Where does the information we have about bi and gay people during the Regency era come from?
Because gay and bi men were defined as “criminals,” most of what we know about them comes from the public records of people who were caught: court cases, trial transcripts, arrest reports, and newspaper articles. There are some personal letters that have survived, although naturally most people couldn’t write anything too revealing. Lord Byron’s journals, which, judging from his letters, might have been a treasure trove of information, were burned after his death by his friend and publisher to protect his reputation. The problem with this kind of limited information is that it can lead to the assumption that every gay and bi man in England ended up hanged or in prison. It’s far more likely that, like any social crime, only a few unlucky people were arrested, and that many more gay and bi men lived relatively uneventful lives. We simply have to use our imagination as to what those lives might have been like–which is where being a novelist helps. My work is sometimes seen as being unrea
