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Sebastian Earl on Michael's lack of girl-friends at Oxford being "perfectly normal".

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ss7220

According to Nico, he [Michael] had a lot of friends who we were girls. But he didn't have any girlfriends.<br /> <br /> I don't think he did! I mean I don't remember any. But why should he? He was 19, 20. 19 or 20. Well an awful lot of people go ---- I only had one girlfriend and not very much at that. I got engaged when I was 20. Just 20. And my wife was 18. That was 56 years ago. We had to wait 5 years to get married. I had to hear wedding bells. But I mean, it wasn't that you see. In those days at Oxford, it wasn't natural. Some of the undergraduates occasionally would go up to London and have a woman and come back on the fornicator. But the idea of having to do anything with any women at Oxford, simply wasn't done. And Eton as well? Oh Eton absolutely. It was unthinkable at Eton. There was the famous case of a chap called Harold Barker. We had these school shields -- a little gold thing. He broke out one night and went to a ball. And fell in love with a girl, gave her one of his school shields. And the girl told her father. And I think Harold Barker was sent from Eton for it. It was most unusual. That was sort of an earthquaking thing. You just had nothing to do with girls at university. It wasn't expected of anybody. Michael's life was so full and gay and delightful. I think absolutely possible that....quite a lot of chaps were mildly homosexual in school. He never had any tradition at all. And he was absolutely unknown in McNaughtern's house. There were certain houses, known for homosexuality. Not McNaughten's. Frightfully bi...

Post Date - 13 Mar 2020 18:28 | Report
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