Includes bibliographical references and index.

Machine generated contents note: 1.Ancient Ancestors -- Khnumhotep and Niankhkhnum -- David and Jonathan -- Sappho -- Socrates -- Hadrian and Antinous -- Chen Weisong -- 2.From The Middle Ages To The Enlightenment -- Saints Sergius and Bacchus -- Aelred of Rievaulx -- Michelangelo Buonarroti -- Michel de Montaigne -- Antonio Rocco -- Benedetta Carlini -- Michael Sweerts -- Katherine Philips -- Frederick the Great -- Chevalier d'Eon -- 3.Founding Fathers And Mothers -- Walt Whitman -- Edward Carpenter -- Andre Gide -- E. M. Forster -- Radclyffe Hall -- Christopher Isherwood -- 4.The Fin-de-Siecle And Belle Epoque -- Maximilian von Schwartzkoppen and Alessandro Panizzardi -- Oscar Wilde -- Wilhelm von Gloeden -- Sergei Diaghilev -- Jacques d'Adelsward-Fersen -- Karol Szymanowski -- 5.Women Who Loved Women -- Eleanor Butler and Sarah Ponsonby -- Anne Lister -- Eva Gore-Booth -- Sylvia Townsend Warner -- Claude Cahun -- Suzy Solidor -- Annemarie Schwarzenbach -- Carson McCullers --

Contents note continued: 6.Entanglements Of Sex And Politics -- Richard Schultz -- Federico Garcia Lorca -- Newton Arvin -- Lilly Wust and Felice Schragenheim -- 7.Visions Of Male Beauty -- Eugene Jansson -- Magnus Enckell -- Donald Friend -- Alair Gomes -- Bhupen Khakhar -- 8.Love In The Levant -- Abu Nuwas -- Constantine Cavafy -- T. E. Lawrence -- Yannis Tsarouchis -- Ali al-Jabri -- 9.Japonisme -- Ihara Saikaku -- Nobuko Yoshiya -- William Plomer -- Yukio Mishima -- Tamotsu Yato -- 10.Diverse Callings -- John Henry Newman -- Rosa Bonheur -- Hubert Lyautey -- Frieda Belinfante -- Ronnie Kray -- Yves Saint Laurent -- 11.Radicals And Activists -- Magnus Hirschfeld -- Del Martin -- Harvey Milk -- Guy Hocquenghem -- Simon Nkoli -- 12.International Lives In The Modern ERA -- Maharaja of Chhatarpur -- Edmund Backhouse -- Claude McKay -- Lionel Wendt -- Xuan Dieu -- Jean Senac -- Shi Pei Pu -- Reinaldo Arenas.

A fascinating portrait of gay men and women throughout time and across the globe whose lives have influenced society at large, as well as what we recognize as today's varied gay culture, this book gives a voice to more than 80 people from every major continent and from all walks of life.