Friends to Lovers

[osprey_archer]

And when I thought how my dear friend my lover was on his way
coming, O then I was happy, - Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

When Civil War soldiers wrote to their wives, they often began their letters “Esteemed Friend.” (Actually they tended to spell it “Esteamed Friend.”) - Bell Irvin Wiley, The Life of Billy Yank

“As for William, he could never have been so wise, so tender, so lovable, so altogether delightful and worshipful, had it not been for his long guardianship of [his sister] Agatha. He has been father, mother, brother and lover to her.” - Florence Morse Kingsley, The Queer Browns, 1907. (I cannot emphasize enough that these Browns are queer because they are socialists.)

As I’ve been working on Sleeping Beauty, one of the things I’ve been thinking about/playing with/tearing my hair out over is the way that the meaning of “friend” and “lover” (and also just “love”) shifted over time between 1865 and 1965. Specifically:

1. Whitman uses “dear friend” and “lover” more or less as synonyms and the entire American reading public apparently found this a completely normal description of affectionate male friendship until about 1890, at which point people began occasionally to have Concerns.

2. In other contexts lover often specifically refers to an as-yet-unrequited romantic relationship: a girl’s “lovers” are the young men who are in love with her, whether or not she returns the feeling. If she does, he is then an “accepted lover.” Are they having sex? Probably not! Maybe? Who knows.

3. Also APPARENTLY you could use the word “lover” about a sister’s feeling for her beloved big brother without the entire reading public going INCEST??? The fact that William has been “father, mother, brother and lover” to his sister Agatha is not at all disturbing but the very reason he is “so wise, so tender, so lovable.” In this case lover seems to mean “shining ideal that the person looks up to very very much but not at all in a sex way.” Hero worship! (I have for a long time wondered how British boarding schools got the whole "You don't have a CRUSH, it's just HERO WORSHIP" thing going, but if that's part of the cultural understanding of crushes anyway...)

4. By the 1960s, “lovers” tends to describe a reciprocated romantic relationship, probaby with extramarital sex. (When my high school class was reading Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar in the 2000s, we all had a good snicker about the guy who signs a letter to Julius Caesar “Your lover.” IIRC he’s never even met Caesar. He just loves him in a “Don’t want you to die, bro” kind of way.)

5. In the 1960s friendship means DEFINITELY PLATONIC and if a man began a letter to his wife “esteemed friend” it would probably count as evidence in divorce court, but in the 1860s this was a warm and loving way in which many men began letters to their dear wives with whom they have had sex at LEAST five times based on the number of children produced by the marriage.

(I just find the “esteemed friend” thing so funny because nowadays I’m pretty sure the only people who use it are senators who hate each other. “My esteemed friend from Georgia would have us believe…”)

6. So when Whitman starts talking about his “dear friends” he’s not so much using a euphemism as using a word that in his context gives you no information at all about whether these people are having sex. Could be your bestie you have no sexual feelings for but would die for should the need arise. Could be your lawfully wedded spouse that you bang six times a week and twice on Sundays. Could be your friend you haven’t had sex sex with but you definitely share a bed whenever possible and kiss each other’s faces while murmuring fond words of deep emotional attachment. Who knows!

Anyway, yes, as you can imagine this is an absolute nightmare to try to write, and there is 100% a scene where they kiss among the wildflowers and afterward Russell gazes tenderly into Andrew’s eyes and murmurs, “You’re my dearest friend,” at which point steam rolls out of Andrew’s ears all “how the FUCK could you SAY that to me after kissing my entire FACE do you expect me to JOIN you in pretending this is platonic friendship???”

Comments

[asakiyume]

I'm laughing myself to tears at your no. 5. Evidence in divorce court! 😂 And you're so right about it being used in Congress omg.

and your no. 6 is making me laugh nearly as hard. Could be your friend you haven’t had sex sex with but you definitely share a bed whenever possible and kiss each other’s faces while murmuring fond words of deep emotional attachment. 😂

[troisoiseaux]

I just find the “esteemed friend” thing so funny because nowadays I’m pretty sure the only people who use it are senators who hate each other. “My esteemed friend from Georgia would have us believe…”

Ah yes, the "bless your heart" effect.

[regshoe]

E. M. Forster's Maurice and Edward Prime-Stevenson's Imre, both fiction about gay men written in the Edwardian period, both use 'friend' to mean 'romantic-sexual partner' in ways that seem to be playing with the equivocal meaning for deliberate effect, and it's something I like very much about both of them. In Imre the phrase 'the friendship which is love, the love which is friendship' is repeated at several pivotal moments (sometimes with Significant Capitals).

All of which is to say, it's a really interesting question! (as is the question of changing ideas about types of love in general, really). I didn't know that 'friend' was sometimes used between (heterosexual) actual married couples—that makes it even more interesting.

your friend you haven’t had sex sex with but you definitely share a bed whenever possible and kiss each other’s faces while murmuring fond words of deep emotional attachment. —hahaha, excellent summary of a specific sort of 19th C Thing...

[sovay]

Whitman uses “dear friend” and “lover” more or less as synonyms and the entire American reading public apparently found this a completely normal description of affectionate male friendship until about 1890, at which point people began occasionally to have Concerns.

"Friend" and "friendship" are used with specifically romantic, queer connotations as late as 1920, cf. this journal which I found because Dorothy L. Sayers of all people contributed to it.

[minutia_r]

This isn't exactly the same, but I've been reading Robert Louis Stevenson's A Child's Garden of Verses, in which he refers to his childhood nurse, while dedicating the book to her, as "my second Mother, my first Wife", which, as a modern reader, kind of makes me go yikes, but apparently this was considered unexceptional enough to publish in a children's book.

So yeah, it does seem like in the nineteenth century you could have both friend (sexual) and wife (platonic).

[katherine]

This is fascinating!

I just finished re-reading Sutcliff's Flame-coloured Taffeta set in 1750 or thereabouts, in which the local witch calls anyone and everyone, down to her cat, lover.

[oracne]

The fine line between historically accurate and what the modern-day readers will understand!

[genarti]

Oh wow, this is fascinating! I knew about some of the "friend" uses, but not about the sheer extent of the overlap here.

[lokifan]

(I just find the “esteemed friend” thing so funny because nowadays I’m pretty sure the only people who use it are senators who hate each other. “My esteemed friend from Georgia would have us believe…”)

LMAO!

The shift in "lover" is blowing my mind.