Historical Homos

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Honey, I'm sure you've heard of the Kamasutra. But did you know it's not just a sex manual for hipster white couples who are ready to graduate to doggy?
This episode goes past the schoolboy giggles the Kamasutra typically provokes to investigate what this fascinating compendium of erotic philosophy can tell us about ancient Indian queer life (and perhaps our own!).

The real Kamasutra was not just a sex manual. It is a Sanskrit treatise on kama ("desire") – which includes sexual desire, yes, but also means desire for friendship, art, music, play. All the things that make life sexy and fun, and have the potential to make you desirable to others.
Written by Vatsyayana during the Gupta empire, the text treats desire as one of life's four core aims. Kama, along with dharma (duty/morality) and artha (wealth), was seen as one of the chief aims of a well-lived life. A life that was lived in the hope of eventually achieving moksha (liberation) from the endless cycle of reincarnation.
For ancient Indians, there was no concept of "sin" – and therefore relatively little interest in policing hetero, homo, or gender-nonconforming behaviour. Certainly there was no consensus that anything their medieval compatriots in Europe were burning people at the stake for was "unnatural" or contrary to fixed laws of sexual behaviour.
This episode is a fascinating dip into what our sexual ancestors knew and did in the sack, but it's also a reminder that homosexuality has not only been around for millennia, it's been theorised over, philosophised, and incorporated into profound systems of thought that are still teaching us how to live.
So here's what you can expect:
A dramatic reading of the text's 8-step guide to a good gay blowjob (spoiler alert: mango-sucking is a transferable skill!)
A 14th-century doctor's explanation of female orgasms, which had a LOT to teach Bash about the clitoris and something called the "G Spot"...
An examination of the Victorian English response to the Kamasutra (more complicated and potentially less hateful than you'd expect!)
And, of course, our eminent scholarly guest's recommendations for how we might want to look at desire, sex, and gender in our own lives given what the Kamasutra has to say about them
Our guest this week is Ruth Vanita, eminent scholar of India's queer history and author of Love's Rite, on same-sex marriage in India.
Stay tuned for our next episode in 2 weeks, with a surprise appearance from everyone's favourite lesbian American poetess. Not telling you which one.
🎧 Listen now on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Apple Podcasts⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, or wherever you pod. Blowjob mangoes sold separately.
📱 Follow Historical Homos on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, and subscribe to our Patreon if you care about gay people, like, at all.
⭐ Most importantly, if you like what you hear, please leave us a ⭐ FIVE STAR ONLY ⭐ review on Apple Podcasts and/or Spotify.

Episode Credits

Written and hosted by Bash
Produced by Dani Henion

Edited by Alex Toskas

Guest: Ruth Vanita
© Sebastian Hendra 2026

★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

For early access to episodes and bonus content, join our Patreon. 
Our community awaits with open arms (and legs) 🤤

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ROCK. HUDSON. The name itself kind of gives your fanny the flutters, doesn't it?
Although, if you haven't heard of Rock, you would be forgiven, as he's one of those mid-20th century celebrities who's been almost entirely forgotten today.
But back in the 50s and 60s, he was a major heartthrob and a household name.
Rock was one of the lucky Hollywood actors who worked his way up through the studio contract system after World War II – despite having zero acting training and a famous inability to remember lines.
He was, however, extremely hot, and many have (rightly) seen that as a talent of its own.
A Navy vet, Rock arrived fresh off the bus in Los Angeles around 1946, met some gay guys, got recruited by a scuzzy (also gay) agent, and the rest...was gay history.
Extremely closeted history, however. Because while Rock's penchant for peen was no secret to the industry, his studio, agent, and inner circle rigorously managed his heterosexual image to "protect" his lucrative career. This gambit worked, and eventually landed him roles opposite the likes of Elizabeth Taylor, Doris Day, and Jimmy Dean.
But the question is: how much did Rock himself resent this closet?
Despite all the fabulous gay pool parties, great friends, and gorgeous lovers, he was loath to discuss his private life with anyone. A not uncommon approach for actors, but especially in the tight-lipped 50s when one's life "behind closed doors" was supposed to remain out of sight and out of mind, even amongst friends.
Long after the studio relinquished Rock from his contract and their publicity machine, and even as public opinion about homosexuality had begun to change, Rock guarded the doors of his closet scrupulously. (Wow, good use of "scrupulously"!!!!)
It was only in the depths of his final, tragic illness that he was forced to reveal his sexuality to the world. The extremely public scandal that followed would alter the course of queer history.
Join Bash and his brilliant guest, Alonso Duralde, this week as they delve into the deep and complicated closet Hollywood erected around Rock, reviving one of Hollywood's gayest and most deliciously handsome talents from Hollywood's Silver Age.
Make sure to grab a copy of Hollywood Pride, Alonso's wonderful survey of queer cinema history. It will give you so many amazing new films to watch and show you just how deeply our queer roots run in American film.
🎧 Listen now on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Apple Podcasts⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, or wherever you pod. Pack of cigarettes and ill-fitting 50s swimsuit sold separately.
📱 Follow Historical Homos on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, and subscribe to our Patreon if you care about gay people, like, at all.
⭐ Most importantly, if you like what you hear, please leave us a ⭐ FIVE STAR ONLY ⭐ review on Apple Podcasts and/or Spotify.

Episode Credits

Written and hosted by Bash
Produced by Dani Henion

Edited by Alex Toskas

Guest: Alonso Duralde
© Sebastian Hendra 2026
 

★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

For early access to episodes and bonus content, join our Patreon. 
Our community awaits with open arms (and legs) 🤤

www.patreon.com/historicalhomos
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Josephine Baker (1906 - 1968) is one of the most alluring, inspiring, and charismatic figures we have ever covered on this podcast.
Her career spanned decades and continents, and on THE Continent, she was the highest paid Black entertainer for most of the 1920s and 1930s. As a dancer-singer-actress triple threat, she was in some ways the precursor to megastars like Beyoncé in our own day.
Unlike Beyoncé, she built her career not only through her own talent (and Jay-Z's influence), but by taking advantage of one of the most racist, colonialist, imperialist periods in Western history: the aftermath of World War One.

Josephine became famous because she created a sensual, wild, "sauvage" style of dance, which the Jazz-frenzied denizens of gay Paree scarfed down like a good soupe à l'oignon. In their 20th century terror of what it meant to be "modern," Josephine represented a return to something raw and wonderfully original. Her nudity, her brazen dancing, her uninhibited artistry were all examples of "true" art – an instinct-driven Fuck You to modern civilisation.

They were of course racist bastards for thinking all of this – but they also genuinely loved Josephine. And Josephine loved to use their racist bullshit not only to line her pockets, but to feel their genuine love in return.
Like many (gay) performers, she lived to be loved.
Throughout her wild and successful career, Josephine presented a completely new vision of what it meant to be a woman, to be Black, and to be an unapologetic diva.

And yet, we barely remember Josephine today. BUT THAT STOPS NOW.
Strap yourselves in and or on, because this episode is another 90 minute doozy (sorry for doing such interesting research and talking to such interesting scholars! so sorry!)
All our gay thanks to Michell Chresfield for bringing her insight and brilliant research to this episode.
And now it's time to dive on in, because the water is an absolutely divine... human temperature.
🎧 Listen now on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Apple Podcasts⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, or wherever you pod. Pet cheetah and sequin nipple tassles sold separately.
📱 Follow Historical Homos on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, and subscribe to our Patreon if you care about gay people, like, at all.
⭐ Most importantly, if you like what you hear, please leave us a ⭐ FIVE STAR ONLY ⭐ review on Apple Podcasts and/or Spotify.

Episode Credits

Written and hosted by Bash
Produced by Dani Henion

Edited by Alex Toskas

Guest: Michell Chresfield
© Sebastian Hendra 2026

★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Well aren't you a lucky little piggy. This bonus episode is now available to all listeners!
Be warned: this will rarely happen again, so if you want to get the full-hog raw-dog Historical Homos experience, please consider subscribing to the Patreon.
Our community awaits you with open arms (and legs).
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HELLO MY LITTLE HORMONES!
Saw the Odyssey. Have some thoughts.
As a recovering classicist and practicing homosexual, my take is pretty simple: this is not our Odyssey.
As a pacifist and optimistic believer that humanity deserves to take care of herself, even in these dark hours, I think this film is timely and to some degree, quite moving.
Nolan may not have given us an Odyssey that any self-respecting, fun-loving, faggocious mythology nerd will treasure...but he does make some good points that we all need to hear.
This is above all an Odyssey for Trump's America, and while it is joyless, austere, and bleak (aka pure Nolan) – we should listen to what his Lordship the Dark Knight has to say.
WARNING. SPOILERS GALORE.
Love you! Bye.
© Sebastian Hendra 2026

★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

"What if the gayest thing about me is how annoying I am?" – Michelangelo, unverified
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For early access to episodes and bonus content, join our Patreon. 
Our community awaits with legs open and lips parted 🤤

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OK we all know Michelangelo. The David. The Sistine Chapel. Blah blah blah.
But did you know he was also 100% a homosexual, according to basically every source we have?
Of course you don't! Because the straight agenda has kept it under wraps for centuries – and because Mike's version of gay tends to make us all a little bit uncomfortable these days.
Instead of settling down and marrying a woman like a good Italian Catholic, Michelangelo spent his life obsessing over his work, himself, male bodies, and the teenaged apprentices he liked to flop around with behind the scenes.
Because yes, like so many Historical Homos before him, Mike's taste in men skewed uncomfortably young.
He was, like all his Florentine compatriots, obsessed with sodomy – and in Renaissance Florence, that usually meant pederasty, which back then meant men in their 20s and 30s (or older) pursuing teenage boys.
Perhaps this is why when we talk Michelangelo today, we don't talk gay. Instead, we focus on the sculptures and paintings that made his name, changed Western art, and still attract the wonder and awe of all who gaze upon them.
Well, this episode believes we can talk about BOTH. Who was Michelangelo before he was Michelangelo? Was he always gay, or did the Medici court turn him? Did he sculpt the David because of pederasty, or just to prove a point to Leonardo da Vinci? And did he ever find love in his incredibly long life?
 
Hark! The answers to all these questions and more begin to trickle into your tight little earholes, from the genius brain of Professor Catherine Fletcher, who joins once again to walk us through the gayest Renaissance in history.
So strap your inflatable marble dildos on and let's get dive in! The water is, of course, human temperature.
🎧 Listen now on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Apple Podcasts⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, or wherever you pod. Sistine Chapel and marble cum gutters sold separately.
📱 Follow Historical Homos on ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, and do ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠sign up to our newsletter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ if you care about gay people, like, at all.
⭐ Most importantly, if you like what you hear, please leave us a ⭐ FIVE STAR ONLY ⭐ review on Apple Podcasts and/or Spotify.
Episode Credits

Written and hosted by Bash
Edited by Alex Toskas
Produced by Dani Henion
Guest: Catherine Fletcher
© Sebastian Hendra 2026

★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★