Fifty years of gay emancipation contrast with two thousand years of queer history in Peter Ackroyd’s survey of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender life in London. Queer City is both a commemoration and a celebration of “the ultimate triumph of London” and its diversity. Yet it also proves that it has ever been the case.
The Romans brought their brothels, catering to every requirement. “It has not been emphasised enough, perhaps due to the modesty of classicists, that Roman society was intensely phallocratic,” Ackroyd notes (with the assistance of his excellent researchers).
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