If we want to find "same-sex lovers" in the ancient sources, we will come across them everywhere, but the problem is that nearly all of them are also represented as enjoying sexual pleasures with the opposite sex and, more important, that there are fundamental incongruities between ancient and modern conceptual categories of sexual acts and identities. This language is clearly inspired by contemporary discussions of racial and sexual minorities and will not work for ancient Rome. The same-sex lovers? We find them where we would expect to find them-considering the sources they are at the margins, where the 'white' male elite set them" (9). In the introduction, having declared that "we look in vain for the voice of one woman of any class" in Roman literature (an assertion contradicted, as Clarke himself observes in an accompanying note, by the existence of Sulpicia), Clarke asks: "Where are the marginal people? The many foreigners?. The phrasing is revealing: here and elsewhere Clarke avoids speaking of "heterosexuality" and "homosexuality," relying instead on the less laden terms "male-female" and "male-male." Yet there are noticeable traces of "heterosexuality" and "homosexuality" throughout the book. On the theoretical level, however, there are occasional problems that lessen the impact of some of the book's arguments.Ĭlarke makes and substantiates a significant point that no one else has argued with such authority: "It is clear that images of both male-female and male-male lovemaking enjoyed considerable popularity among all classes" (142). This book is at its best in the close analysis of individual images and scenes without Clarke's careful, insightful readings, I would have missed any number of important details. Unlike the snapshot collections that have prevailed until recently, it insists on putting these objects firmly in their original contexts: illustrations of frescoes, for example, are accompanied by plans of the buildings in which they are found and by discussions of their role in the buildings' architectural and decorative schemes.
Looking at Lovemaking offers a wide-ranging, exquisitely illustrated discussion of Roman artifacts with sexual themes. Clarke Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998.
Looking at Lovemaking: Constructions of Sexuality in Roman Art, 100 B.C.-A.D. GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 6.2 (2000) 347-350 PO Box, APO/FPO, Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, American Samoa, Angola, Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Armenia, Aruba, Azerbaijan Republic, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Benin, Bermuda, Botswana, British Virgin Islands, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cambodia, Cameroon, Cape Verde Islands, Cayman Islands, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Congo, Democratic Republic of the, Congo, Republic of the, Cook Islands, Costa Rica, Côte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast), Djibouti, Dominica, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Fiji, French Polynesia, Gabon Republic, Gambia, Georgia, Ghana, Greenland, Grenada, Guadeloupe, Guam, Guatemala, Guernsey, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kiribati, Kyrgyzstan, Lesotho, Liberia, Macedonia, Madagascar, Malawi, Maldives, Mali, Marshall Islands, Martinique, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mayotte, Micronesia, Mongolia, Montserrat, Morocco, Mozambique, Namibia, Nauru, Netherlands Antilles, New Caledonia, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, Niue, Palau, Panama, Papua New Guinea, Reunion, Russian Federation, Rwanda, Saint Helena, Saint Kitts-Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Pierre and Miquelon, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, San Marino, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Solomon Islands, Somalia, South Africa, Svalbard and Jan Mayen, Swaziland, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Togo, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Turks and Caicos Islands, Tuvalu, Uganda, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Vanuatu, Virgin Islands (U.S.In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content: