild Boys
The Wild Boys (novel)
The Wild Boys is a novel written by Beat Generation author William S. Burroughs. It was first published in 1971 by Grove Press.-Introduction:...
in which he linked drug use and homosexuality as anti-authoritarian activities.
The New Wave era (1960–70s)
By the late 1960s, science fiction and fantasy began to reflect the changes prompted by the civil rights movement and the emergence of a counterculture. Within the genres, these changes were incorporated into a movement called "the New WaveNew Wave (science fiction)
New Wave is a term applied to science fiction produced in the 1960s and 1970s and characterized by a high degree of experimentation, both in form and in content, a "literary" or artistic sensibility, and a focus on "soft" as opposed to hard science. The term "New Wave" is borrowed from the French...
," a movement more sceptical of technology, more liberated socially, and more interested in stylistic experimentation. New Wave writers were more likely to claim an interest in "inner space" instead of outer space. They were less shy about explicit sexuality and more sympathetic to reconsiderations of gender roles and the social status of sexual minorities. Under the influence of New Wave editors and authors such as Michael Moorcock
Michael Moorcock
Michael John Moorcock is an English writer, primarily of science fiction and fantasy, who has also published a number of literary novels....
(editor of the influential New Worlds
New Worlds (magazine)
New Worlds was a British science fiction magazine which was first published professionally in 1946. For 25 years it was widely considered the leading science fiction magazine in Britain, publishing 201 issues up to 1971...
), sympathetic depictions of alternative sexuality and gender multiplied in science fiction and fantasy, becoming commonplace. The introduction of gay imagery has also been attributed to the influence of lesbian-feminist and gay liberation movements in the 1960s. In the 1970s, lesbians and gay men became a more visible presence in the SF community and as writers; notable gay authors included Joanna Russ
Joanna Russ
Joanna Russ was an American writer, academic and feminist. She is the author of a number of works of science fiction, fantasy and feminist literary criticism such as How to Suppress Women's Writing, as well as a contemporary novel, On Strike Against God, and one children's book, Kittatinny...
, Thomas M. Disch
Thomas M. Disch
Thomas Michael Disch was an American science fiction author and poet. He won the Hugo Award for Best Related Book – previously called "Best Non-Fiction Book" – in 1999, and he had two other Hugo nominations and nine Nebula Award nominations to his credit, plus one win of the John W...
and Samuel R. Delany
Samuel R. Delany
Samuel Ray Delany, Jr., also known as "Chip" is an American author, professor and literary critic. His work includes a number of novels, many in the science fiction genre, as well as memoir, criticism, and essays on sexuality and society.His science fiction novels include Babel-17, The Einstein...
.
Feminist SF authors imagined cultures in which homo- and bisexuality and a variety of gender models were the norm. Joanna Russ
Joanna Russ
Joanna Russ was an American writer, academic and feminist. She is the author of a number of works of science fiction, fantasy and feminist literary criticism such as How to Suppress Women's Writing, as well as a contemporary novel, On Strike Against God, and one children's book, Kittatinny...
's The Female Man
The Female Man
The Female Man is a feminist science fiction novel written by Joanna Russ. It was originally written in 1970 and first published in 1975. Russ was an avid feminist and challenged sexist views during the 1970s with her novels, short stories, and nonfiction works...
(1975) and the award winning story "When It Changed
When It Changed
"When It Changed" is a science fiction short story by Joanna Russ. It was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Short Story 1973, and won the Nebula Award for Best Short Story in 1972. It was included in Harlan Ellison's anthology Again, Dangerous Visions....
", showing a female-only lesbian society that flourished without men, were enormously influential. Russ is largely responsible for introducing radical lesbian feminism into science fiction; she has stated that being openly lesbian was bad for her career and sales. Similar themes are explored in James Tiptree Jr.'s award-winning "Houston, Houston, Do You Read?
Houston, Houston, Do You Read?
"Houston, Houston, Do You Read?" is a novella by James Tiptree, Jr. . It won a Nebula Award for Best Novella in 1976 and a Hugo Award for Best Novella in 1977....
", which presents a female-only society after the extinction of men from disease. The society lacks stereotypically "male" problems such as war, but is stagnant. The women reproduce via cloning and consider men to be comical. Tiptree was a closeted bisexual woman writing secretly under a male pseudonym, and explored the sexual impulse as her main theme.
Other feminist utopias do not include lesbianism: Ursula K. Le Guin
Ursula K. Le Guin
Ursula Kroeber Le Guin is an American author. She has written novels, poetry, children's books, essays, and short stories, notably in fantasy and science fiction...
's The Left Hand of Darkness
The Left Hand of Darkness
The Left Hand of Darkness is a 1969 science fiction novel by Ursula K. Le Guin. It is part of the Hainish Cycle, a series of books by Le Guin all set in the fictional Hainish universe....
(1969) depicts trans-species
Species
In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biological classification and a taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring. While in many cases this definition is adequate, more precise or differing measures are...
sexuality, in which individuals are neither "male" nor "female" but can have both male and female sexual organs and reproductive abilities, making them in some senses bisexual. In The Language of the Night, a collection of Le Guin's criticism, she admits to having "quite unnecessarily locked the Gethenians into heterosexuality ... the omission [of the homosexual option] implies that sexuality is heterosexuality. I regret this very much." Le Guin often explores alternative sexuality in her works, and has subsequently written many stories that examine the possibilities SF allows for non-traditional homosexuality, such as the bisexual bonding between clones in "Nine Lives
Nine Lives (novelette)
"Nine Lives" is a 1969 science fiction novelette by Ursula K. Le Guin. Originally published in Playboy magazine, it was reprinted in The Wind's Twelve Quarters, the story is about what human cloning does to one's perception of the self, and among other things explores bisexual bonding between...
". Sexual themes and fluid genders also figure in the works of John Varley
John Varley (author)
John Herbert Varley is an American science fiction author.-Biography:Varley grew up in Fort Worth, Texas, moved to Port Arthur in 1957, and graduated from Nederland High School. He went to Michigan State University on a National Merit Scholarship because, of the schools that he could afford, it...
, who came to prominence in the 1970s. Many of his stories contain mentions of same-sex love and gay and lesbian characters. In his "Eight Worlds
Eight Worlds
Eight Worlds refers to a series of novels and short stories by John Varley, in which the solar system has been colonized by human refugees fleeing an alien invasion of the Earth. Earth and Jupiter are off-limits to humanity, but Earth's moon and the other worlds and moons of the solar system have...
" suite of stories and novels, humanity has achieved the ability to change sex on a whim. Homophobia is shown to initially inhibit uptake of this technology, as in his story "Options", as it engenders drastic changes in relationships, with bisexuality eventually becoming the norm for society. His Gaea trilogy
Gaea trilogy
The Gaea Trilogy consists of three science fiction novels by John Varley. The stories tell of humanity's encounter with a living being in the shape of a 1,300 km diameter space habitat, inhabited by many different species, most notably Titanides, in orbit around the planet Saturn.The novels...
features lesbian protagonists, and almost all the characters are to some degree bisexual.
Samuel R. Delany
Samuel Ray Delany, Jr., also known as "Chip" is an American author, professor and literary critic. His work includes a number of novels, many in the science fiction genre, as well as memoir, criticism, and essays on sexuality and society.His science fiction novels include Babel-17, The Einstein...
was one of the first openly gay science fiction authors; in his earliest stories the gay sexual aspect appears as a "sensibility", rather than in overt sexual references. In some stories, such as Babel-17
Babel-17
Babel-17 is a 1966 science fiction novel by American writer Samuel R. Delany in which the Sapir–Whorf Hypothesis plays an important part...
(1966), same-sex love and same-sex intercourse are clearly implied but are given a kind of protective colouration because the protagonist is a woman who is involved in a three-person marriage with two men. The affection all three characters share for each other is in the forefront, and sexual activity between or among them is not directly described. In Dhalgren
Dhalgren
Dhalgren is a science fiction novel by Samuel R. Delany. The story begins with a cryptic passage:to wound the autumnal city.So howled out for the world to give him a name.The in-dark answered with wind....
(1975), his most famous science fiction novel, Delany peoples his large canvas with characters of a wide variety of sexualities. Once again, sexual activity is not the focus of the novel although there are some of the first explicitly described scenes of gay sex in SF and Delany depicts characters with a wide variety of motivations and behaviours.
Delany's Nebula
Nebula
A nebula is an interstellar cloud of dust, hydrogen gas, helium gas and other ionized gases...
-winning short story "Aye, and Gomorrah
Aye, and Gomorrah
"Aye, and Gomorrah..." is a famous science fiction short story by Samuel R. Delany. It is Delany's first sold short story, and won the 1967 Nebula Award for best short story. Before it appeared in Driftglass and Aye, and Gomorrah, and other stories, it was first published as the closing tale in...
" posits the development of neutered human astronauts and then depicts the people who become sexually oriented toward them. By imagining a new gender and resultant sexual orientation, the story allows readers to reflect on the real world while maintaining an estranging distance. Further award winning stories featuring gay characters, such as "Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones
Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones
"Time Considered as a Helix of Semi-Precious Stones" is a science fiction short story by Samuel R. Delany. It won the Hugo Award for Best Short Story 1970, and the Nebula Award for Best Novelette in 1969.-Plot summary:...
", were to follow, all collected in Delany's short story retrospective Aye, and Gomorrah, and other stories
Aye, and Gomorrah, and other stories
Aye, and Gomorrah, and other stories, by Samuel R. Delany is a thematically arranged collection, in the style of James Joyce’s Dubliners , Sherwood Anderson’s Winesburg, Ohio , and Willa Cather’s Youth and the Bright Medusa . Also, for all practical purposes, it is Delany’s collected science...
. Delany faced censorship from book distribution companies for treatment of these topics. In later works, gay themes become increasingly central to Delany's works, attracting controversy, and some blur the line between science fiction and gay pornography.
Delany's SF series Return to Neveryon
Return to Nevèrÿon
Return to Nevèrÿon collects three sword and sorcery stories by Samuel R. Delany, along with an appendix: "The Game of Time and Pain," "The Tale of Rumor and Desire," and "The Tale of Gorgik," and "Appendix: Closures and Openings." It is the last of the four-volume Return to Nevèrÿon series...
was the first novel from a major US publisher to deal with the impact of AIDS
AIDS
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome is a disease of the human immune system caused by the human immunodeficiency virus...
, and he later won the William Whitehead Memorial Award for lifetime achievement in gay and lesbian writing.
Other big name SF authors approached LGBT themes in individual works: In Time Enough for Love
Time Enough for Love
Time Enough for Love is a science fiction novel by Robert A. Heinlein, first published in 1973. The work was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1973 and both the Hugo and Locus Awards in 1974.-Plot:...
(1973) by Robert A. Heinlein
Robert A. Heinlein
Robert Anson Heinlein was an American science fiction writer. Often called the "dean of science fiction writers", he was one of the most influential and controversial authors of the genre. He set a standard for science and engineering plausibility and helped to raise the genre's standards of...
, the main character argues strongly for the future liberty of homosexual sex, but sex for the purpose of procreation remains held as the ideal. The female bisexuality in Stranger in a Strange Land
Stranger in a Strange Land
Stranger in a Strange Land is a 1961 science fiction novel by American author Robert A. Heinlein. It tells the story of Valentine Michael Smith, a human who comes to Earth in early adulthood after being born on the planet Mars and raised by Martians. The novel explores his interaction with—and...
(1961) has been described as mere titilation and male homosexuality in the same work was a "wrongness" deserving pity. Heinlein's use of sexuality is discussed in an essay entitled "The Embarrassments of Science Fiction" by SF writer Thomas Disch. Disch was publicly gay from 1968; this came out occasionally in his poetry and particularly in his novel On Wings of Song
On Wings of Song
On Wings of Song is a 1979 science fiction novel by Thomas M. Disch. It was first published as a serial in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction in three installments in February to April 1979....
(1979). His other major SF novels also contained bisexual characters: in his mosaic novel 334
334 (novel)
334 is a science fiction novel by American author Thomas M. Disch, written in 1972. It is a dystopian look at everyday life in New York City around the year 2025.-Title:...
, gay people are referred to as "republicans" in contrast to the straight "democrats". However, he did not try to write to a particular community: "I'm gay myself, but I don't write 'gay' literature."
Elizabeth Lynn
Elizabeth A. Lynn
Elizabeth A. Lynn is a US writer most known for fantasy and to a lesser extent science fiction. She is particularly known for being one of the first writers in science fiction or fantasy to introduce gay and lesbian characters; in honor of Lynn, the GLBT bookstore "A Different Light" took its...
is an openly lesbian science fiction and fantasy writer who has written numerous works featuring positive gay protagonists. Her Chronicles of Tornor novels (1979–80), the first of which won the World Fantasy Award, were among the first fantasy
Fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
novels to have gay relationships as an unremarkable part of the cultural background, and included explicit and sympathetic depictions of same-sex love; the third novel is of particular lesbian interest. Her SF novel A Different Light (1978) featured a same-sex relationship between two men, and inspired the name of the LGBT bookstore and chain "A Different Light". The "magical lesbian tale" "The Woman Who Loved the Moon" also won a World Fantasy Award and is the title story in the Lynn's The Woman Who Loved the Moon, a collection also containing other gay speculative fiction stories.
Modern SF (post New Wave)
After the pushing back of boundaries in the 1960s and 70s, homosexuality gained much wider acceptance, and was often incorporated into otherwise conventional SF stories with little comment. This was helped by the growing number of openly gay or lesbian authors, such as David GerroldDavid Gerrold
Jerrold David Friedman , better known by his pen name David Gerrold, is an American science fiction author who started his career in 1966 while a college student by submitting an unsolicited story outline for the television series Star Trek. He was invited to submit several premises, and the one...
, Geoff Ryman
Geoff Ryman
Geoffrey Charles Ryman is a writer of science fiction, fantasy and surrealistic or "slipstream" fiction.Ryman currently lectures in Creative Writing for University of Manchester's English Department. His most recent full-length novel, The King's Last Song, is set in Cambodia, both at the time of...
, Nicola Griffith
Nicola Griffith
Nicola Griffith is a British science fiction author, editor and essayist. Griffith is a 1988 alumnus of the Michigan State University Clarion science fiction writing workshop and has won a Nebula Award, the James Tiptree, Jr Award, the World Fantasy Award and six Lambda Literary Awards. She also...
and Melissa Scott. In the 1980s, blatant homophobia was no longer considered acceptable to most readers. However, depictions of unrealistic lesbians continue to propagate for the titillation of straight men in genre works. In the 1990s, stories depicting alternative sexualities experienced a resurgence.
Cyberpunk
Cyberpunk
Cyberpunk is a postmodern and science fiction genre noted for its focus on "high tech and low life." The name is a portmanteau of cybernetics and punk, and was originally coined by Bruce Bethke as the title of his short story "Cyberpunk," published in 1983...
, a genre arising in the mid 1980s, has been seen as heteronormative and masculine to a large extent, although feminist and "queer
Queer theory
Queer theory is a field of critical theory that emerged in the early 1990s out of the fields of LGBT studies and feminist studies. Queer theory includes both queer readings of texts and the theorisation of 'queerness' itself...
" interpretations are mooted by some critics. Melissa Scott, a lesbian writer, has written several cyberpunk works that prominently feature LGBT characters, including Lambda-award winning Trouble and Her Friends
Trouble and Her Friends
Trouble and Her Friends is a science fiction novel by Melissa Scott, first published in 1994. It is set in the United States of America sometime in the near future, and tells the story of India Carless, who goes by the name "Trouble" in her life as a criminal hacker, and her ex-lover Cerise...
(1994) and Shadow Man (1995), the latter having also been inducted into the Gaylactic Spectrum Hall of Fame. Scott has reported that reviewers called some of these works "too gay" for mixing cyberpunk clichés with political themes. Many of Scott's other SF works also contain LGBT themes; she said that she chooses to write about gay themes using SF because these genres allow her to explore situations in which LGBT people are treated better or worse than in reality, and that it also gives an estranging distance for readers averse to such themes, who might otherwise feel accused of similar discriminatory practices as those in the books.
Uranian Worlds, by Eric Garber and Lyn Paleo, was compiled in 1983 and is an authoritative guide to science fiction literature featuring gay, lesbian, transgender, and related themes. The book covers science fiction literature published before 1990 (2nd edition, 1990), providing a short review and commentary on each piece.
A number of LGBT-themed anthologies of speculative short fiction have been published since the 1980s, the first being the science fiction-themed Kindred Spirits (1984), edited by Jeffrey M. Elliot. These anthologies often focus on particular sexual identities, such as the New Exploits of Lesbians series with titles in the fantasy (Magical lesbians, Fairy-tale lesbians) and horror (Twilight lesbians) areas. Others are grouped around particular genres, such as the award-winning Bending the Landscape
Bending the Landscape
Bending the Landscape is the title of an award-winning series of LGBT-themed anthologies of short speculative fiction edited by Nicola Griffin and Stephen Pagel. Three books were produced, subtitled Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror, between 1997 and 2002.The editors asked contributors to...
series edited by Nicola Griffith and Stephen Pagel, in which each of the three volumes focus upon science fiction, fantasy or horror; or the horror-oriented Queer Fear anthologies, edited by Michael Rowe
Michael Rowe
Michael "Mike" Rowe is a television writer, producer and comedian. He has written for Becker, The Nanny, Futurama and Family Guy, as well as writing the episode of The PJs, "A Race to His Credit".-Becker episodes:...
.
Gay characters became common enough that Diana Wynne Jones
Diana Wynne Jones
Diana Wynne Jones was a British writer, principally of fantasy novels for children and adults, as well as a small amount of non-fiction...
' The Tough Guide to Fantasyland
The Tough Guide To Fantasyland
The Tough Guide To Fantasyland is a book by Diana Wynne Jones that humorously examines the common tropes of a broad swathe of fantasy fiction. It was nominated for both a Hugo award and a World Fantasy Award....
contains an entry on gay mages as a fantasy cliche. Such characters are found in Mercedes Lackey
Mercedes Lackey
Mercedes "Misty" Lackey is a best-selling American author of fantasy novels. Many of her novels and trilogies are interlinked and set in the world of Velgarth, mostly in and around the country of Valdemar...
's works, such as the Lambda award winning The Last Herald Mage trilogy (1989), in which the protagonists are gay and have magical powers. Their relationships are an integral part of the story, which takes places in the fictional country
Fictional country
A fictional country is a country that is made up for fictional stories, and does not exist in real life, or one that people believe in without proof....
of Valdemar. Much of the extended series provides non-heterosexual role-models for younger readers.
David Gerrold
David Gerrold
Jerrold David Friedman , better known by his pen name David Gerrold, is an American science fiction author who started his career in 1966 while a college student by submitting an unsolicited story outline for the television series Star Trek. He was invited to submit several premises, and the one...
is an openly-gay science fiction writer with a number of LGBT themed works. The Man Who Folded Himself
The Man Who Folded Himself
The Man Who Folded Himself is a 1973 science fiction novel by David Gerrold that deals with time travel. It was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1973 and the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1974...
examines the narcissistic love of a time-traveler who has gay orgies with alternate versions of himself, including female and lesbian versions. Gerrold's multi-award winning Jumping Off the Planet (2000) is the first book in a young adult series, in which a father kidnaps his three sons and goes to the moon; one son is gay, and rejected from college as he is ineligible for a scholarship available to straight people who agree to have their sexual orientation changed to prevent overpopulation. Gerrold received a Nebula award
Nebula Award
The Nebula Award is given each year by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America , for the best science fiction/fantasy fiction published in the United States during the previous year...
for a semi-autobiographical short story "The Martian Child
The Martian Child
"The Martian Child" is a novelette by David Gerrold. It won the 1995 Hugo Award for Best Novelette, Locus Award and HOMer Award and the 1994 Nebula Award for Best Novelette, and was nominated for the Theodore Sturgeon award for best short fiction...
" (1994), in which a gay man adopts a child. The story was later expanded to book length, and a feature film
Martian Child
Martian Child is a 2007 American comedy-drama film about a writer who adopts a strange young boy who believes himself to be from Mars. Martian Child was released on November 2, 2007. The film was directed by Menno Meyjes and produced by New Line Cinema. It stars John Cusack and Bobby Coleman...
was produced in which the protagonist was straight, causing criticism.
Geoff Ryman has produced a string of award-winning novels and short stories that prominently feature LGBT characters: The Child Garden
The Child Garden
The Child Garden is a 1989 science fiction novel by Geoff Ryman. It won both the Arthur C. Clarke Award and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award in 1990....
s (1989) protagonist cannot conform to the future society due to her resistance to genetic manipulation and her lesbian nature, which leads her into a relationship to a similarly outcast lesbian polar-bear. Lust follows a gay man who finds that his sexual fantasies are magically coming true. Was
Was (novel)
Was is a WFA nominated 1992 parallel novel by Geoff Ryman focussing on the lives of disparate individuals linked to one another by L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, and the musical film version...
(1992) includes a gay actor with AIDS and a mentally-challenged abused child, linked by their connection to The Wizard of Oz books
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is a children's novel written by L. Frank Baum and illustrated by W. W. Denslow. Originally published by the George M. Hill Company in Chicago on May 17, 1900, it has since been reprinted numerous times, most often under the name The Wizard of Oz, which is the name of...
and film
The Wizard of Oz (1939 film)
The Wizard of Oz is a 1939 American musical fantasy film produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was directed primarily by Victor Fleming. Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson and Edgar Allan Woolf received credit for the screenplay, but there were uncredited contributions by others. The lyrics for the songs...
.
In a Locus magazine interview Ryman claimed that the gay and SF genre markets are incompatible: “In 1990, if you had asked me which was the worst thing to be labeled as, gay or an SF writer, I'd have said gay: kills you stone-dead in the market. Then Was came out.... They had it in the gay section of bookstores and they had stuff in gay magazines, but they didn't say SF — at which point I realized that being a science fiction writer is worse than being gay."
The post-publication revelation that Dumbledore
Albus Dumbledore
Professor Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore is a major character in J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter series. For most of the series, he is the headmaster of the wizarding school Hogwarts...
, a secondary character in the Harry Potter series, was gay caused some controversy, in spite of his sexuality never having been shown in the books.
Tierra del Fuego, Colony Ship, by Caron Cro, is an adventure set in 2088 aboard the first colony ship with a mission to inhabit a distant planet. Lesbian characters include the ship's systems engineer, the primatologist, the coroner and an M.D. fertility specialist. The women use their expertise, along with their courage and athleticism, to save the ship from adversaries who believe the ship's bill of rights for animals, recognition of same sex partners, and population growth through randomly assigned embryos representing ethnicities of Earth represent affronts to their religions.
The Nightrunner Series, by Lynn Flewelling
Lynn Flewelling
Lynn Flewelling is a fantasy fiction author, best known for two internationally acclaimed fantasy series: the Nightrunner books and Tamír Triad.-Biography:...
, is a fantasy series about a spy/thief and his protégé who become embroiled in political intrigues and magical mysteries in the fictional land of Skala. The two main male characters, Seregil and Alec, eventually form a romantic relationship by the ending of the second book, Stalking Darkness
Stalking Darkness
Stalking Darkness is the second book in Lynn Flewelling's Nightrunner series. It is preceded by Luck in the Shadows and followed by Traitor's Moon, Shadows Return and The White Road....
.
It's Always Spring Break Somewhere In The Galaxy, a comic science fiction adventure by Raven c.s. McCracken, features a rock and roll band made up of college-age technical prodigies who invent interstellar space travel. Two of the four main characters, Lisa and Christine, have an ongoing tangled romantic/sexual relationship throughout the book.
Comics and manga
For much of the 20th century, gay relationships were discouraged from being shown in comics which were seen mainly as directed towards children. Until 1989, the Comics Code AuthorityComics Code Authority
The Comics Code Authority was a body created as part of the Comics Magazine Association of America, as a tool for the comics-publishing industry to self-regulate the content of comic books in the United States. Member publishers submitted comic books to the CCA, which screened them for adherence to...
(CCA), which imposed de facto
De facto
De facto is a Latin expression that means "concerning fact." In law, it often means "in practice but not necessarily ordained by law" or "in practice or actuality, but not officially established." It is commonly used in contrast to de jure when referring to matters of law, governance, or...
censorship
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
on comics sold through news stands in the United States, forbade any suggestion of homosexuality. Artists had to drop subtle hints while not stating directly a character's orientation. Overt gay and lesbian themes were first found in underground and alternative
Alternative comics
Alternative comics defines a range of American comics that have appeared since the 1980s, following the underground comix movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Alternative comics present an alternative to "mainstream" superhero comics which in the past have dominated the US comic book industry...
titles which did not carry the CCA's seal of approval.
The CCA came into being in response to Fredric Wertham's Seduction of the Innocent
Seduction of the Innocent
Seduction of the Innocent is a book by German-American psychiatrist Fredric Wertham, published in 1954, that warned that comic books were a negative form of popular literature and a serious cause of juvenile delinquency. The book was a minor bestseller that created alarm in parents and galvanized...
, in which comic book creators were accused of attempting to negatively influence children with images of violence and sexuality, including subliminal homosexuality. Wertham claimed Wonder Woman's strength and independence made her a lesbian
Lesbian
Lesbian is a term most widely used in the English language to describe sexual and romantic desire between females. The word may be used as a noun, to refer to women who identify themselves or who are characterized by others as having the primary attribute of female homosexuality, or as an...
, and stated that "The Batman type of story may stimulate children to homosexual fantasies."
In recent years the number of LGBT characters has increased greatly in mainstream superhero comics; however, LGBT characters continue to be relegated to supporting roles, and generate criticism for the treatment gay characters receive.
Marvel
Alpha FlightAlpha Flight
Alpha Flight is a fictional superhero team published by Marvel Comics, noteworthy for being one of the few Canadian superhero teams. Created by John Byrne, the team first appeared in Uncanny X-Men #120 ....
’s Northstar
Northstar
Northstar is a fictional character, a superhero who appears in comic books published by Marvel Comics. He is the twin brother of Aurora. Through his mutation, Northstar gains superhuman powers, which he uses for the betterment of society...
was the first major gay character in the Marvel universe and remains the most famous gay character in mainstream comics. Created by Marvel comics
Marvel Comics
Marvel Worldwide, Inc., commonly referred to as Marvel Comics and formerly Marvel Publishing, Inc. and Marvel Comics Group, is an American company that publishes comic books and related media...
in 1979 as a member of the original Alpha Flight superhero team, Northstar's sexual identity was hinted at early in his history, in 1983 in issues 7 and 8 of Alpha Flight, but not openly stated; his apparent lack of interest in women was chalked up to his obsessive drive to win as a ski champion. The character was finally revealed to be gay in 1992's Alpha Flight issue 106 and his outing made national headlines.
In 2002, Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics
Marvel Worldwide, Inc., commonly referred to as Marvel Comics and formerly Marvel Publishing, Inc. and Marvel Comics Group, is an American company that publishes comic books and related media...
revived The Rawhide Kid in their Marvel MAX
MAX (comics)
MAX is an imprint of Marvel Comics aimed at a niche 'adults only' audience, launched in 2001 after Marvel broke with the Comics Code Authority and established its own rating system...
imprint, introducing the first openly gay comic book character to star in his own magazine. The first edition of the Rawhide Kid’s gay saga was called Slap Leather. According to a CNN. com article, the character’s sexuality is conveyed indirectly, through euphemisms and puns, and the comic’s style is campy. Conservative groups quickly protested the gay take on the character and claimed that children would be corrupted by it, and the covers carried an "Adults only" label.
Marvel's policy had stated that all series emphasizing solo gay characters must carry an "Adults Only" label, in response to conservative protests. But in 2006, Marvel editor-in-chief Joe Quesada
Joe Quesada
Joseph "Joe" Quesada is an American comic book editor, writer and artist. He became known in the 1990s for his work on various Valiant Comics books, such as Ninjak and Solar, Man of the Atom...
claimed that this policy was no longer in force, and Marvel received GLAAD’s 2005 Best Comic Book Award for its superhero comic book Young Avengers
Young Avengers
Young Avengers is an American comic book series written by Allan Heinberg and published by Marvel Comics. It follows a group of young superheroes, each of whom patterns themselves after a member of the long-established Marvel superhero team the Avengers....
, which included gay characters but was published as a mainstream book with no warning label.
DC
DC has been noted to have greater representation of LGBT characters than its rival Marvel comics, although still drawing criticism for its use of stereotypes. FirebrandFirebrand (DC Comics)
Firebrand is a name that has been used by four heroes by DC Comics.-Rod Reilly:Published by Quality Comics from August 1941 to November 1942, Rod Reilly was the bored and wealthy socialite son of a steel tycoon, who decided to fight crime with his servant and friend, "Slugger" Dunn...
, a superhero debuting in 1941, is thought by some to be an early example, with his pink or transparent costume. Writer Roy Thomas penned thought balloons that suggested Firebrand had been involved in a gay relationship with his sidekick and bodyguard Slugger Dunn, although these hints never moved beyond subtext. A more modern example is the violent vigilante superhero Midnighter
Midnighter
Midnighter is a fictional comic book superhero, best known as a member of the rogue superhero team The Authority. Created by writer Warren Ellis and artist Bryan Hitch, he first appeared in Stormwatch #4, before appearing in various Authority books and series and his own eponymous ongoing series...
. The Batman-like Midnighter was shown as being in a relationship with the Superman-like Apollo during their time as members of the superhero team The Authority. Midnighter and Apollo
Apollo (comics)
Apollo is a fictional character, a comic book superhero who first appeared in the Stormwatch series, but is best known for his role in The Authority. While visually distinct, Apollo is cast in the mold of the Superman archetype....
are now married and have an adopted daughter — Midnighter has gone on to star in his own title. In 2006, DC Comics
DC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. is one of the largest and most successful companies operating in the market for American comic books and related media. It is the publishing unit of DC Entertainment a company of Warner Bros. Entertainment, which itself is owned by Time Warner...
could still draw widespread media attention by announcing a new, lesbian incarnation of the well-known character Batwoman
Batwoman
Batwoman is the name of several fictional characters, female counterparts to the superhero Batman. The original version was created by Bob Kane and Sheldon Moldoff. Her alter ego is Kathy Kane. This character appears in publications produced by DC Comics and related media beginning in Detective...
, even though openly lesbian minor characters such as Gotham City
Gotham City
Gotham City is a fictional U.S. city appearing in DC Comics, best known as the home of Batman. Batman's place of residence was first identified as Gotham City in Batman #4 . Gotham City is strongly inspired by Trenton, Ontario's history, location, atmosphere, and various architectural styles...
police officer Renee Montoya
Renee Montoya
Renee Montoya is a fictional comic book character published by DC Comics. The character was initially created for Batman: The Animated Series, and was preemptively introduced into mainstream comics before the airing of her animated debut in 1992....
already existed in the franchise.
Batman
Batman is a fictional character created by the artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger. A comic book superhero, Batman first appeared in Detective Comics #27 , and since then has appeared primarily in publications by DC Comics...
's relationship with Robin
Robin (comics)
Robin is the name of several fictional characters appearing in comic books published by DC Comics, originally created by Bob Kane, Bill Finger and Jerry Robinson, as a junior counterpart to DC Comics superhero Batman...
has famously come under scrutiny, in spite of the majority of creators associated with the creator denying that the character is gay. Psychologist Fredric Wertham, who in Seduction of the Innocent asserted that "Batman stories are psychologically homosexual", claimed to find a "subtle atmosphere of homoeroticism which pervades the adventures of the mature 'Batman' and his young friend 'Robin'". It has also been claimed that Batman is interesting to gay audiences because "he was one of the first fictional characters to be attacked on the grounds of his presumed homosexuality," and "the 1960s TV series remains a touchstone of camp." Frank Miller
Frank Miller (comics)
Frank Miller is an American comic book artist, writer and film director best known for his dark, film noir-style comic book stories and graphic novels Ronin, Daredevil: Born Again, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Sin City and 300...
has described the relationship between Batman and the Joker as a "homophobic nightmare", he views the character as sublimating his sexual urges into crime fighting.
Some continue to play off the homosexual interpretations of Batman. One notable example occurred in 2000, when DC Comics refused to allow permission for the reprinting of four panels (from Batman #79, 92, 105 and 139) to illustrate Christopher York's paper All in the Family: Homophobia and Batman Comics in the 1950s. Another happened in the summer of 2005, when painter Mark Chamberlain displayed a number of watercolors depicting both Batman and Robin in suggestive and sexually explicit poses. DC threatened both artist and the Kathleen Cullen Fine Arts gallery with legal action if they did not cease selling the works and demanded all remaining art, as well as any profits derived from them.
Manga
YaoiYaoi
In careful Japanese enunciation, all three vowels are pronounced separately, for a three-mora word, . The English equivalent is . also known as Boys' Love, is a Japanese popular term for female-oriented fictional media that focus on homoerotic or homoromantic male relationships, usually created by...
and Yuri (also known as Boys' Love and Girls' Love, respectively, as well as Shōnen-ai and Shōjo-ai in the West, although these are not used in Japan due to pedophilic undertones) are Japanese genres which have homosexual romance themes, across a variety of media. Yaoi and yuri have spread beyond Japan: both translated and original yaoi and yuri is now available in many countries and languages. The characters of yaoi and yuri do not tend to self-identify as homosexual or bisexual. As with much manga and anime, SF and fantasy tropes and environments are common: For example Ai no Kusabi
Ai no Kusabi
is a Japanese novel written by Rieko Yoshihara. Originally serialized in the yaoi magazine Shousetsu June between December 1986 and October 1987, the story was collected into a hardbound novel that was released in Japan in 1990. This futuristic tale is set in a world where men are assigned various...
, a 1980s yaoi light novel series described as a "magnum opus" of the Boys Love genre, involves a science fictional caste system. Simoun
Simoun (anime)
is a Japanese anime television series that was broadcast in Japan in 2006. It ran for 26 weekly episodes from 3 April to 25 September.A manga adaptation was published in three issues of Comic Yuri Hime. The manga shared the same characters and setting as the anime, but presented a different storyline...
has been described as being "a wonderful sci fi series" which does not have to rely on its yuri content to appeal to the audience.
Yaoi has been criticised for stereotypical and homophobic portrayals of its characters, and failing to address gay issues. Homophobia
Homophobia
Homophobia is a term used to refer to a range of negative attitudes and feelings towards lesbian, gay and in some cases bisexual, transgender people and behavior, although these are usually covered under other terms such as biphobia and transphobia. Definitions refer to irrational fear, with the...
, when it is presented as an issue at all, is used as a plot device to "heighten the drama", or to show the purity of the leads’ love. Matt Thorn has suggested that as BL is a romance narrative, having strong political themes may be a "turn off" to the readers. Critics state that the genre challenges heteronormativity via the "queer" bishōnen
Bishonen
is a Japanese term literally meaning "beautiful youth ". The equivalent English concept is a "pretty boy".The term describes an aesthetic that can be found in disparate areas in East Asia: a young man whose beauty transcends the boundary of gender or sexual orientation...
.
There is also a style of manga called Bara
Bara (genre)
, also known as the wasei-eigo construction or ML, is a Japanese jargon term for a genre of art and fictional media that focuses on male same-sex love and desire, usually created by and for gay men. The bara genre began in the 1960s with fetish magazines featuring gay art and content...
, which is typically written by gay men for a gay male adult audience. Bara often has more realistic themes than yaoi and is more likely to acknowledge homophobia and the taboo nature of homosexuality in Japan. While western commentators sometimes group bara and yaoi together, writers and fans consider them separate genres.
Film and television
In general, speculative fiction on television and film has lagged behind literature in its portrayals of homosexuality. Sexual relationships in major speculative fiction franchises have generally been depicted as heterosexual in nature. Inter-species and inter-ethnic relationships have been commonly depicted, while homosexual and transgendered (LGBT) relationships are more rare.Film
LGBT characters in films began to appear more regularly only in the 1980s. Films in the late 1920s and early 1930s reflected the liberal attitudes of the day and could include sexual innuendos and references to homosexualityHomosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...
, but from the 1930s until 1968 the film industry in the US followed the Production Code
Production Code
The Motion Picture Production Code was the set of industry moral censorship guidelines that governed the production of the vast majority of United States motion pictures released by major studios from 1930 to 1968. It is also popularly known as the Hays Code, after Hollywood's chief censor of the...
, a set of censorship guidelines written by a Jesuit
Society of Jesus
The Society of Jesus is a Catholic male religious order that follows the teachings of the Catholic Church. The members are called Jesuits, and are also known colloquially as "God's Army" and as "The Company," these being references to founder Ignatius of Loyola's military background and a...
priest. The code spelled out what was morally acceptable
Public morality
Public morality refers to moral and ethical standards enforced in a society, by law or police work or social pressure, and applied to public life, to the content of the media, and to conduct in public places...
for a public audience; references to sexual "perversions" such as homosexuality were forbidden. Virtually all motion pictures produced in the United States adhered to the code, and similar censorship was common in other countries, for example an early version of the first lesbian vampire
Lesbian vampire
Lesbian vampirism is a trope in 20th century exploitation film that has its roots in Joseph Sheridan le Fanu's novella Carmilla about the predatory love of a female vampire for a young woman :...
film Dracula's Daughter
Dracula's Daughter
Dracula's Daughter is a 1936 American vampire horror film produced by Universal Studios, a sequel to the 1931 film Dracula. Directed by Lambert Hillyer from a screenplay by Garrett Fort, the film stars Otto Kruger, Gloria Holden, Marguerite Churchill and, as the only cast member to return from the...
, a film described in The Celluloid Closet
The Celluloid Closet
The Celluloid Closet is a 1996 American documentary film directed and written by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman. The film is based on the 1981 book of the same name written by Vito Russo, and on previous lecture and film clip presentations given in person by Russo 1972–82.Russo researched the...
as presenting "homosexuality as a predatory weakness", was rejected by the British Board of Film Censors in 1935, who said in part "...Dracula's Daughter would require half a dozen ... languages to adequately express its beastliness.". Horror author Anne Rice
Anne Rice
Anne Rice is a best-selling Southern American author of metaphysical gothic fiction, Christian literature and erotica from New Orleans, Louisiana. Her books have sold nearly 100 million copies, making her one of the most widely read authors in modern history...
has named Dracula's Daughter as a direct inspiration for her own homoerotic vampire fiction, naming a bar in her novel Queen of the Damned "Dracula's Daughter" in honor of the film.
Films produced under such censorship could only introduce homosexuality as a disguised undercurrent, and still flirted with controversy in doing so, such as in the cult horror film White Zombie
White Zombie (film)
White Zombie is a 1932 American independent Pre-Code horror film directed and produced by brothers Victor Halperin and Edward Halperin, respectively. The screenplay by Garnett Weston tells the story of a young woman's transformation into a zombie at the hands of an evil voodoo master. Béla Lugosi...
.
The less stringent rules of the post-Hayes film industry allowed sexuality to be more open, and cinema as a whole became more sexually explicit from the 1980s in particular, but aimed to purely to entertain rather than exploring underlying sexual dynamics. Much of the sex in speculative fiction film is merely intended to titillate; a review of fantasy films identified 10-15% as softcore pornography. but it remained rare to see gay characters in speculative fiction films. Horror films, that had sex as one of their major preoccupations, continued to be more leniently censored, due to the perception of being unserious and lightweight. Vampires in particular have been described as obvious erotic metaphors and as a result, numerous vampire films since the 1970s strongly imply or explicitly show lesbianism, following the inspiration of lesbian vampire
Lesbian vampire
Lesbian vampirism is a trope in 20th century exploitation film that has its roots in Joseph Sheridan le Fanu's novella Carmilla about the predatory love of a female vampire for a young woman :...
story Carmilla
Carmilla
Carmilla is a Gothic novella by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu. First published in 1872, it tells the story of a young woman's susceptibility to the attentions of a female vampire named Carmilla...
. The prototypical hollywood vampire, Dracula
Dracula
Dracula is an 1897 novel by Irish author Bram Stoker.Famous for introducing the character of the vampire Count Dracula, the novel tells the story of Dracula's attempt to relocate from Transylvania to England, and the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and women led by Professor...
, was shown to be openly gay in the spoof film Does Dracula Suck? in 1969.
Gay genre films remain rare, and science fiction films' inclusion of gay characters continues to relegate them to supporting roles, such as the "stereotypical, limp-wristed, frantic homosexual" minor character in the 1996 blockbuster Independence Day
Independence Day (film)
Independence Day is a 1996 science fiction film about an alien invasion of Earth, focusing on a disparate group of individuals and families as they converge in the Nevada desert and, along with the rest of the human population, participate in a last-chance counterattack on July 4 – the same...
, a film whose main theme has been described as being the anxiety surrounding male friendships and homosexual panic. It is also interesting to note that the film's director, Roland Emmerich
Roland Emmerich
Roland Emmerich is a German film director, screenwriter, and producer.His films, most of which are Hollywood productions filmed in English, have grossed more than $3 billion worldwide, more than those of any other European director...
, is openly gay. Still in this bleak panorama there are some curious cases like Cthulhu (2007) a horror/thriller film based on the works of H. P. Lovecraft
H. P. Lovecraft
Howard Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
, in which the main character is gay but it isn't the main thing, although it is important in the development of the character's psychology. The film is plagued with monsters and disturbing happenings. Also, in V for Vendetta
V for Vendetta (film)
V for Vendetta is a 2005 dystopian thriller film directed by James McTeigue and produced by Joel Silver and the Wachowski brothers, who also wrote the screenplay. It is an adaptation of the V for Vendetta comic book by Alan Moore and David Lloyd...
there are two secondary characters - one gay, one lesbian - shown as victims of the totalitarian dystopia
Dystopia
A dystopia is the idea of a society in a repressive and controlled state, often under the guise of being utopian, as characterized in books like Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four...
.
Television
Xena: Warrior Princess
Xena: Warrior Princess is an American–New Zealand supernatural fantasy adventure series that aired in syndication from September 4, 1995 until June 18, 2001....
fantasy television series introduced its main characters, Xena
Xena
Xena is a fictional character from Robert Tapert's Xena: Warrior Princess franchise. She first appeared in the 1995–1999 television series Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, before going on to appear in Xena: Warrior Princess TV show and subsequent comic book of the same name...
and Gabrielle
Gabrielle (Xena)
Gabrielle is a fictional character played by Renée O'Connor in Xena: Warrior Princess. She is referred to by fans as the Battling Bard of Potidaea. Her trademark weapons are the Amazon fighting staff and later, the sais...
, as close companions; fan speculation about lesbian overtones led to them becoming lesbian icons, although the lesbian content remained at the subtext
Subtext
Subtext or undertone is content of a book, play, musical work, film, video game, or television series which is not announced explicitly by the characters but is implicit or becomes something understood by the observer of the work as the production unfolds. Subtext can also refer to the thoughts...
level. The series has been cited as "trail-blazing" and breaking down barriers, allowing the production of subsequent programming such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which introduced a number of LGBT characters. The most famous is the major character, Willow
Willow Rosenberg
Willow Rosenberg is a fictional character created for the fantasy television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer . She was developed by Joss Whedon and portrayed throughout the TV series by Alyson Hannigan...
and her partners Tara
Tara Maclay
Tara Maclay is a fictional character created for the fantasy television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer . She was developed by Joss Whedon and portrayed by Amber Benson from the fourth to the sixth season until the character's death. Tara is a shy young woman with magical talents who falls in love...
and Kennedy. Although praised for their "healthy relationship" and being the first lesbian relationship between major characters on prime-time television, others criticised the use of witchcraft as a metaphor for lesbian sex. Tara's death directly after reconciliatory sex with Willow caused an outcry amongst the LGBT community, who saw it as a "homophobic cliché". Andrew Wells
Andrew Wells
Andrew Wells is a fictional character in the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, played by Tom Lenk. The character also appears in Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight, the canonical continuation of the series....
, a recurring villain and eventual ally, was strongly implied to be gay, although closeted. The series was influential on subsequent television speculative fiction, including Torchwood. The series won a number of LGBT themed awards, and was regarded as groundbreaking in its portrayal of gay youth.
Torchwood
Torchwood
Torchwood is a British science fiction television programme created by Russell T Davies. The series is a spin-off from Davies's 2005 revival of the long-running science fiction programme Doctor Who. The show has shifted its broadcast channel each series to reflect its growing audience, moving from...
is a British science fiction drama television programme, part of the long-running Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
franchise, which began airing in 2006 on BBC Three
BBC Three
BBC Three is a television network from the BBC broadcasting via digital cable, terrestrial, IPTV and satellite platforms. The channel's target audience includes those in the 16-34 year old age group, and has the purpose of providing "innovative" content to younger audiences, focusing on new talent...
. The series explores several themes
Themes in Torchwood
Science fiction Torchwood discusses many themes in its narratives, specifically dealing with LGBT themes associated with its homosexual and bisexual characters and their problems, with various characters portrayed as sexually fluid...
in its narrative, in particular LGBT
LGBT
LGBT is an initialism that collectively refers to "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" people. In use since the 1990s, the term "LGBT" is an adaptation of the initialism "LGB", which itself started replacing the phrase "gay community" beginning in the mid-to-late 1980s, which many within the...
themes. Various characters are portrayed as sexually fluid; through those characters, the series examines homosexual
Homosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...
and bisexual
Bisexuality
Bisexuality is sexual behavior or an orientation involving physical or romantic attraction to both males and females, especially with regard to men and women. It is one of the three main classifications of sexual orientation, along with a heterosexual and a homosexual orientation, all a part of the...
relationships. Although the nature of their sexual flexibility is not explicitly discussed, the characters offer varying perspectives on orientation, with The Sun
The Sun (newspaper)
The Sun is a daily national tabloid newspaper published in the United Kingdom and owned by News Corporation. Sister editions are published in Glasgow and Dublin...
describing all of the characters on Torchwood as bisexual.
Series creator Russell T Davies has said that he hopes to defy audience expectations of monosexual
Monosexuality
A monosexual person is someone who is sexually attracted to one sex only, monosexuality being the corresponding sexual orientation...
characters: "Without making it political or dull, this is going to be a very bisexual programme. I want to knock down the barriers so we can't define which of the characters is gay. We need to start mixing things up, rather than thinking, 'This is a gay character and he'll only ever go off with men.'"
Davies has also described Jack Harkness
Jack Harkness
Captain Jack Harkness is a fictional character played by John Barrowman in Doctor Who and its spin-off series, Torchwood. He first appeared in the 2005 Doctor Who episode "The Empty Child" and reappeared in the remaining episodes of the 2005 series as a companion of the ninth incarnation of the...
as omnisexual: "He'll shag anything with a hole. Jack doesn't categorise people: if he fancies you, he'll do it with you."
The inclusion of significant LGBT characters in modern speculative fiction television series has not been universal. For example the Star Trek
Star Trek
Star Trek is an American science fiction entertainment franchise created by Gene Roddenberry. The core of Star Trek is its six television series: The Original Series, The Animated Series, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Enterprise...
franchise's lack of same-sex relationships has long been a sore spot with LGBT fandom, some of whom have organised boycotts against the franchise to protest its failure to include LGBT characters. They also point out that Gene Roddenberry
Gene Roddenberry
Eugene Wesley "Gene" Roddenberry was an American television screenwriter, producer and futurist, best known for creating the American science fiction series Star Trek. Born in El Paso, Texas, Roddenberry grew up in Los Angeles, California where his father worked as a police officer...
had made statements in later life favourable to acceptance of homosexuality and the portrayal of same-sex relationships in Star Trek, but that the franchise's coverage has remained meagre.
Within the Star Trek canon
Canon (fiction)
In the context of a work of fiction, the term canon denotes the material accepted as "official" in a fictional universe's fan base. It is often contrasted with, or used as the basis for, works of fan fiction, which are not considered canonical...
, there have been no officially recognized LGBT characters in the television spin-off
Spin-off (media)
In media, a spin-off is a radio program, television program, video game, or any narrative work, derived from one or more already existing works, that focuses, in particular, in more detail on one aspect of that original work...
s. The International Review of Science Fiction ran a feature entitled "Prisoners of Dogma and Prejudice: Why There Are no G/L/B/T Characters in Star Trek: Deep Space 9" However, gender identity
Gender identity
A gender identity is the way in which an individual self-identifies with a gender category, for example, as being either a man or a woman, or in some cases being neither, which can be distinct from biological sex. Basic gender identity is usually formed by age three and is extremely difficult to...
has occasionally been treated as an "issue" within the new Star Trek series, to be dealt with as a theme in individual episodes, such as the 1995 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is a science fiction television series set in the Star Trek universe...
episode "Rejoined", which was the first episode of the show to feature a same-sex relationship and romantic same-sex kiss between women. Subsequently, the Star Trek franchise has portrayed a few same-sex kisses, but always in the context of either the evil "mirror universe" ("The Emperor's New Cloak") or body possession ("Warlord
Warlord
A warlord is a person with power who has both military and civil control over a subnational area due to armed forces loyal to the warlord and not to a central authority. The term can also mean one who espouses the ideal that war is necessary, and has the means and authority to engage in war...
" and others), and often for comedic purposes between otherwise heterosexual characters. In a 2000 Fandom interview, Star Trek screenwriter Ronald D. Moore
Ronald D. Moore
Ronald Dowl Moore is an American screenwriter and television producer best known for his work on Star Trek and the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica miniseries and television series, for which he won a Peabody Award for creative excellence in 2005 and an Emmy Award in 2008.-Early life and...
suggested that the reason why no gay characters existed in the television franchise was because someone wanted it that way, and no amount of support from fans, cast or crew was going to make any difference. In recent years, a few of the Star Trek novels and comics, which are officially licensed but not considered canon
Canon (fiction)
In the context of a work of fiction, the term canon denotes the material accepted as "official" in a fictional universe's fan base. It is often contrasted with, or used as the basis for, works of fan fiction, which are not considered canonical...
, have featured serious direct same-sex relationships, including portraying a minor canon character as gay.
Slash fiction
The platonic close male relationships in television and film science fiction have been reinterpreted by fans as slash fictionSlash fiction
Slash fiction is a genre of fan fiction that focuses on the depiction of romantic or sexual relationships between fictional characters of the same sex...
- Kirk/Spock
Kirk/Spock
Kirk/Spock, also commonly referred to as "K/S" and referring to James T. Kirk and Spock from Star Trek, is a pairing popular in slash fiction, possibly the first slash pairing according to Henry Jenkins. Early on, a few fan writers started speculating about the possibility of a sexual relationship...
being the earliest example. Slash cannot be commercially distributed due to copyright, and up until the 1990s was either undistributed or published in zine
Zine
A zine is most commonly a small circulation publication of original or appropriated texts and images. More broadly, the term encompasses any self-published work of minority interest usually reproduced via photocopier....
s. With the advent of the internet, the slash fiction community of fans and writers began to cluster at sites such as fanfiction.net, and websites and fanzines dedicated to popular speculative fiction franchises such as X-files and Star Trek have become common. The use of characters from major SF franchises in "gay readings" has caused legal action: LucasFilm has sent cease and desist orders to prevent gay reinterpretations of Star Wars
Star Wars
Star Wars is an American epic space opera film series created by George Lucas. The first film in the series was originally released on May 25, 1977, under the title Star Wars, by 20th Century Fox, and became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, followed by two sequels, released at three-year...
characters, and Anne Rice is notorious for attempts to stop production of slash fiction based on her Vampire Chronicles characters, although many of the characters are bisexual in canon
Canon (fiction)
In the context of a work of fiction, the term canon denotes the material accepted as "official" in a fictional universe's fan base. It is often contrasted with, or used as the basis for, works of fan fiction, which are not considered canonical...
. Slash fiction has been described as important to the LGBT community and the formation of queer identities, as it represents a resistance to the expectation of compulsory heterosexuality, but has also been noted as being unrepresentative of the gay community, being more a medium to express feminist dissatisfactions with SF. According to polls, most of slash fandom is made up of heterosexual women with a college degree. These demographics are older than the yaoi fans and they tend to be more easily disturbed about slash depicting underage sexuality, but this is becoming less true due to the popularity of Harry Potter
Harry Potter
Harry Potter is a series of seven fantasy novels written by the British author J. K. Rowling. The books chronicle the adventures of the adolescent wizard Harry Potter and his best friends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, all of whom are students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry...
-inspired slash fiction.
Femslash
Femslash
Femslash is a subgenre of slash fan fiction which focuses on romantic and/or sexual relationships between female fictional characters. Typically, characters featured in femslash are heterosexual in the canon universe; however, similar fan fiction about lesbian characters is commonly labeled as...
is a subgenre of slash fiction which focuses on romantic and/or sexual relationships between female fictional characters, Typically, characters featured in femslash are heterosexual in the canon universe; however, similar fan fiction about lesbian characters are commonly labeled as femslash for convenience. There is less femslash than there is slash based on male couples - it has been suggested that heterosexual female slash authors generally do not write femslash, and that it is rare to find a fandom with two sufficiently engaging female characters. Janeway/Seven is the main Star Trek femslash pairing, as only they have "an on-screen relationship fraught with deep emotional connection and conflict". There is debate about whether fanfiction about canon lesbians such as Willow and Tara of Buffy the Vampire Slayer counts as "slash", their relationship storylines are more coy than heterosexual ones, which entices Willow/Tara femslash authors to fill in the gaps in the known relationship storyline. It is "relatively recently" that male writers have begun writing femslash.
Reaction of the speculative fiction community
Daughters of Bilitis
The Daughters of Bilitis , was the first lesbian rights organization in the United States. It was formed in San Francisco in 1955, conceived as a social alternative to lesbian bars, which were considered illegal and thus subject to raids and police harassment...
. He claims the group named him an honorary lesbian for his support, and to have pseudonymously written the earliest work of "lesbian SF" in 1947 in Vice Versa, the lesbian fanzine edited by Lisa Ben.
As the number of works featuring LGBT characters increased, so did the visibility of LGBT fans. At least as early as the 1980 Worldcon
Worldcon
Worldcon, or more formally The World Science Fiction Convention, is a science fiction convention held each year since 1939 . It is the annual convention of the World Science Fiction Society...
(Noreascon Two
38th World Science Fiction Convention
The 38th World Science Fiction Convention , also known as Noreascon Two, was held 29 August – 1 September 1980 at the Sheraton-Boston Hotel and Hynes Civic Auditorium in Boston, Massachusetts, USA.The chairman was Leslie Turek....
), there were gatherings of gay and gay-friendly members of the SF community, including Samuel R. Delany
Samuel R. Delany
Samuel Ray Delany, Jr., also known as "Chip" is an American author, professor and literary critic. His work includes a number of novels, many in the science fiction genre, as well as memoir, criticism, and essays on sexuality and society.His science fiction novels include Babel-17, The Einstein...
, Marion Zimmer Bradley
Marion Zimmer Bradley
Marion Eleanor Zimmer Bradley was an American author of fantasy novels such as The Mists of Avalon and the Darkover series. Many critics have noted a feminist perspective in her writing. Her first child, David R...
and Melissa Scott. However, such meetings did not necessarily indicate whole-hearted acceptance within the fan community, and gay and lesbian fans were not regarded as a unified interest group. Informal gatherings at conferences and the attempted creation of a newsletter for LGBT fans drew little notice.
Networking between gay fans continued, finally coalescing at the 1986 Worldcon into a plan of action. This led to the first Gaylaxicon
Gaylaxicon
Gaylaxicon is an annual science fiction, fantasy and horror convention that focuses on gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender topics. It takes place in various locations in the United States and occasionally Canada, often on the east coast....
science fiction convention
Science fiction convention
Science fiction conventions are gatherings of fans of various forms of speculative fiction including science fiction and fantasy. Historically, science fiction conventions had focused primarily on literature, but the purview of many extends to such other avenues of expression as movies and...
being held in 1988 and subsequently to the creation of the Gaylactic Network
Gaylactic Network
The Gaylactic Network is the national gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and friends science fiction, fantasy, horror, comics and gaming organization, consisting of several affiliate chapters throughout the United States and Canada....
and the Gaylactic Spectrum Awards
Gaylactic Spectrum Awards
The Gaylactic Spectrum Awards are given to works of science fiction, fantasy and horror that explore LGBT topics in a positive way. Established in 1998, the awards were initially presented by the Gaylactic Network, with awards first awarded in 1999. In 2002 the awards were given their own...
by the science fiction community
Science fiction fandom
Science fiction fandom or SF fandom is a community or "fandom" of people actively interested in science fiction and fantasy and in contact with one another based upon that interest...
. Gay-themed discussions are now a staple at conventions such as WisCon
WisCon
Wiscon or WisCon, the Wisconsin Science Fiction Convention, is often called the world's leading feminist-oriented science fiction convention and conference. It was first held in Madison, Wisconsin in February 1977, and is held annually throughout the four day weekend of Memorial Day...
; for example, WisCon 30 featured a panel discussing "Why Women Write About Gay Men", and the 38th World Science Fiction Convention in Boston had a discussion panel entitled "The Closed Open Mind — Homophobia in Science Fiction and Fantasy Stories".
Other SF authors, such as Orson Scott Card
Orson Scott Card
Orson Scott Card is an American author, critic, public speaker, essayist, columnist, and political activist. He writes in several genres, but is primarily known for his science fiction. His novel Ender's Game and its sequel Speaker for the Dead both won Hugo and Nebula Awards, making Card the...
, have been criticised by the LGBT community for their works or opinions, which have been described as homophobic.
Some lesbian science fiction is targeted specifically to a lesbian audience, rather than science fiction fans, and published by small feminist or lesbian presses such as Bella Books
Bella Books
Bella Books is a small press publisher of lesbian literature that is based in Tallahassee, Florida. The chief executive officer is Linda Hill, who is also the chief executive officer of Spinsters Ink and BeanPole Books....
. A notable author writing science fiction published by lesbian presses is Katherine V. Forrest
Katherine V. Forrest
Katherine V. Forrest is an American writer.Forrest is best known for her eight novels about lesbian police detective Kate Delafield. The character was the very first lesbian police detective in the American lesbian mystery genre and is described as "Miss Marple with k.d...
.
LGBT speculative fiction awards
- The Gaylactic Spectrum AwardsGaylactic Spectrum AwardsThe Gaylactic Spectrum Awards are given to works of science fiction, fantasy and horror that explore LGBT topics in a positive way. Established in 1998, the awards were initially presented by the Gaylactic Network, with awards first awarded in 1999. In 2002 the awards were given their own...
honour works in science fiction, fantasy and horror which include positive explorations of gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered characters, themes, or issues. The awards were instituted in 1999 and are given for best novelGaylactic Spectrum Award winners and nominees for best novelThe Gaylactic Spectrum Awards are given to works of science fiction, fantasy and horror that explore LGBT topics in a positive way...
, short fictionGaylactic Spectrum Award winners and nominees for best short fictionThe Gaylactic Spectrum Awards are given to works of science fiction, fantasy and horror that explore LGBT topics in a positive way...
and other worksGaylactic Spectrum Award winners and nominees for best other workThe Gaylactic Spectrum Awards are given to works of science fiction, fantasy and horror which explore LGBT topics in a positive way...
of the previous year. Works produced before the awards' inception are eligible for entry into the Hall of Fame. - The Lambda Literary AwardLambda Literary AwardLambda Literary Awards are awarded yearly by the US-based Lambda Literary Foundation to published works which celebrate or explore LGBT themes. Categories include Humor, Romance and Biography. To qualify, a book must have been published in the United States in the year current to the award...
s include awards for science fiction, fantasy and horrorLambda Literary Awards winners and nominees for science fiction, fantasy and horrorLambda Literary Awards are awarded yearly by the United States-based Lambda Literary Foundation to published works that celebrate or explore LGBT themes. To qualify, a book must have been published in the United States in the year current to the official year of the award; the presentation...
. The awards were first presented in 1989, with separate categories for speculative fiction for lesbians and gay men. In 1993 these categories were merged and the combined award has undergone several name changes since then. Although the awards are given based on the quality of the writing and the LGBT themes, the author's sexual orientation is also a factor. - The James Tiptree, Jr. AwardJames Tiptree, Jr. AwardThe James Tiptree, Jr. Award is an annual literary prize for works of science fiction or fantasy that expand or explore one's understanding of gender. It was initiated in February of 1991 by science fiction authors Pat Murphy and Karen Joy Fowler, subsequent to a discussion at WisCon.- Background...
honours works of science fiction or fantasy that expand or explore one's understanding of gender. Thus, it often goes to works which deal directly or tangentially with gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender issues. - Golden Crown Literary SocietyGolden Crown Literary SocietyThe Golden Crown Literary Society is a 501 organization established in February 2004 as a literary and educational organization for the study, discussion, enjoyment, and enhancement of lesbian literature. The GCLS membership includes publishers, distributors, authors, and readers of lesbian fiction...
Awards (or "Goldies") are given to works containing lesbian themes or depictions of lesbian characters. Awards are given in numerous categories, including speculative fiction (or "SciFi/Fantasy/Horror") and paranormal romanceParanormal romanceParanormal romance is a sub-genre of the romance novel. A type of speculative fiction, paranormal romance focuses on romance and includes elements beyond the range of scientific explanation, blending together themes from the genres of traditional fantasy, science fiction, or horror...
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See also
- Sex and sexuality in speculative fiction
- Gender in speculative fiction
- LGBT literatureLGBT literatureGay literature is a collective term for literature produced by or for the LGBT community, or which involves characters, plot lines or themes portraying male homosexual behavior.-Subgenres:...
- List of LGBT-themed speculative fiction
- List of LGBT figures in mythology
- Single-gender worldsSingle-gender worldsA relatively common motif in speculative fiction is the existence of single gender worlds or single-sex societies. These fictional societies have long been one of the primary ways to explore implications of gender and gender-differences in science fiction and fantasy...
Footnotes
SF is used throughout as an abbreviation for speculative fiction, for convenience. Science fiction and slash fiction are written in full when referred to specifically.Collected in In a Glass Darkly
In a Glass Darkly
In a Glass Darkly is a collection of five short stories by Sheridan Le Fanu, first published in 1872, the year before his death. The second and third are revised versions of previously published stories, and the fourth and fifth are long enough to be called novellas.The title is taken from 1...
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Collected in A Saucer of Loneliness
A Saucer of Loneliness
"A Saucer of Loneliness" is a short story by Theodore Sturgeon which first appeared in Galaxy Magazine in February 1953. It was later adapted as a radio play for X Minus One in 1957; and as the second segment of the twenty-fifth episode of the television series The Twilight Zone.-Short story:The...
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Collected in Her Smoke Rose Up Forever
Her Smoke Rose Up Forever
Her Smoke Rose Up Forever is a collection of Science fiction and fantasy stories by author James Tiptree, Jr.. It was released in 1990 by Arkham House...
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Collected in The Wind's Twelve Quarters
The Wind's Twelve Quarters
The Wind's Twelve Quarters is a collection of short stories by Ursula K. Le Guin first published by Harper & Row in 1975.Le Guin describes the collection as a retrospective. It includes many stories which had been published previously or expanded into novels. Others take place in locations that...
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External links
- The Outer Alliance, LGBT advocacy in speculative fiction and literature
- GLBT Science Fiction and Fantasy Literature — A Web Directory
- GLBT Science Fiction and Fantasy Resources
- Queer Science Fiction issue of speculative magazine The Future FireThe Future FireThe Future Fire is a small press, online science fiction magazine , run by a joint British-US team of editors. The magazine was launched in January 2005 and releases issues four times a year, with stories, articles, and reviews in both HTML and PDF formats...
- The Gaylactic Network, LGBT fandom organization
- Gaylaxicon, annual LGBT science fiction, fantasy, horror, comics & gaming convention