Dictionaries and Encyclopedias

Love and nature were the main themes of traditional Korean poems which were usually sung (see *sijo, *Yun Son-do). Homoerotic feelings are strongly present in the poetry from earliest times as already noted, both in terms of strong *male bonding—exemplified in *Confucianism—and in individual relationships: see *Chong Ch'ol. The Chinese homosexual *cut sleeve trope appears in a poem of *Yi Hyang-Gum.

The first study of homosexuality in relation to Korea was by *Ferdinand Karsch-Haack in German in 1906; *Father Richard Rutt wrote the seminal article on the poetry. *Peter H. Lee's poetry translations into English are outstanding. All *scholars wrote poems and *calligraphy was highly regarded as in China and Japan; poets also frequently did *illustrations to their poems many, following Confucian tradition, showing groups of all male scholarly drinking parties. There are very few records of popular culture before the nineteenth century. For an overview of the literature see Queneau, Histoire des littératures, volume one, pp. 1305–1316. Leupp, Male Colors: The Construction of Homosexuality in Tokugawa Japan, 17–19, has a historical over of homosexuality in Korea.

The Roman educated classes were bilingual after 146 B.C. when the Romans subjugated Greece. The upper classes were infatuated with Greek civilization and educated people—such as the poet *Virgil—spoke Greek and we can assume the entire Greek homopoetry heritage was known to them including many poets lost to us today (see *Overview—Greek and *lost works—Greek). Of course, knowledge of such works depended on access to written manuscripts which were not as widely circulated as mechanically printed books have become. Latin homosexual poetry of the Roman period was written in this environment.

Homosexuality occupies a significant place in surviving ancient Latin poetry. The Second Eclogue of *Virgil (70–19 B.C.), the writer of the finest *epic in ancient Latin, The Aeneid, is a homosexual love poem. Male homosexuality finds a restrained place in his great contemporary *Horace (65–8.C.), the most popular Latin lyric poet in Europe from the *Renaissance when the Roman poets were first published in printed form. The *epigrams of Martial (ca. 40–ca. 104) describe homosexual activities in *Rome in great detail and he regarded Virgil as a homosexual; the 300 and more surviving manuscripts of Martial testify to his great popularity through the *Middle Ages and he is the Latin homosexual poet par excellence. His work was to inspire the writing of the *European epigram from the Renaissance on (though rarely in explicit sexual terms because of harsh laws against homosexuality).

The Second and Ninth Satires of *Juvenal (60–140) are the first Latin homosexual *satires to survive: they vividly portray male *transvestism and *prostitution in Rome, attesting to a rich homosexual culture. They have been frequently omitted from editions of the poet's work owing to *censorship. Later in the middle ages, satire in poetry, by such writers as *Bernard of Cluny, was directed against the dominant Italian and west European institution, the *Catholic Church, accusing it of fostering homosexuality .

Homosexuality is referred to in *myth in the Roman poet *Ovid (43 B.C–17), a major souce of ancient Greek and Roman myth to the modern world, and a homosexual *graffiti poem survives from *Pompeii. *Gallias Caesar subegit and other oral poems about *Julius Caesar (100 B.C.–44 B.C.) are the earliest Latin *bawdry *songs known, a tradition later continued in the songs of the *Carmina Burana and *student songs. The late *imperial poet *Nemesianus (active 283) is the last poet to write a homopoem in the Latin *eclogue tradition started by Virgil.

The middle ages. In the *middle ages homopoems continued to be written in monasteries, since Latin was the language of western Christianity—see the brilliant anthology of the period 300–1400 of *Thomas Stehling *Medieval Latin Poems of Male Love and Friendship, an anthology based on careful scholarship. *John Boswell, who has dealt with the religious background, also compiled an anthology of poetic works. It has been estimated by A. G. Rigg that up to ninety per cent of literature written in Great Britain 1066–1422 was written in Latin; much of this material has not been analysed for homosexuality and if similar figures hold for other countries a huge volume of Latin material awaits analysis.
Many gay love poems were written in the Middle Ages and popular poems such as *O Admirabile Veneris Idolym (about a beautiful youth) and *Altercatio Ganimedis et Helene (debating whether it was better to love a man or a woman) testify to the popularity of gay themes. The French philosopher *Michel Foucault has brilliantly discussed the rise of *Christianity and its suppression of Greek and Latin literary culture, including homosexuality.

Though Latin remained the language of learning in western Europe from the fall of the Roman empire until the late nineteenth century, it was otherwise a dead language, gradually breaking down into such *Romance languages as French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan and Romanian. But scholars in these languages were aware of the literature in Latin since Latin was used in the universities as well as the Catholic Church. For the Middle Ages see the special entry *Medieval Latin. Major poets are *Walafrid Strabo, *Baudri, *Marbod and *Hilary the Englishman.

The publication of the ancient poets—such as Martial—in book form from the Renaissance on made them widely available to a learned audience (especially supposedly celibate clerics); previously manuscripts had only a limited circulation as has been pointed out in relation to ancient Greek poetry. The collection of the works of five Latin poets, *Quinque Illustrium Poetarum (1791), published in *Paris after the French Revolution, reprinted the Latin poets *Beccadelli, *Pacificus Maximus and *Ramusius. *Commentaries in mechanically-printed editions, dating from ca. 1475, need examination, these usually being written by the *editors (see also *scholars). Translation from Latin to *European vernacular languages commenced in 1480 with the translation of Juvenal into Italian. The ancient Latin poets have been widely translated into European vernacular languages and their work is known in all countries sharing European educational traditions, from Brazil to Australia to South Africa to the United States.

Translation of ancient Greek homopoetry—an important vein of homopoetry—into Latin itself also started in the Renaissance (the *Anacreontea was a favorite work, as were *Theocritus and *Theognis). This continued until the nineteenth century. Translation into Latin has acted as a form of *censorship: learned readers, including Catholic clerics and university educated males (women were not permitted to go to universities until the nineteenth century), could enjoy the works while denying them to vernacular readers. However it was not until the 1750s that the major anthology of Greek poems, the *Palatine Anthology, containing the first complete homosexual anthology, the *Mousa paidike, was put into Latin by *J. J. Reiske.
Later poets. The tradition of poets, writers and scholars writing poems in Latin continued into the eighteenth century with such writers as *Thomas Gray, *Horace Walpole and *Richard West writing poems and, in the nineteenth century, with *William Johnson and *Lionel Johnson (a brilliant poem referring to *Oscar Wilde). The first surviving poem of the famous nineteenth century French homopoet *Rimbaud is a Latin poem. In the seventeenth century the poet *Théophile de Viau wrote what have been described as homosexual love letters in Latin. The early gay German activist *K. H. Ulrichs wrote poems in Latin and edited a journal written entirely by him in Latin .
The writing of Latin poetry virtually ceased at the end of the nineteenth century though Latin poems used in homosexual *magic rituals by *Aleister Crowley and *Victor Neuburg, involving *anal sex, were composed by *Walter Duranty ca. 1914. The *Oxford scholar *John Sparrow who was homosexual also wrote Latin poetry. *Dissertations in Latin concerning poetry and homosexuality have been written—especially at the *Sorbonne, in Paris; these were noticed by the great gay scholar *Georges Hérelle in the early part of the twentieth century.

In 1943, the gay book collector *C. R. Dawes wrote the first—and still unpublished—study of homosexuality in ancient Roman life and literature. *Otto Kiefer in Sexual Life in Ancient Rome (1933; repr.) discusses homosexuality in the chapter "Love in Poetry". Recent scholarship, especially since the weakening of censorship in the United States and other countries from the mid-1960s, shows increasingly candid discussion (see *Kenneth Quinn) and there has been detailed work on Martial, with commentaries on several books of his epigrams in English, for instance. In 1983 *Sara Lilja published the first comprehensive study of homosexuality in *Republican and early Imperial literature but no overall study of homosexuality in Latin literature—let alone homosexuality and poetry—has been written even for the Roman period. A detailed bibliography of references in literature is being compiled by *Claude Courouve.

The Persian poet *Sa`di was translated into Latin in 1651 and such diverse works as *Shakespeare's Sonnets and the works of the Persian poets *Hafiz and *Omar Khayyam (pseud.) have been translated into Latin; on the other hand, Catullus has been translated from Latin into such languages as Ukrainian. No overall anthology of Latin homopoetry—the longest continuous gay poetry tradition in a west European language—exists. The closest is *Il Gaio verso: poesia latina per l'altro amore, an anthology of ancient Latin homosexual love poetry published in 1992.
See Queneau, Histoire des littératures, volume two, pp. 237–316, for an overview for the period from Christianity onwards; volume one, pp. 479–539, has an overview of the earlier Latin period.
Dictionaries and Encyclopedias. Summers, Gay and Lesbian Literary Heritage: see "Roman Literature". Gay Poetry Anthologies. Reid, Eternal Flame, volume 1, 153–66 (ancient Latin); 205–11 (Renaissance Latin; some poets only). Criticism. Woods, History of Gay Literature, 32–40: deals with ancient Latin.

Malay, Bahasa Indonesia, Javanese and Balinese
Malay, Bahasa Indonesia, Javanese and Balinese are *Malayo-Polynesian languages and are all close (especially Malay and Bahasa Indonesia). Malay is spoken in Malaysia and Bahasa Indonesia, Javanese and Balinese are spoken in Indonesia. Material dates from ca. 1000 in Javanese (see *Mahabharata). See the separate entry *Overview—Oral languages—Southeast Asia for oral cultures in these two countries.

*Indian religions have been very influential culturally in Malaysia and Indonesia: the Indian *Mahabharata and *Ramayana exist in translation and in adaption in the languages. Javanese, spoken on the island of Java in Indonesia, is the most ancient written language—records go back a thousand years. The poem *Centini contains references to homosexuality and the *Lay of Jaya Prana warrants perusal. Javanese is written in a script descended from Indian scripts and is sometimes called Kawi (also spelt Kavi); Malay and Bahasa Indonesia are now written in the Roman alphabet.

*Islam has been the predominant religion in Malayasia and Indonesia since 1500 and the *mystical influence of *Sufism appears in the Malay *Pantun and the work of *Hamzah Fan Suri (pronouns in Malay are *non gender specific, an added complication for Sufi poetry—which could in theory be addressed to a man or a woman). *Omar Khayyam has been translated into both Malay and Bahasa Indonesia. Prior to Islam *Buddhism was the dominant religion. Animistic religions are still widely practiced.

For twentieth century poetry, in Bahasa Indonesia, see *Amir Hamzah and *Chairil Anwar; the *Bhagavad Gita has also been translated. The gay journal Gaya Nusantara (1987+), edited by the gay activist Dede Oetomo of Universitas Airlangga, Surabaya, has published some gay poems: e.g., in vol.1 no. 2, p. 36 and no. 4, pp. 8–9, though the poems are unsigned (copies sighted: *Cornell University Library; copies in the collection of *Paul Knobel). Another journal is Jaka (1985+) edited in Yogyakarta by Persaudaraan 'G' (source: *Library of Congress Catalogue). W. S. Rendra, a famous contemporary Indonesian poet and dramatist has written a poem, "Prostitutes of Djakarta Unite", which may have some applicability as some prostitutes are transvestites. In Balinese, spoken on the island of Bali in the east of Indonesia, a most unusual situation is described in the poem *Gaguritan Brayut: a woman who appears to fuck a man from behind, thus suggesting homosexual anal sex.