After seeing a screening of “ Before Stone
wall,” a film full of humanity and good humor,
I thought an exchange of information on the
subject of homosexuality between the Ameri
can and Soviet public would be very useful in
helping our people overcome conservatism
and hostility.
In the early years of the 20th century, writ
ers, artists, and choreographers came
together in the group "World of Art" (Mir
Iskusstva,) and dealt for the first time with
subjects which previously had been assumed
to be too delicate to discuss. Two unique
married couples stood out as willing to broach
alternative themes: Vyacheslav Ivanov and
Zinovieva/Annibal, who began to discuss
lesbianism more or less openly, and Zinaida
Gippius and Merezhkovsky, who opened the
subject of gay communities. I would like to
add a few words about Zinaida Gippius, an
original and brilliant personality and poet
Physiologically, she was a hermaphrodite with
an attractive, rather feminine outward
appearance; she dedicated poems to friends
both male and female, and dressed elegantly,
if not extravagantly.
After the Russian Revolution, the Soviet
Union was the first country which legalized
homosexuality, and in the 1920s a Russian
Sappho appeared — Sophia Pamok. Today
the poetry of Zinaida Gippius and Sophia
Pamok can be found more readily in America
than in the Soviet Union. From the 1930s on,
anything that did not conform to the nar
rowminded limits of Stalinism was either de
stroyed or was concealed in the army
reserves. In the '40s the war separated wo
men and men, which encouraged the possi
bility of developing love for others of the
same sex. The war, while separating people
from their hope and their dear ones, threw
Just O ut, August, 1985
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people together in the rare moments of
peace: men embraced one another, and wo
men danced in pairs. This was natural, no
one called this homosexuality, but homosex
uality did exist
The war took 20 million human lives, and
as soldiers were primarily male, the popula
tion gap between men and women continued
on into the '50s. Many children were left
fatherless, wives lost their husbands, and
brides-to-be were without fiances. Friendship
between women found its place, and was
often exalted. Irina Grekhova, who today is a
Soviet writer well-known in the West wrote
about this kind of friendship in her novels of
the postwar era, but of course without a men
tion of homosexuality.
During the '60s there was a thaw:
Khrushchev's criticism of the Stalinist terror
opened the floodgates, within the country as
well as on the international scene. A relaxa
tion of tensions allowed closer contact
between Soviet and American people, and
new currents began to emerge in our art We
became familiar with the verses of Walt
Whitman, we learned about the passionate
friendship of the two French poets Rimbaud
and Verlaine; we began to read Oscar Wilde,
Andre Gide, Proust — and through subtle
hints we found out about their homosexual
ity. The women fared less well: virtually no
thing was mentioned about Colette, Renee
Vivien, Natalie Clifford Barney, Gertrude Stein
or Virginia Woolf. But in artistic circles they
began to talk of the "sky blue" and “ rose"
ones (meaning gay men and women re
spectively, as in the lavender of American
slang — tr.). The passion for others of the
same sex began especially to appear in the
ballet Homosexuality, forbidden in the time
of Stalin, began bit by b it to find its right to
exist and if liberalization had developed
further, it probably would have been legalized
once again; b u t alas, the power struggle
within the party ended with the ousting of
Khrushchev. And we can cite the suppression
of the Czech uprising in 1968 as the end of
democratization.
In the 70s the arrest of the famous Cauca
sian filmmaker Sergei Paradzhanov ("The
Color of Pomegranates,” “Shadows of
Forgotten Ancestors," and and other films)
caused a sensation. Paradzhanov, convicted
of homosexuality, was sentenced to five
years’ confinem ent By Soviet laws enacted
during Stalinist times, male homosexuality is
punishable by 5-8 years’ imprisonment (8
years for the involvement of a minor), while
lesbians are given psychiatric hospitalization.
The Russian Orthodox priest Father
Dim itrii Dudko, well-known in the opposition
circles in Moscow, was accused of homosex
uality, but escaped arrest renouncing his im
proper conduct (he was also charged with
anti-Sovietism). In 1979, the newspaper
Izvestia published an article about Father
D im itrii’s disavowal which concluded with his
words: “All power is from God.” This sounded
full of double meaning.
With the '80s has come the growth of a
“ parallel culture" in the USSR. There was the
unofficial appearance of the almanac "Wo
men & Russia," the first (Russian-tr.) feminist
publication. The almanac broached the
question of bisexuality. I. as editor-in-chief,
was accused of immorality both by the rul
ing powers (through the KGB) and by the
Orthodox Christieui dissidents. Yet every
one knew that bisexuality existed all along
and had certainly not disappeared now:)
the Ekaterinsky Gardens on one side of
Nevsky Prospekt (Leningrad's main street
— Tr.), and the Pushkin Theatre on the other,
are famous as meeting places for gays. And
in Moscow gay men gather at the Bolshoi
Theatre, while lesbians seek lovers at the
statue in Mayakovsky Square. After my exile
from the Soviet Union, we received some
inform ation in the West that groups of gay
people are beginning to make their voices
heard in the large cities of the USSR.
Unfortunately, the stance of the emigre
Russian-language press is so conservative
towards alternative movements, even in the
USSR, that it sheds no light on the actual
situation either in the Soviet Union, or outside
of it Such gay news as is occasionally al
lowed to run in emigre publications is not
permitted to say enough: it suffers either from
bias or essential flaws in moral matters. In any
case, it does not go beyond the limits of the
old image of the homosexual as depraved, or
at least unwell.
The widespread maxim that “gay is good"
(“ Stonewall") does not relate at all to the
books of Edward Limonov, a gay man who
came out of the closet after emigration
Limonov’s writings are lengthy, pornographic,
and in this sense differ little from the preva
lent emigre output This commercially suc
cessful product exploits only one form of
freedom: the freedom to mock the feeling of
love. Therefore, male sexuality (hetero- and
homo- alike) as presented in the emigre
Russian-language press does not address
basic human desires. What little is said about
lesbianism is primarily in the past tense. Here
especially we can see evidence of the
hypocrisy and subservience of our emigre
press: one day they carry an article about
Sophia Pamok in connection with the release
of a book of her poems. The foreword by S.
Polyakova attests to her serious research, but
Polyakova does not risk using the word les
bian’ (in this area Soviet taboos are preserved
intact among us). Yet the next day they write
that homosexuality is an unforgiveable sin.
Then they discuss the awful story of a lesbian
feminist who seduced wealthy clients in order
to rob and murder them. Along with the ex-
treme scarcity of news about the feminist
movement in the emigre press, a similar lack
of information about lesbianism creates an
unfriendly atmosphere by solidly reinforcing
prejudice.
Obviouly, there may be bad people among
homosexuals, but no more so than among
heterosexuals. However, the Russian emigre
press tends to maintain precisely this tradi
tional m indset An article published recently
was quite characteristic: “Georgian Orthodox
Church Undergoes Crisis." This contained an
appeal by 80 laypeople to the Church leader
and Patriarch Ilia II. The laypeople’s signed
docum ent calls for “the divestiture and ex-
com m unication from the Church of some
church officials who have compromised
themselves
Everyone knows that they are
homosexuals. Instead of being servants of
the Church who give young people examples
of high morals, these morally fallen persons
corrupt youth, which evokes particular indig
nation"
Among themselves Russian emigres are
not so god-fearing as one might think from
reading their press. Some emigres are enter
ing international progressive movements for
ecology, peace, feminism, or are joining gay
communities. But progressives as a rule,
have lost their voice in the emigre press
which remains on the level of pulp detective
stories about lesbian-vampires and mysteri
ous illnesses which strike only homosexuals
as a divine judgem ent The spirit of slander
and malevolence prevails toward all who dif
fer with the conceptions of our patriarchal
authority AJexsandr Solzhenitsyn. The pri
mordial right of one human being to love
another is construed as criminal. Where then
is the democracy and pluralism of which we
love to speak?
Tatyana Mamonova
Cambridge, November 1904
(Research materials in Harvard University
9