Page:Lovers Legends - The Gay Greek Myths.pdf/57

Rh suits the woodlands of Aphrodite, I will say, Callicratidas, that it is allowed to make use of a woman in the fashion of a boy, the road being open to a double enjoyment, but the male must never lend himself to effeminate delights.

That is why, if a woman can satisfy the lover of boys, let him abstain from the latter; or else, if males can conjoin with males, then from now on allow women also to love each other. Come, men of the new age, you legislators of strange thrills: having blazed fresh trails for men's pleasures, grant women the same license. Let them commingle as do the males: let a woman, girded with those obscene implements, monstrous toys of sterility, lie with another woman, just as a man with another man. Let those filthy lesbians, word that only rarely reaches my ears because modesty forbids it, triumph freely. Let our schools for girls be nothing but the domain of Philenis, dishonored by androgynous loves. And yet, would it not be better to see a woman play the man than to see a man take on the role of a woman?


 * Having uttered these words with fire and conviction, Charicles grew quiet, his gaze still terrible, almost ferocious. He seemed to have made a conjuration to atone for all male loves. As for me, I glanced at the Athenian with a gentle smile and said, "I had thought, Callicratidas, that I would merely be judging some game, or lark, but here I find myself, due to Charicles' vehemence, referee over a more serious cause. He has grown heated beyond measure, as if on the Areopagus, pleading for a murderer, or a criminal arsonist, or, by Zeus, for an affair of poison. It is time now to make recourse to Athena's help: may the eloquence of Pericles and the tongues of the ten orators marshaled against the Macedonians make your harangue worthy of those declaimed on the Pnyx!

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