The American Byron: Homosexuality and the Fall of Fitz-Greene HalleckHailed in the mid-nineteenth century as the most important American poet of the period, Fitz-Greene Halleck was a close friend of William C. Bryant, an associate of Charles Dickens and Washington Irving, and a celebrity sought out by John Jacob Astor and American presidents. Halleck, an attractive man of wit and charm, was dubbed "the American Byron" because he both employed similar poetic strategies and challenged the most sacred institutions of his day. A large general readership enjoyed his verse, though it was infused with homosexual themes. Indeed, Halleck's love for another man would be fictionalized in Bayard Taylor's novel Joseph and His Friend a century before the Stonewall riots. |
From inside the book
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... Taylor , who was a married man , found himself there . Taylor had remarkable insight into both the expression and oppression of homosexuality in nineteenth- century America . Taylor's widow did not give Wilson the impression that her ...
... Taylor . Whitman's Leaves of Grass and Taylor's Lands of the Saracens and Poems of the Orient were all published in 1855 and attempted to expand the social consciousness of their audiences . Like other uninhibited au- thors , including ...
... Taylor tried to salvage Halleck's personal reputation in a dedication speech that defended Halleck before his harshest critics - his townsmen . Taylor left New York with Richard Stoddard , a homosexual . The two men traveled by train ...