AC Benus

Some autumnal music for an October day . . . Malcolm Binns and the Philharmonia Orchestra, led by Nicholas Braithwaite, perform William Sterndale Bennett's Adagio for piano and orchestra.

Thanks, Parker. I totally agree And I love the way he ends it, knowing to be "decent" per society's hypocrisy, he'd have to moralize against the love he's seeing, and he just cannot be rotten enough to do that. It's elegant he brings down the stage curtain just when he does

. “…a kiss resounds through the silence…” Lermontov is considered Russia's greatest Romantic Era poet, second only behind Pushkin. The following excerpt is the conclusion of a poem he composed while still a cadet at a military school. But then the dark of night envelopes our school, Cleron has finally made his usual nightly rounds, And no more music's heard from our old school piano . . . At last the final candle next to Belove

"Order your own 'Big Dick' today! *supplies limited*"

Thanks, drpaladin. I don't know much about Tolstoy, but admire War and Peace, especially the 2015 BBC series filmed in Russia -- it's wonderful. I've seen some pictures of Tolstoy and his wife in their senior years looking miserable together. I'm glad his diary entries recording his private thoughts on love were preserved and printed in Soviet Russia. Even that seems miraculous, but perhaps the writer's icon status and the last shreds of Soviet lip-service concerning sexual freedom mixed at the last moment to preserve an accurate record. I'm glad these things gelled at the right time and continue to paint the complex picture each of us as humans live

Thanks, Parker. Let me just say, this is not the last of Tolstoy we will be seeing in the Mirror But you are right; perhaps Dyakov -- whom he was still in love with in 1851 -- had wanted to pull up the sleigh blanket and kiss just as much as little Leo did that magical ride

. A Diary Entry November 29th, 1851. Tiflis I was never in love with women. —There was only one strong feeling like love that I felt when I was 13 or 14; but I don't want to believe that this was love; because the subject of it was a plump maid (though with a very handsome face), and furthermore from 13 to 15 is the most muddled phase for a boy (the youth phase): you don't know what to throw yourself on, and desire in this period, acts with unusual force. —I fell in love ve

I feel I should mention that David Vieth's staid 1960 edition of Wilmot's Complete Poems (p.26, in the 1968 edition) mentions "Let's practice, then, and we shall prove/These are the only sweets of love" seems to bear a direct inspiration from Marlowe's immortal lines "Come live with me and be my love/And we will all the pleasures prove." But this is further proof of Wilmot's intent that this poem be read as coming from a man to a man, as Marlowe's "Alexis and Corydon" was (and still is) the most famous same-sex love poem of the entire English Renaissance -- something evidently Vieth did not feel comfortable reminding his readers

Thank you, Parker. I keep thinking of his generation having to pick up the pieces of his broken country after their civil war. It seems -- like say, the 1920s -- there's a need to unwind and not take the world so sincerely, since hypocrisy, regardless of place or time, is evergreen. So it is very interesting to see the poet be so unafraid to mention things that in theory should have meant his death. Perhaps no one took his written antics as true-to-life in his times, but which the 18th century reveled in as if gospel. Funny, I think Juvenal and Hemingway fall into this same billing of tall-tale tellers regarded as oracles of history later on. Thanks again for reading all of these postings

Stendhal was never shy in saying he got more out of Paisiello's music and drama than any other composer. A sensitive, and exciting performance like the new one below shows why Paisiello will always grace stages the world over. Simone Perugini and the Tuscan Opera Academy Orchestra perform the overture to L'inganno felice ("The Joyous Deception")

Many of Wilmot's poems are boastful and glib about sex with women, which are always cold and emotionless. These two poems, along with a very few others on same-sex love, are sober and serious. He treated the love among equals as something very special; holy, might be a better word.

. Two John Wilmot Poems [If] I could love thee till I die, Would'st thou love me modestly, And never press, whilst I live, For more than willingly I would give: Which should sufficient be to prove I'd understand the art of love. I hate the thing is called enjoyment: Besides it is a dull employment, It cuts off all that's life and fire From that which may be termed desire; Just like the bee whose sting is gone Convert

Rumors? The man was out. In his own words: "Even more than MGM, Disney was the most conservative studio in town. They were growing aware. They weren't stupid. They could add two and two, and I think they were beginning to suspect my [orientation]. I noticed people in certain quarters were getting less and less friendly. In 1963 Disney didn't renew my option and let me go. But Walt had me return to do the final Martin Jones movie, The Monkey's Uncle, because those were money-makers for the studio. In the 1960s all my social life was underground Gay. It was my own life. I kept it separate from work, where I went on publicity dates with Annette Funicello or Roberta Shore." -- Tommy Kirk* ------------ *Interview reprinted in Queers in History Keith Stern (Dallas 2009), ps. 254-255

. 7. On the lime-washed partitions of our latrine I scratch: 400 days and then some rest! For how I long for my books and typewriter, And forever, my eyes are falling closed. And forever, reveille comes 'round in a blink When curses and rifle clatter show up; I a spit-ee among many spat upon Tell the receiving earth of You, my pain. And forever, I wait for one to comfort With a temperate hand my sore afflictions, And see me wearied to the point of nothing. I only feel the fright, the ever tight'ning, Spasmodic numbness of my naked life Reeling before a storm-lashed lake of red. --Hans Ehrenbaum-Degele _