Back to the story of Mary Shelley and Washington Irving ...
Of course, Payne had well
prepared Irving for what he was going to read; it was no surprise to the
American that Mary was interested in him. But now, in the correspondence, he
was learning some details. I try to imagine what he was thinking as he read
those letters—letters that Mary surely knew (hoped?) Payne would share with
Irving. Was he shocked? Worried? Horrified? Flattered? All of the above?
The only thing we know for
certain is that he was not “interested”—not
in the way Mary clearly was. And why not? Mary Shelley—to my mind—was one of
the most interesting women I’ve ever read about. Brilliant (think about Frankenstein—published when she was only
twenty years old!), attractive (from all accounts), diligent, a wonderful
mother (her only living son, Percy, adored her), a loyal friend, and on and on.
What’s not to like?
Well, for Irving, one thing was
surely her reputation. Her elopement with the married Bysshe Shelley when she
was just sixteen, her well-known friendship with the notorious Lord Byron, her
controversial parents (Godwin and Wollstonecraft—also publicly reviled for
their social and political beliefs and behavior)—all of these were factors that
would cause a cautious man to hesitate.
And, naturally, there’s really
nothing too rational about the attractions between the sexes. You can’t talk
yourself into desire. It’s there or it isn’t. Mary clearly felt it; Irving
clearly did not.
But there’s another possibility
that has occurred to some—including a few of his biographers. Was Washington
Irving gay? A couple of recent biographers have dealt more or less directly
with it. In his The Original
Knickerbocker: The Life of Washington Irving (2007), Andrew Burstein is
less explicit. For so long indefinite in
his stated attractions, he writes, the
self-conscious bachelor did not express hunger for women; rather, he sought
innocent perfection from them.[1]
Bryan J. Jones—in his Washington Irving: An American Original
(2008)—is more direct: Irving’s possible
homosexuality must also be considered. … Once Matilda [Hoffman, his early love]
died, however, Irving [just about to turn 26], the gay bachelor—perhaps literally—was
off the hook for the rest of his life. He could simply claim, as sentimental
biographers did for decades, that Matilda’s death had so scarred him that it
was impossible for him to ever marry another.[2]
There’s been some speculation
online, as well (Google it!), and one site shows that 67% of those voting said
that Irving was gay. Of course, the only thing scientific about this finding is
that it uses a number; the rest? Worthless.[3]
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