The first page of Jeremy Reed's 'autobiographical exploration of sexuality' finds him with 'a red gash of lipstick' on his mouth, pondering whether to take the ten steps down to a beach where men sunbathe nude. He is androgynous, 16, 'looking for a new species'. James Kirkup also admits to androgyny and to a passion for make-up, from childhood when he experimented with his mother's make-up box, through the time when, as head of the English Department at the Bath Academy of Art, he appeared in his own play for children wearing white tights and with gold sequins on his upper eyelids, right into middle age. Swinburne had a sympathetic line or two for androgynes:

LRB 15 August 1991 | PDF Download