Quentin Crisp

1908-1999
I have three stories about Quentin Crisp.
After one of his “Evening with”s that he endlessly toured the country with, I asked him to sign a copy of his book for my mother. As he was doing so I told him that she thought he gave homosexuals a bad name! “Forgive me!” he wrote on the title page.
We used to do the same gay talking circuit during the time I was secretary of what was then called the “Gay Teachers’ Group” and we frequently attended each other’s gigs. One evening he took me to aside and said, “Dear boy, you know you tell at least three different stories about your coming out as a teacher?” And he was right – not mistaken, but a confirmation that you never only come out once. I used to tell whichever story most amused me at the time. And there were far more than three!
Having relocated to New York he was asked by one journalist or another if he attended any of the many gay clubs in New York. He replied, “Disco music is too high a price to pay for one’s sexuality.”
He was particularly loved by the straight world that found his combination of wit, bravery and victimhood both reassuring and unthreatening.
That he was a key figure in our fight for visibility is beyond doubt. However his self-loathing prevents him from doing much to change the world for others.
In his own words he was “one of the stately homos of England”, but that probably says more about England than Quentin Crisp.
I first became aware of Quentin Crisp after the John Hurt drama “The Naked Civil Servant”. I always felt that he showed an amazing strength of character to live his life in such open contrast to the social norm, and his personal presence was such that he could get away with his humorous self-proclaimed nickname of “one of the stately homos of England”. I feel that his high profile persona has at least raised the collective awareness of gay people among heterosexuals.