But Is It Gay? Kissing, Friendship, and 'pre-homosexual' Discourses in Eighteenth-Century Germany

Abstract

Many queer studies scholars have been too ready to read past cultures through the lens of homosexuality in its modern configurations. Taking as an example the correspondence between Gleim and Jacobi published in 1768, this article uses kissing between men as a touchstone for this issue. It delineates an early modern culture of friendly kissing between men that shows no signs of homoeroticism, arguing that the depiction of the Gleim--Jacobi correspondence as gay derives from masculinist attacks by the "Sturm und Drang" and from Anna Louisa Karsch's ambiguous statements. It closes by seeking criteria for detecting homoeroticism in such texts.