I knew the disgrace and humiliation of gay people. Oscar Wilde had taught me that it would be a life of mockery, exile and secrecy.
And then there were those writers, like EM Forster or Somerset Maugham, who held their heads up high and made me feel that it wasn’t all slime and grim mackintosh people in a terrible world of darkness.In the ’80s, I was known as ‘Celibate Stephen.’ I was so excited by my work that I forgot to have sex.
It was also fear: I always felt rejected in gay bars. I couldn’t dance; I didn’t look cool. All I wanted was to sit and talk.