The Boundaries Between Romantic Friendship and Erotic Love

The Boundaries Between Romantic Friendship and Erotic Love

"A man who kissed or embraced an intimate male friend in bed did not worry about homosexual impulses because he did not assume that he had them. In the Victorian language of touch, a kiss or an embrace was a pure gesture of deep affection at least as much as it was an act of sexual expression,"

says Anthony Rotundo, attempting to define the boundaries between romantic friendship and erotic love, in relation to same gender friendships, in the late nineteenth century (Miller 4). Same gender relationships could exist on a physical level, expressing affection, without bringing up questions of sexual preference. Further, F.S. Ryman, a gentleman in his twenties, wrote of the very few documents ever discovered from the Victorian age regarding intimate encounters and the emotions attached to them. He has helped give us an idea of what some male relationships were like back then. In his diary, August of 1886, he describes spending the night in his best friends arms with out sexual intentions.

"…Now in all this I am certain there was no sexual sentiment on the part of either of us… I am certain that the thought of the least demonstration of unmanly & abnormal passion would have been as revolting to him as it is & ever has been to me, & yet I do love him & I love to hug & kiss him because of the goodness genius I find in his mind" (Duberman 45).

The ability to express love for another male through affection became more questionable short there after as the distinction between romantic and erotic love was less muddy. Until this point, no one got forced into feeling shame because they made it clear that they cared deeply for each other on a close-friendship level....

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...ess more gays than straights take for granted certain limited expressions of physical—touching, kissing, and hugging—with their friends" (Duberman 46).

These in today's world are mostlikely uncomfortable to answer. That goes to show what the invention of homosexuality has done for the world. The love one has for another of the same sex is crippled in expressing that love effectively through affection, as the fear of being labeled as a homosexual has become more powerful than the unshared love remaining in his heart.

Bibliography:

Duberman, Martin Bauml. About Time: Exploring the Gay Past. New York: Gay Presses

of New York, 1986.

Halperin, David M. One Hundred Years of Homosexuality. New York: Routledge, 1990.

Miller, Neil. Out of the Past/ Gay and Lesbian History from 1869 to the Present. New

York: Vintage Books, 1995.