Sexual inversion (sexology)
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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"Central polemical texts contributing to this [sexual inversion] discourse include Symonds's A Problem in Greek Ethics (1883); and his A Problem in Modern Ethics (1891); Havelock Ellis's Sexual Inversion, originally written with Symonds, published and suppressed in England in 1897, and later to be included as volume 2 of Ellis's Studies in the Psychology of Sex (1901); and Edward Carpenter's Homogenic Love (1894) and his The Intermediate Sex (1908)." --Speaking of Gender (1989) by Elaine Showalter That inversion of the sexual instinct is not infrequent is proved, among other things, by the circumstance that it is frequently a subject in novels. Chevalier (op. cit.) points out in French literature, besides the novels of Balzac, like "La Passion au Desert" [1830] (treating of bestiality) and " Sarrazine" [1830] (treating of the love of a woman for a eunuch), Diderot's " La Religieuse " (a story of one given to amor lesbicus) ; Balzac's " La Fille aux Yeux d'Or " [1835] (amor lesbicus) ; Th. Gautier's " Mademoiselle de Maupin" [1835]; Feydeau's "La Comtesse de Chalis" [1867]; Flaubert's "Salammbo [1862]," etc. Belot's " Mademoiselle Giraud, ma Femme" [1870] may also be mentioned (now translated into English). It is interesting that the heroines of these (Lesbian) novels appear in the character and role of the husband of a lover of the same sex, and that their love is extremely passionate. Moreover, the neuropathic foundation of this sexual perversion does not escape the writers. This theme is treated in German literature in " Fridolin's heimliche Ehe," by Wilbrand ; in "Brick and brack, oder Licht in Schatten," by Emerich Graf Stadion ; also by Balduin Groller, " Prinz Klotz ". The oldest urning romance is probably that published by Petronius at Rome, under the Empire, under the title " Satyricon ".--Psychopathia Sexualis (1886) by Richard Freiherr von Krafft-Ebing |
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Sexual inversion is a term used by sexologists, primarily in the late 19th and early 20th century, to refer to homosexuality. Sexual inversion was believed to be an inborn reversal of gender traits: male inverts were, to a greater or lesser degree, inclined to traditionally female pursuits and dress and vice versa. The sexologist Richard Freiherr von Krafft-Ebing described female sexual inversion as "the masculine soul, heaving in the female bosom".
Initially confined to medical texts, the concept of sexual inversion was given wide currency by Radclyffe Hall's 1928 lesbian novel The Well of Loneliness, which was written in part to popularize the sexologists' views. Published with a foreword by the sexologist Havelock Ellis, it consistently used the term "invert" to refer to its protagonist, who bore a strong resemblance to one of Krafft-Ebing's case studies.
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