The Lord of the Rings

I had a friend in high school who claimed to have read J.R.R. Tolkien's  Lord of the Rings trilogy straight through 38 times (for a fast reader, that would take 2 hours per day, every day, for 5 years). I barely made it through once, with lots of skimming, , but I returned to certain passages over and over again.  They were "good beyond hope."

A company of men.  Working together, fighting, rescuing each other, hugging, saving the world.

Heterosexual desire almost absent: Tom Bombadil is devoted to Goldberry, the Ents pine away for the Entwives, Aragorn pines for Arwen (though not as much as in the movie series), and a few poems and songs say things like "Little Princess Mee -- Lovely was she," but nobody read them anyway.

And lots of same-sex romance.

1.  Everyone today sees a romance between Frodo and Sam, especially as portrayed by Elijah Wood and Sean Astin in the movie series.  But I didn't see it.  Tolkien was highly class conscious, and Frodo and Sam are master and devoted servant.  At the end of the story, Frodo goes to the Undying Lands by himself, and Sam goes home to his wife.

But I did notice that Frodo is gay.  He surrounds himself with men and never once mentions a woman.  (He reveres Galadriel, but as a goddess to be worshipped, not as an object of desire). 

2. Merry and Pippin (played by Dominic Monaghan and Billy Boyd in the movie) are devoted to each other.  They go through deadly danger for each other, and when they are split up, each pines for the other.  After the War of the Ring, they go to work for Aragorn, so they can stay together forever.

3. The Elf Legolas and the Dwarf Gimli (played by Orlando Bloom and John Rhys-Davies in the movie) are sworn enemies, working together only to fight a greater evil.  But as the novels progress, they develop a grudging admiration, then a friendship, then a romance.  Neither seeks out a wife.

After the War of the Rings, when Legolas goes to the Undying Lands, Gimli comes with him. Tolkien comments:

It is strange that a Dwarf should be willing to leave Middle Earth for any love, or that the Eldar (Elvish Gods) should receive him, or that the Lords of the West should permit it. . .More cannot be said about this matter.

This is a curious way to end the discussion, suggesting not that Tolkien has no more information on the subject (of course he does, he wrote the books and he could invent any information he wanted), but that he is forbidden from saying more.  What is forbidding him?  It seems that, in attempting to understand Legolas and Gimli, their love for each other, and their motive for forsaking Middle Earth together, Tolkien is drawing dangerously close to acknowledging a love that he dare not acknowledge, and he abruptly forbids himself from considering the matter further.

 Tolkien was no doubt quite as homophobic as others of his generation, or moreso, a conservative Roman Catholic who eschewed the modern era.  But his subject matter  -- Medieval epics like Beowulf and The Nibelungenlied -- traditionally minimize heterosexual exploits to concentrate on the manly love of comrades.  Tolkien couldn't help but acknowledge it, on some level, whether he wanted to or not.

Classics Illustrated

A decade after the Seduction of the Innocent scandal that blamed comic books for single-handedly causing the downfall of society, teachers still thought they were cesspools of corruption.  Archie, Casper the Friendly Ghost, Little Lulu -- it didn't matter.  The only comics we could read with impunity at recess or summer camp were Classics Illustrated, the long-running series of comic adaption of adventure classics: Moby Dick, The Last of the Mohicans, Around the World in 80 Days.  

The publishers quickly ran out of adventure classics and began presenting adaptions of obscure works that no one except literary scholars ever read, like Eugene Sue's Mysteries of Paris, Emile Zola's The Downfall, Jules Verne's Michael Strogoff, and Charles Nordhoff & James Hall's The Hurricane. 

But regardless of the "classic," you could always depend on shirtless and semi-nude muscle shots to draw the eye to the cover art.  Who knew that Mark Twain's Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court had such a buffed physique?

There was also a Classics Junior series, with fairy tales and mythology.  The Magic Pitcher was about the muscular Hermes of Greek mythology dishing out a cornucopia, with disastrous consequences.

Mark Harmon

Former footballer Mark Harmon moved into modeling and then into acting during the 1970s, with roles in the usual suspects: Emergency, Adam-12, Police Woman, Love Boat.  He starred in three tv series: Sam (1977-78), 240-Robert (1979-80), Flamingo Road (1980-82), and St. Elsewhere (1983-86).

But I didn't watch any of those programs: I knew him from Battle of the Network Stars, which shoved hunks into Speedos and paraded them around for us: he appeared in 1981, 1982, and twice in 1984.

And for Let's Get Harry (1986), a rehash of the man-mountain genre, in which a regular guy named Harry (Mark Harmon) is taken hostage in Colombia, and a group of regular guys, including his brother (Michael Schoeffling, not to be confused with John F. Kennedy Jr., left) and best friend (Gary Busey, who previously appeared in Big Wednesday) come to the rescue.  Buddy-bonding, beefcake, and minimal heterosexual interest.

And for Summer School (1987), in which a slacker substitute teacher takes his class to the beach.  There's a heterosexist boy-meets-girl plot, but a huge amount of male nudity, especially Kevin (Patrick Labyorteaux) (Matthew's brother) and Larry (Ken Olandt), who takes a summer job as a stripper.  Plus a nicely-realized crush between slackers Dave (Gary Foley) and Chainsaw (Dean Cameron), a precursor to Orange County's Arlo and Chad.

While I wasn't looking, Mark Harmon was stacking up Golden Globes, Emmies, and up lots of "most beautiful people" award;, appearing nude in Playgirl;  and playing a doctor who contracts AIDS (through unprotected sex with a woman) on St. Elsewhere.  He's currently the central character on NCIS, which has had several gay-themed episodes.