early "gay" cite

[Joel S. Berson]

Jon,

If this from 1932/1933/1937 can be confirmed as really referring to
homosexuality, will you consent to removing the square brackets
surrounding the OED's 1938 quotation from "Bringing Up Baby"?   :-)

And perhaps they could be removed from some of the other 1922 to 1941
OED quotations as well.  (I don't have HDAS on line or shelf.)

(I note that Ron Butters once wrote "1. The remark was an ad lib,
made up by Grant himself." and "3. Thus the audience in the late
1930s would certainly not have known GAY = 'homosexual' (except maybe
some gay people themselves, who at the time preferred QUEER or THAT
WAY as terms of self-reference."

(What the audience would not know is not evidence of Grant's intended
meaning, *particularly* if it was an ad lib.  And it does not have to
be a pun; it could be simply intended for those in the know.)

Joel

At 9/21/2011 05:50 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>Worth checking. HDAS quotes earlier McAlmon writings, however, none of which
>appeared to me to use the word in the given sense.
>
>The word he preferred in _A Companion Volume_ (1923) was "queer."
>
>
>JL
>
>On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 4:22 PM, Mullins, Bill AMRDEC <
>Bill.Mullins at us.army.mil> wrote:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       "Mullins, Bill AMRDEC" <Bill.Mullins at US.ARMY.MIL>
> > Subject:      early "gay" cite (UNCLASSIFIED)
> >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
> > Caveats: NONE
> >
> > Natalie Galustian's "Catalogue of Early Gay Fiction"
> > http://www.nataliegalustian.com/theyWereWhatTheyWere.pdf
> > includes four editions of "Scarlet Pansy" by Robert Scully (probably a
> > pseud. for Robert McAlmon), published as far back as 1932.
> >
> > The catalogue quotes Hugh Hagius as saying "McAlmon is, I believe, the
> > first writer to use 'gay' in the sense of same-sex orientation."  And
> > Fred Shapiro in a Jul 15 2003 ADS-L posts quotes part of a Gary Simes
> > article which has citations from "Scarlet Pansy" which support this.
> >
> > The citations are not given any significant context by Simes, and the
> > auction catalogue doesn't elaborate either, but it is clear that the
> > book is full of gay content.
> > Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
> > Caveats: NONE
> >
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> >
>
>
>
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