Talk:Stephen Spender

Untitled

Spender's birthday was February 28. The homosexual emphasis on the page so far is excessive.

Agree. Page needs far more about his writings. He is primarily known as a left wing writer. The gay thing needn't take up most of the article.

Yes. Apparently, some "advocate" decided to hold forth. Have cleaned up the mess. Still needs a good home for remaining "orphan" links. — J M Rice 15:27, 31 May 2005 (UTC)

Stephen Spender and homosexuality

(Note: The following section was removed from the original article.)

He was friends with gay fellow poets Christopher Isherwood and W. H. Auden, with whom he had a mentoring relationship. Spender himself had many homosexual affairs in his earlier years, most notably with Tony Hyndman (who is called "Jimmy Younger" in his memoir World Within World). During World War II, he decided to shift his focus to heterosexuality, marrying concert pianist Natasha Litvin in 1941. Consequently, he toned down homosexual allusions in later editions of his poetry, for example the line

"Whatever happens, I shall never be alone. I shall always have a boy, a railway fare, or a revolution."

got revised to read

"Whatever happens, I shall never be alone. I shall always have an affair, a railway fare, or a revolution."

Spender also sued gay author David Leavitt for allegedly using his relationship with "Jimmy Younger" in Leavitt's While England Sleeps in 1994. The case was settled out of court with Leavitt removing certain portions from his text.

Spender's seemingly changing attitudes towards homosexuality and heterosexuality have caused him to be labeled bisexual, repressed, latently homophobic, or simply someone so complex as to resist easy labeling.

Perhaps this discussion was foreseen by him, because he addresses this issue quite thoroughly in World Within World. However, even there he cannot fully decide on one explanation for what he does but prefers to give several ones, right after writing about his first, clearly homosexual, but also very one-sided relationship with a fellow student at Oxford:

1. Spender feels the assignment of labels to emotions to be limiting oneself's freedom, an act which was unnecessary until the 20th century:

"Yet I have come to wonder whether many contemporaries in labelling themselves [homosexuals] do not also condemn themselves to a kind of doom of being that which they consider themselves in the psychological text-book. (...) As a result of this tendency to give themselves labels, people feel forced to make a choice which, in past times, was not made."

In other words, labeling oneself a certain way may have a feedback on behavior, as he describes in another part of his autobiography, that when he learns he is part Jewish, he begins to "feel Jewish".

2. He feels homosexual relationships mostly coexisted with "normal", that is heterosexual, relationships throughout history, for example in Shakespeare's sonnets "what does Shakespeare say to his lover? Get married and have a child."

3. He somewhat questions the whole concept of a "third sex", that is, people who are exclusively homosexual, as put forth by 19th century science:

"At no point is there an acceptance of the idea of the poet and his lover friend belonging to a world of a third sex, which is characteristic of much literature in the twentieth century."

4. Without further reasons, he asserts that one's goal in life should be to be "normal", which he defines as matching closely what society perceives as "normal" and what is "normal" for oneself, i.e. to "conform with" one's nature. This act is regarded by him as an overcoming of "limitations" in oneself, a word he uses repeatedly to suggest his attraction to other men.

5. Spender feels that an artist (and maybe specifically a poet) requires the interaction with "normal" people as an inspiration and may not place himself in a situation where he is "cut off from this warm flow of the normal general life".

6. Finally (and maybe this reason is somewhat more telling than the others, because it is less rational), Spender blames others for "guarding" him from intimacy with women, both at Oxford and before. At the same time, however, he admits that his expression of emotion towards an "attractive nurse" was "without consciousness of the implications" of what he was doing, which stands in marked contrast to his very conscious, painful feelings of attraction to his fellow student.

Comments about removed text

Why was this text removed? If there are details that are wrong, can they be corrected? Certainly, Spender is known for his views on sexuality and the homosexual allusions in his early writings. I first became aware of him that way. To remove the entire section seems extreme to say the least. It also seems disrespectful of the people who wrote the section.

Perhaps, if you feel "The homosexual emphasis on the page so far is excessive." and "Page needs far more about his writings. He is primarily known as a left wing writer. The gay thing needn't take up most of the article", then the thing to do is to add MORE about his writings and MORE about his politics and tighten the writing about his sexuality. It doesn't call for removing the entire section.

So if it were up to me, I would simply restore the entire section. I'm willing to give you the chance to correct any factual errors, and to discuss the issue here first. So please, state what is incorrect, help correct any errors and restore the text. I would restore it myself, but I am aware of Spender only through a few of his writings, and not from knowing all that much about the details of his life. But if I know anything about him, it is that his sexuality was an important part of who he was and what he wrote. -- Samuel Wantman 09:31, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I thoroughly agree with Samuel Wantman on this point. However, I'm afraid I won't be able to correct any factual errors either, but I'm positive someone else will do so sooner or later. As far as I'm concerned, I wouldn't mind putting the above text back into the article as it is now. <KF> 18:04, Jun 2, 2005 (UTC)

Just to remove any ambiguity, there are THREE comments atop this page — two besides mine. Here is EXACTLY where the homosexual thing belongs, NOT in the article proper. The amount of room taken up by it was ridiculous. The emphasis on Spender's homosexuality, based on your premise that it is integral to his oeuvre, comes under the rubric of literary criticism and opinion. I mentioned his sexual ambiguity, and that should be sufficient. As to how much it influenced his writing, that's up to the reader, NOT YOU. Wikipedia is NOT for making cases. Wikipedia is NOT for advocacy. Wikipedia is NOT a playground for pedants.

If you wish to assert your opinions, do it here or write a letter to the editor. And if you try to restore this homosexual section, I shall remove it again, place the appropriate tag on the article and refer it to arbitration. I've also removed the stupid "Note" atop this thread. If someone wants to see who removed the section, he need only look at the article History. J M Rice 14:57, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia is a collaborative effort. I am respectfully asking that you collaborate with other editors in this project. I did not start a revert war with you, I requested that you point out what factual errors there were in the section you removed. I'm sorry you feel offended by that. I believe it is you who are asserting your own POV. My "opinion" is that Spender's sexuality is relevant. The section supports this view. The premise that it is integral to his oeuvre does come under the rubic of literary criticism and opinion, and as long as that criticism and opinion are not original research it has a valid place in this article. Would you remove mention of the sexuality of James Baldwin from his article? Would you want to remove mention about how his being black affected his writings? You are the one who removed the section, so I believe it is your responsibility to show that the material is incorrect. If you are unwilling to collaborate on this then certainly it would make sense to refer it to arbitration. And finally, the reason I mention that was you who removed the section was just to assist anyone else who reads this page in understanding the history of what happened without having to figure it out themselves. -- Samuel Wantman 20:27, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

"I'm sorry you feel offended"??? Now that's offensive! You don't know how I feel — stop being a drama queen! Ok, let's collaborate. Replace the section with a non-headlined paragraph, and cut the verbiage by at least half. — J M Rice 21:45, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Spender and revisionism

Just for whatever it's worth, Spender got quite cranky on the subject of homosexuality later in his life. I heard him speak twice, and both times his talk was comprised almost entirely of anecodtes of himself and Eliot, himself and Woolf, etc., and he thundered angrily at anyone who might spread terrible rumors about Virginia Woolf's being a lesbian or, even worse, Leonard Woolf's being bisexual or homosexual. It was a puzzling display. I believe he even wrote a book on the subject of V.W.'s not being lesbian? At any rate, if his late statements do not gibe with his early statements on his own sexuality, it is not surprising, since his late statement on the subject of relatively well known same-sex oriented people of his youth didn't gibe with the statements made by virtually all others. Geogre 16:49, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Merge discussion

The merge tag has been on this article and on Stephen Spender's sexuality since July (!). It's about time something was done about it. In general we don't have separate articles for one aspect of someone's personality (Christopher Marlowe's temper, Robert MacNamara's regret, W. A. Mozart's financial incompetence. . .) no matter how important. Please comment on the merge here; if I hear no objections within the next week or so, I will perform the merge. Thanks. Chick Bowen 18:08, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

Having gotten no comments on the merge, I have merged in a small amount of the content of Stephen Spender's sexuality and made that page a redirect to Stephen Spender. The rest of the content is available in the history of Stephen Spender's sexuality, as well as being quoted on this talk page above. Feel free to refine that section (and PLEASE replace anything with information whose sources are PROPERLY CITED, but please do not recreate a spur page; information about Spender should be in this article. Thanks. Chick Bowen 16:24, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, I've been pretty busy and have over 1000 articles on my watchlist. I didn't notice this one. If you propose to merge articles, they should be fully merged. Most of the article didn't make it. If you read the top of this page, this was a long process of reaching consensus which was undone by the merge. I think one of the following should happen.

1. The sub article is restored until other aspects of this article have as much detail as the sexuality part, at which time it could be completely merged (the previous consensus).
2. It could be completely merged now. If there are factual errors, they can be corrected (I am not aware of any). The previous discussions were not about whether the material was correct, but about the over emphasis in the article.

--Samuel Wantman 01:11, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

My concern isn't so much with accuracy as it is with citation, but as I said, you're welcome to include anything I haven't. However, I feel strongly that the sub article should not be recreated--articles should exist on their own merits, not to solve problems in other articles, which is considered content forking. I left out some information from the merge because I thought it was redundant and because it was uncited, but if you feel differently, put it in--not a problem. Chick Bowen 19:00, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

The unpleasant matter of Encounter's funding

Isn't it time it got addressed in the article? It is a subject that generates a fair amount of interest. I don't know whether I'd like to write about it myself - I am sure there is somebody who knows more about the subject - and, of course, it is unpleasant. (Or is that POV?) Hasdrubal 06:06, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Anti-Communism

I see a certain editor takes issue with my description of Spender as an anti-Communist in the categories. This is fairly self-evident in the fact that he contributed to a major anti-Communist book, The God that Failed. I suspect this will be online somewhere, but appearing in this book is what one could call "nailing your colours to the mast."--MacRusgail (talk) 16:45, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

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Albacete

In the section headed "Career" and the para beginning "In 1936" the text says "Spender was imprisoned for a while in Albacete." I'm not at all sure about this. Having just read his autobiography "World within World", I note that it was actually "Jimmy Younger" Spender's former partner who was imprisoned in Albacete (then under the control of the Republicans) as a would-be deserter. One of Spender's great preoccupations at the time was to get him home safely, as he felt responsible. The book contains a lengthy, first person account from "Jimmy" which talks about his imprisonment among other things, so I wonder has somebody misread it as being Spender himself talking? I don't recall seeing any evidence of Spender ever having been imprisoned by his "own" side, but does somebody know something I don't? Thanks 92.24.62.247 (talk) 13:33, 3 December 2022 (UTC)