Neil Hopcroft

[Read aloud to Adelle]

Queer Georgians by Anthony Delaney

This book collects some stories about gender non-conforming people in Georgian times, from before we had the understanding and rich language we now have to describe people outside the heteronormative world.

We have been handed down little in the way of unbiased information about these people, with much of the record of the time being exaggerated rumour or court proceedings. The author has tried to piece together a rigorous history from these pieces, sometimes straying into conjecture.

There are a number of people covered in the book, from cotqueans in the molly houses of London, courtiers in France to sex workers in New York. Each is described in terms of non-conformity we understand these days, although often using the language of the time rather than modern phasing.

Two things strike me about these histories, first about the legal situation, male same-sex relationships were outlawed. This is something which doesn’t make a lot of sense to me, there is no victim in consensual relationships, so why is there a crime committed? Non-consensual acts should clearly be criminal, no matter who the parties to those acts – there is a victim. It seems again like a conflation of same-sex with non-consensual in the eyes of the law, a view which remains prevalent among some in society today. Given the significant legal consequences men still involved themselves in these relationships, at great risk, which suggests that there is a strong sense of value they attached to their partnerships.

The other thing is that there is a difference in how gay relationships were seen depending on the class of those involved. For the common men it was clearly criminal, while for those of stature companions were considered part of their eccentricities. I guess the eloquence afforded by education, as well as the space to take a companion without overtly sharing a room, would have made explanation of the situation seem less suspicious.

The book itself is well researched and is unafraid of talking about the relationships of the people it covers, and acknowledges where the histories are incomplete or reconstructed. I found it a little self-indulgent in places, with the author breaking in to the world he is talking about with commentary from a modern perspective. There is a place for that reflection, especially as much of the subject matter was censored at the time. There is more depth in the epilogue, but I found it sat uneasily within the body of the book.

Overall, this book explores the ideas that non-heteronormative relationships existed long before we had language to understand those relationships. The law had a hard time understanding it, and the populace was split, with some supportive and others disgusted. These are not new ideas, we didn’t invent homosexuality 150 years ago, but we did start talking about it. And once we did, people could more easily explain their particular place in the world and find other people with whom they felt alignment.

A good read if you want to understand more of sexual non-conformance in those times, and get some context for how and why things are the way they are now. It is a collection of tenuously related stories around a common theme, but I don’t see there would be another way to present this kind of material. It is likely that each has a more detailed history elsewhere, should you care to find it.

[Audiobook]

The Last Overland by Alex Bescoby

This book recounts the story of an expedition following the return path from the First Overland, a journey from London to Singapore in 1955. A documentary of which launched the career of David Attenborough.

The background to this journey and the planning for it are covered. The original plan had been to take Tim Slessor, one of the members of the earlier party. However he fell ill in Singapore on the day of departure and was amply replaced by his grandson, Nat, who amply rose to the challenge.

One of the two Land Rovers from the First Overland, Oxford, was a core character for this journey, the other, Cambridge, was lost to a desert. The 65 year old vehicle, along with two other, more recent, models set off from the Formula 1 starting line in Singapore, travelling through Thailand, Myanmar, China, India and many other places – their route deviated from the outbound journey because of political changes along the way, but there were many nods to the notes in Tims diaries from 1955, visiting some of the same places.

I love travel books, road books especially, and this was no exception – this was an ambitious journey by any measure, and the window into the lives and countries they found on the way provides a different view than you would receive by reading about visiting them as a tourist.

He alluded to the marks on maps left by the British Empire, and how they have left deep scars in some places, rifts between local peoples. I worry that it is worse than that, that there was only a certain type of people who could have embarked upon such a journey in 1955, and their situations in the upper echelons of British society would not have offered them an unbiased view of the places on their passage. The return journey suffered less from the class bias, but not everybody can put aside their lives for a four month project of this nature.

That all said, I have a deep respect for Tim, for his enthusiasm, even if he didn’t actually travel with the group. What an epic adventure for his grandson, and what an amazing shared history for the two of them, even with the temporal displacement.

They were incredibly lucky to have returned to London in December 2019, weeks before Covid started impacting borders, a few more breakdowns or waiting at the entry to Tibet and they could easily have been stranded without hope of proceeding.

There is a television series of the journey available on YouTube, which I am very much looking forward to watching – that was the part of Top Gear I used to most enjoy, before they changed their ‘appeal’ to being mindless oafs.