Christopher Isherwood (August 26, 1904 – January 4, 1986) during a lecture at St. Michael’s College,
Christopher Isherwood (August 26, 1904 – January 4, 1986) during a lecture at St. Michael’s College, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, February 8, 1977. Photo © Jearld Moldenhauer. Born into an upper-middle class British family one hundred and twelve years ago today, Christopher Isherwood embraced his homosexuality at a young age and sought out experiences to affirm his way of life. In 1929, Isherwood abandoned his studies in London and, along with friend and occasional lover, W.H. Auden, escaped to the libertine culture of Weimar-era Berlin. Isherwood’s experiences in Berlin—including his love affair with Heinz Neddermeyer, his friendship with Jean Ross, and his correspondence with E.M. Forster—formed the basis of many of the young writer’s early works, collectively known as “The Berlin Stories,” including “Goodbye to Berlin” (later adapted into the musical “Cabaret”). After leaving Berlin in 1933, Isherwood traveled Europe and to China before ultimately setting sail for the United States, with Auden, in 1939. Settling in California, Isherwood had friendships with established writers, like Aldous Huxley, and up-and-coming writers, like Truman Capote. In 1953, Isherwood met Don Bachardy on the Santa Monica beach; while the relationship raised eyebrows—Isherwood was thirty years Bachardy’s senior—the two men stayed together until the older man’s death. Throughout his prolific writing career, Isherwood articulated a revolutionary perspective on homosexual love: Pride. “Girls,” Isherwood wrote in “Christopher and His Kind,” “are what the State and the Church and the Law and the Press and the Medical Profession approve and command me to desire….That is the will of Almost Everyone, and their will means my death. MY will is to live according to my nature, and to find a place where I can be what I am….If boys did not exist, I would have to invent them.” Isherwood died of prostate cancer on January 4, 1986; he was eighty-one. #lgbthistory #lgbtherstory #lgbttheirstory #lgbtpride #QueerHistoryMatters #HavePrideInHistory #ChristopherIsherwood #JearldMoldenhauer (at Toronto, Ontario) -- source link
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