Book launch: Queer Cambridge
Schedule
Wed Jan 22 2025 at 06:30 pm to 08:00 pm
UTC+00:00Location
Cambridge University Press Bookshop | Cambridge, EN
Join us for the book launch of "Queer Cambridge" to hear author Simon Goldhill in conversation with Dan OrrellsAbout this Event
Book launch: Queer Cambridge
Come join us for the launch of Queer Cambridge at Cambridge University Press Bookshop where author Simon Goldhill (University of Cambridge) will be in conversation about the book with Dan Orrells (King's College, London)
Queer Cambridge recounts the untold story of a gay community living, for many decades, at the very heart of the British Establishment. Making effective use of chiefly forgotten archival sources – including personal diaries and letters – the author reveals a network that was in equal parts tolerant and acerbic, and within which the queer Fellows of Cambridge University explored bold new forms of camaraderie and relationship. Goldhill examines too the huge influence that these individuals had on British culture, in its arts, politics, music, theatre and self-understanding. During difficult decades when homosexuality was unlawful, gay academics – who included celebrated literary and scientific figures like E. M. Forster, M. R. James, Rupert Brooke and Alan Turing – lived, loved, and grew old together, bringing new generations into their midst. Their remarkable stories add up not just to an alternative history of male homosexuality in Britain, but to an alternative history of Cambridge itself.
'Queer Cambridge succeeds on a number of fronts. It is a fascinating analysis of a remarkably coherent group identity and its transmission across generations. It is a revelatory work of institutional history, delivering rich insight both into one institution in particular and into how institutions in general work to create and solidify identity and values. And it is a book that says new and unusual things about the place of same-sex desire at the heart of the Victorian and Edwardian English cultural' establishment. I agree with pretty much every word of Queer Cambridge, and learned something new and surprising on every page.
Darryl Jones, Professor of Modern British Literature and Culture, Trinity College Dublin
'Unique in its examination of a multi-generational queer community, Queer Cambridge expertly maps the interpersonal relationships between a wide range of individuals and displays the range of behaviors present within this community. Goldhill demonstrates how same-sex desire long preceded the development of the modern category of 'the homosexual' and fleshes out influential individuals such as Lytton Strachey and John Maynard Keynes in ways not achieved elsewhere.'
Charles Upchurch, Professor of British History, Florida State University
'In this exciting, authoritative, gossipy, giddy book, sleuthing homosexualist Simon Goldhill charts the sprawling topography of same-sex desire contained in little more than a few square yards. An indispensable microhistory of Cambridge and the networks of queer men that thrived within the walls of its most famous college – from flamboyant Oscar Browning to the devastating Rupert Brooke; tortured Arthur Benson to the flirtatious Dadie Rylands - Queer Cambridge shows how vital a sense of place is to queer intimacy, community, and identity, and how indispensable its study is to any history of sexuality.'
Diarmuid Hester, Research Associate in English, Emmanuel College and author of Nothing Ever Just Disappears: Seven Hidden Histories
Accessibility Information
Seating is available for 40 attendees (maximum) plus standing space. Some views may be partially obstructed by architectural columns, bookshelves, etc. but we aim to minimise this where possible. Space will be made available for wheelchair users. Access is via main entrance from street level and there are not steps or ledges.
There are 2 single-person bathrooms, including one large enough to fit a wheelchair with the door closed.
Please get in touch to reserve a seat, or if you have particular needs that you would like us to consider in advance.
Where is it happening?
Cambridge University Press Bookshop, 1-2 Trinity Street, Cambridge, United KingdomGBP 0.00
