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From Eros to Romosexuality
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In his famous courtroom definition of ‘the love that dare not speak its name’, Wilde pays tribute to Plato and ‘that deep, spiritual affection that is as pure as it is perfect’. But how does Wilde translate Platonic love into his works, especially The Picture of Dorian Gray, where erotic purity and perfection seem hard to find? Plato is a crucial influence, but this chapter suggests we should also turn to Roman sexual models, for two pivotal texts that Dorian reads are Petronius’ Satyricon and Suetonius’ Lives of the Caesars. What emerges is an idea of love and sex that destabilizes the categories of erastes and eromenos, that stresses erotic reciprocity rather than paiderastia, and that appropriates Roman models to a much greater degree than Wilde acknowledges in his speech.
Title: From Eros to Romosexuality
Description:
In his famous courtroom definition of ‘the love that dare not speak its name’, Wilde pays tribute to Plato and ‘that deep, spiritual affection that is as pure as it is perfect’.
But how does Wilde translate Platonic love into his works, especially The Picture of Dorian Gray, where erotic purity and perfection seem hard to find? Plato is a crucial influence, but this chapter suggests we should also turn to Roman sexual models, for two pivotal texts that Dorian reads are Petronius’ Satyricon and Suetonius’ Lives of the Caesars.
What emerges is an idea of love and sex that destabilizes the categories of erastes and eromenos, that stresses erotic reciprocity rather than paiderastia, and that appropriates Roman models to a much greater degree than Wilde acknowledges in his speech.
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