by Liv Barefoot

HUM124 with Jeremy Phillips

In the contemporary world there is an ever-growing tolerance and even acceptance of queer identities including those that fall under the sapphic and/or lesbian umbrella; yet, in this modern world, there is still a convoluted uphill battle for accurate representation in all forms of media–including literature. However, sapphic identities are nothing new, in fact, such identities are believed to be observed as far back as 640-570 BCE with the ancient Greek lyric poet, Sappho. Sappho’s poetry, especially her famous hymn to the goddess Aphrodite, undoubtedly exemplifies some of the earliest expressions of sapphism/lesbianism–both modern terms centered around Sappho herself–and more broadly women’s sexuality despite the intense heteronormative suppression and silencing her works have endured. 

Firstly, who exactly is Sappho? While little is truly known about the details of her personal life and story, accounts from the “‘Suda,’ a tenth-century Byzantine encyclopedia of ancient culture,” helps piece together the puzzle of who she was (Mendelsohn). According to ancient texts, she is described as being “short in stature and dark in complexion” (Mark). Some of the other more certain details of her life include how she was born into an aristocratic family on the island of Lesbos around 640 BCE and was raised being taught to play the lyre–hence her poems being lyrical. The circumstances regarding her demise are unknown and most historians decide to conjecture that she simply died of old age around 570 BCE as she lived long enough to write about her “graying hair and cranky knees” (Mendelsohn). Moreover, the ancient Greek society she lived in was heavily patriarchal with fathers selecting husbands for their daughters and women having little to no purpose in society other than child-rearing or domestic house activities (Cartwright).

Unfortunately, many of her works have become heavily fragmented with large pieces missing due to the lack of preservation of her works, and are therefore assigned a number in place of their lost titles. In her best-preserved piece, titled Ode to Aphrodite, lines 18 through 24 are devoted to portraying how Sappho hopes Aphrodite will help her “harness [the] love” of her unrequited beloved, who notably uses “she” pronouns; it is such verses that begin to spark the initial curiosity surrounding her sexuality (Rayor 52). This is mainly attributed to the fact that, in such verses, it seems apparent how much she appeared to directly comprehend sapphic emotions in a time when lesbianism is scarcely documented. Ultimately, by the late 6th century CE, her popularity and inferred affinity with homosexuality led to “the meaning of the term lesbian [changing] from ‘one from Lesbos’ to ‘a woman who prefers her own sex [or gender]’” (Mark).

As her poetry was discovered and recognized more, so was her sexuality. In fact, ancient writers, who had notably sounder access to better-preserved versions of her work and more immediate reports about her disposition, while notably “prais[ing]” her knack for lyrics, also posed a stark critique of her “behaving as a masculine woman” (Mark). Then, later on around 1073 CE, there is evidence that the medieval church’s Pope Gregory VII ordered her poetry to be burned “to suppress lesbian love poetry” (Mark). Similarly, some playwrights shamed her for having “loose morals” with one theologian even writing that she was a “sex-crazed whore who sings of her own wantonness” (Mendelsohn). On a less vulgar but equally as invalidating note, early German scholarship attempted to clarify that while what she felt was indeed “love” it was far less “objectionable, vulgarly sensual, and illegal,” and therefore platonic which aligns with what many early classicists did, which involved clamoring for more “innocent” explanations–meaning ones that did not involve her being queer (Mendelsohn). In all instances, with the latter ones being more overtly against her sexuality, there is some degree of scorn and revulsion surrounding her open expressions of desire and sexuality; and her apparent queer declaration of sexuality, no less.

Likewise, despite it being “generally accepted that Sappho was a gay poet”–and believing her poetry harbored her personal sapphic attraction–many modern scholars have also countered with the assertion that the queer woman portrayed in her works was merely a separate “persona” and thus “advise against reading her works biographically” (Mark). Even if it were to be read with some level of detachment from Sappho and her sexuality, her works still vividly illustrate the infatuation of one woman with another thereby still underscoring its sapphic representation. Moreover, lines such as, “[Aphrodite,] Come to me now again, release me from / this pain, everything in my spirits longs / to have fulfilled, fulfill, and you / be my ally” in her Ode to Aphrodite, capture and seem to suggest an innately personal and emotional understanding of the fervor and woes of sapphic unrequited love (Rayor 52). Furthermore, it seems important to note that these scholars fail to consider an important question: Given the “intimacy” and deeply personal sentiment of the lyrics, why choose to make the person of interest a woman rather than a man–especially in the era she lived in–if sapphic attraction was not to some degree something she experienced (Mark)? It seems far less controversial and simple to have just made the unnamed woman’s (or her own) infatuation to be with a man; hence why her choice to make the lover a woman so captivating–so captivating that it has sparked three millennia-long debates and scrutiny. 

Then again, there are women scholars such as Mary R. Lefkowitz and Maureen B. Fant who continue to advocate for Sappho’s identity as a lesbian by noting, “Many of [Sappho’s] poems describe a world that men never saw: the deep love women could feel for one another in a society that kept the sexes apart” (Mark). What this references, is the aforementioned patriarchal society Sappho dwelled in that left women in the domestic sphere while men engaged in the outside world–the same society that could have forced her to marry under the instruction of an older male relative around the “typical age of 13 or 14” and in which she likely could not openly express her desires for risk of being punished by a male authority figure (Cartwright). As such, the potential inability to openly express her desires, especially for other women whom she may have come into contact with in the domestic sphere, made lyric poetry a viable outlet to express herself. So, even if she were perhaps married to a man at some point as some scholars claim to be the case, this could point to a number of additional possibilities, including being bisexual or pansexual (still sapphic identities for women) or nevertheless being lesbian but just forced into a heterosexual marriage–just because these labels did not happen to exist back then, does not erase the existence of such feelings.  

Over the course of history, both ancient and more contemporary, ancient authorities, historical scholars, classicists, and even some of her fellow poets and writers have aimed to discredit and almost totally erase the sapphic nature of her lyric; yet, despite the harsh rejection of her sexuality across the ages, her radiant poetry has still shined through the dense fog of heteronormitivity. Thus, regardless of debates raging on and whether Sappho herself may or may not have identified as queer in some capacity, her poetry serves as a beacon and “inspiration” for the LGBTQ+ community today–allowing sapphics in particular to depict our continuous existence (Mark). 

Works Cited

Cartwright, Mark. “Women in Ancient Greece.” World History Encyclopedia. 27 July 2016. Web. https://www.worldhistory.org/article/927/women-in-ancient-greece/. Accessed 15 Nov. 2022.

Mark, Joshua J. “Sappho of Lesbos.” World History Encyclopedia. 10 June 2021. Web. https://www.worldhistory.org/Sappho_of_Lesbos/. Accessed 15 Nov. 2022.

Mendelsohn, Daniel. “Girl, Interrupted: Who was Sappho?” New Yorker. Condé Nast, 9 Mar. 2015. Web.  https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/03/16/girl-interrupted. Accessed 15 Nov. 2022.

Rayor, Diane J. and W. R. Johnson. “Sappho.” Sappho’s Lyre: Archaic Lyric and Women Poets of Ancient Greece, University of California Press, 1991, pp. 51-82. JSTOR,  http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/j.ctt1ppgxf.10. Accessed 15 Nov. 2022.