William Shakespeare and Bisexuality
Now, I would like to preface this by saying that we couldn’t possibly know how William Shakespeare himself would identify, and obviously the term “bisexual” was not coined and used until much later. When discussing historical figures sexuality, it gets very tricky with labels. However, if we look at whether or not William fit into the category “bisexual”- that is to say, if he was attracted to two or more genders- that is a question we can attempt to discuss.
Due to the rampant homophobia of society, traces of anyone that wasn’t heterosexual were attempted to be scrubbed away. That combined with the extreme lack of information about Shakespeare’s personal life means that it isn’t likely we will ever find a blatant “I like guys” confession. Shakespeare did, however, explore many gay themes in his works. Though of course straight men can explore gay themes, even modern day straight men are just getting into that. Back then, in a society where being openly gay was heavily looked down upon, not to mention many men didn’t even write strong female characters? It seems… unlikely that a straight playwright would have so many gay themes. And let’s add in his sonnets- my favorites! 1 through 126 are dedicated to the “Fair Youth”- often called Mr. W.H. This man is suspected to be Henry Wriothesley, the Earl of Southampton. A lusty, bisexual earl, whose initials were reversed to protect his identity. He was the dedicatee of Venus & Adonis and other poems. However, this hasn’t been proven and people also say W.H might not even be the Fair Youth in the first place. Because we don’t have super solid evidence for either, I’m just going to refer to the Fair Youth as that.
The famous sonnet, Sonnet 18 (Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day) was included in these. Yep, one of the most famous romantic sonnet was possibly written as a love letter to a guy he liked. Now, of course, these could have been written from the viewpoint of another person, not Will himself. But one, I doubt it, and two, like I said, writing 126 gay sonnets as a straight guy? Seems pretty sketchy. I’m on to you, Bill.
Let’s look at some especially convincing sonnets- I’m personally gonna skip 1 through 17, because they are literally all. About. Kids. William really wanted the Fair Youth to have some kids so his beauty would be preserved. It’s all he talked about until Sonnet 18. Sonnet 20- the basic idea? Something like, “you’re super hot like a girl. You have a dick, though. But I don’t care that much.” This sonnet is kinda sexist, but it gets the point across. He also calls the Fair Youth “the master-mistress of my passion”, which honestly seems like something you would call your genderfluid lover. This one is very hard to deny- it’s obvious what it’s about, and it would make zero sense of it was written from the viewpoint of a women- plus, it’d still be pretty bisexual. And if you bring up it could be another man’s viewpoint- see above.
In sonnet 26, he calls the Fair Youth the “Lord of my love”, which is honestly super sweet. In sonnet 30, he talks about being super depressed (basically, I’m paraphrasing here,) but then goes on to say that when he thinks of the Fair Youth, he is able to recover. Honestly? Same, Will, thinking of cute people always helps me out of a depression spiral. In sonnet 40, he says love a lot. He also begins to talk about how the Fair Youth and Will’s mistress are sleeping together, which makes him sad, but he forgives him. In sonnet 53, he says “describe Adonis, and the counterfeit is poorly imitated after you. On Helen’s cheek all art of beauty set, And you in Grecian tires are painted new.” If you can’t read the Early Modern English, here’s No Fear Shakespeare’s translation: “If an artist tries to depict Adonis, he’ll wind up creating an inferior imitation of you. If he were to paint Helen as beautifully as possible, he would again wind up with a picture of you, decked out in Greek costume.” In my mind, it is pretty gay to describe your crush as prettier than Adonis and Helen, two bangin’ Greeks. Helen literally started a war cause she was so pretty. So that’s a pretty nice compliment.
I know what some may be saying- “Jane!” You cry, “I’m sure these are just platonic, no-homo love sonnets!” But are you, dear reader, telling me that Sonnet 18 is platonic? That “Lord of my love” is platonic? That calling the Fair Youth “love” repeatedly platonic? Are you honestly telling me that, were these not about a man, and instead a woman, you would still call them platonic? If but a woman was called “Lady of my love”, people would be swooning and saying how romantic it was. But the moment it’s gay? All romance is evaporated. This, readers, is heteronormativity- the idea that being heterosexual is the norm, it’s the base, that people are “hetero until proven otherwise.” This viewpoint makes people act like we need 5 eyewitness to William Shakespeare sucking a dick to truly call bisexual (not to mention that most people ignore the idea of bisexuality, but we’ll get to that eventually.) Instead, look at William like a blank slate- he obviously loved women, the Dark Lady sonnets (all sonnets after 126), prove that. But, as a Certified Bisexual myself, I can say that just because I like girls doesn’t mean that I don’t like guys. And just scrolling through, we can see there's definitely some attraction between the narrator and the Fair Youth. Now, yes, this all depends on if the sonnets are written from William’s viewpoint. People claim them to be a writing exercise, though this doesn’t explain the 17 sonnets solely devoted to begging the Fair Youth to have kids. If it is a writing exercise, why are all of them seemingly told about the same person from the same point of view? As a writer, that seems… strange. Not to mention the fact that Shakespeare seemed to find these very private, and though I’m sure most artists don’t publish their exercises, the fact he didn’t want them to be known at all is strange. Writing about gays a a straight man back then would be weird, but writing sonnets to a gay lover? That’s how you die, sir.
It is the opinion of most scholars that these sonnets are autobiographical. If this is true, which I and many other, smarter people believe, than this is the closest we get to and insight on his personal life and, more importantly (at least, for this essay), his sexuality.
“Alright, Jane, if this is all so obvious, why isn’t it fact?” Well, dear counter argument, due to previously-stated heteronormativity and the fact that we don’t have any rock solid evidence, we can’t say anything for absolute sure. Not to mention the fact that many people often ignore bisexuality as an argument. If you say “William might have been a smidge… gay,” people can jump in and fire back “But he liked women!” This bisexual erasure isn’t only annoying and hurtful but also makes this whole issue more mysterious than I think it needs to be. Bisexual men often like women. Bisexual men often marry women. William Shakespeare’s attraction to women isn’t a counter argument to his bisexuality, it’s just showing that he definitely played for one team, and most likely the other! Another issue is that people act as though a bisexual historical figure is amazing. The idea that LGBT people have existed before modern labels. Shocking! But that’s an idiotic statement. People haven’t gotten gayer, the world has gotten clearer. People stopped hiding, and started inventing communities and identities and started to be proud. There are so, so many LGBT people throughout history- you just have to try and spot them. Acting as if we are a modern invention is hurtful and erases our rich and history and identity. If there were gays in Ancient Greece, then I’m sure as Hell there were gays in the 15th century. We didn’t take a break.
As stated before, we probably will never be able to say for sure, until I either go back in time or see him in the possible afterlife. Both of those, by the way, are in my top 5 goals of life. Regardless, the evidence we currently have seems to make a pretty convincing case, and we might even find more evidence as time goes on! A couple days ago, I was listening to a Podcast, Shakespeare and Contemporary Theory. They had one on q*eer theory, so obviously I had to listen. A woman who works at a Pennsylvania and was writing a book on q*eer theory was talking. I really enjoyed the episode, and I especially like this quote: “If Shakespeare’s work isn’t q*eer, I don’t know what is.” She also mentioned that to read his work as only straight is to “misread the plays and misread the historical moment.” If you want more information on the subject (and told by a smarter person), I beg that you check it out. If you take anything from this essay, take this: Shakespeare’s work was, at least, filled with gay themes. And when you are in the 15th century, putting gay themes in your plays and writing 156 gay sonnets? It doesn’t scream heterosexual.