Studies in the psychology of sex. Vol. 1, Sexual inversion / by Havelock Ellis and John Addington Symonds / by Havelock Ellis.
- Havelock Ellis
- Date:
- 1897
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Studies in the psychology of sex. Vol. 1, Sexual inversion / by Havelock Ellis and John Addington Symonds / by Havelock Ellis. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![with me is necessary to any degree of pleasure, and the acts must be mutual. I am tall, slight and dark, with a small moustache. I have always been delicate and averse to all rough games. I suffer a i ' a deal from 44 nerves, and am always terribly sensitive to jarring or disturbing influence. I am passionately devoted to music, and indeed to art of all kinds, though through bad health my powers have not been developed to their proper extent. I consider the taste for sexual relations with my own sex to be perfectly natural; as either having been inherited, or as the result of having been led astray by an older man than myself at the age of puberty. [It will be observed that the word natural is here used in a peculiar sense.] At the same time I look upon it as a curse, for it is a moral barrier between the ordinary run of mankind and myself. I have contempt for those who allow the passion to conquer them, and whose life is spent in eternally seeking for people of like tastes. I never regard the act of sexual intercourse as sin, and, if comparisons must be drawn, consider this particular form as more harmless in its effects than the love of the opposite sex. Case X VI — Englishman, born in Paris ; aged 26, an actor. He belongs to an old English family; his father, so far as he is aware, had no homosexual inclinations, nor had any of his ancestors on the paternal side; but he believes that his mother's family, and especially a maternal uncle who had a strong feeling for beauty of form, were more akin to him in this respect. His earliest recollections show an attraction for males. At children's parties he incurred his father's anger by kissing other small boys, and his feelings grew in intensity with years. He has never practised self-abuse, and seldom had erotic dreams ; when they do occur they are about males. His physical feeling for women is one of absolute indifference. He admires beautiful women in the same way as one admires beautiful scenery. At the same time he likes to talk with clever women, and has formed many friendships with frank, pure, and cultivated English girls, for whom he has the utmost admiration and respect. Marriage is impossible, because physical pleasure with women is impossible ; he has tried but cannot obtain the slightest sexual feeling or excitement. He especially admires youths (though they must not be immature) from 16 or 17 to about 25. The type which physically appeals to him most, and to which he appeals, is fair, smooth-skinned, gentle, rather girlish and effeminate, with the effeminacy of the ingenue not the cocotte. His favourite to attract him must be submissive and won anly ; he likes to be the man and the master. On this point](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b2041996x_0076.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
