From Goats to Ganymedes

This chapter provides the first scholarly assessment of how Edward II developed a reputation for having engaged in sexual relationships with his male favourites. Edward’s reputation for non-specific sexually transgressive behaviour developed during his reign; however, the first writer to explicitly state that this transgression constituted sex with men was Christopher Marlowe. Following the publication of Marlowe’s Edward II, discourse concerning Edward and his favourites in texts of all genres shifted towards consensus that their relationships were sexual. As well as documenting the cumulative process by which narratives of sexual transgression were shaped, this chapter provides new insights into the significance of Marlowe’s work, and into the ways in which drama as a genre enabled his historiographical innovation.