The Edward Carpenter
Archive
(edwardcarpenter.net)
Links to
simondawson.com
Website

If you want to get an excellent biography of Edward Carpenter you can do no better than to obtain Sheila Rowbotham's "Edward Carpenter - A Life of Liberty and Love".

It is a detailed but readable book which captures Carpenter's style and spirit.

	The Edward Carpenter Archive
	A web-based archive of works by and about Edward Carpenter, famous for his thoughts on on spirituality, sexuality and socialism.

Books |Pamphlets | Music | Unpublished Works | Police Investigation

Introduction to the Edward Carpenter Archive
Using the Carpenter Archive	Notes about the Archive - how to browse the site and find the document you want
Bibliography	A listing of Carpenter's Writing - Books, pamphlets, music and letters
Video Biography	A Youtube video detailing Carpenter's life and work
Biographical Note	A short guide to Carpenter's life, written by Philip Taylor.

Announcing My New Teaching Project - switchingview

In 2024 I launched a YouTube/website based teaching project inspired by the writings of Edward Carpenter. I want to bring his ideas up to date using modern research.

Like Carpenter, the switchingview project tells positive stories about LGBTQIA+ people from centuries past. It explores the relationship between homosexual people and religion and corrects centuries of prejudice and distortion.

It describes how in many cultures, right across the world and across history, homosexual and other LGBTQIA+ people were valued for the gifts they brought to their cultures. Sadly the Christian church developed teachings that were critical of these people. As Christianity spread across the world LGBTQIA+ people were attacked, pagan and indigenous cultures suppressed, and across the world these varied queer histories have been all but forgotten.

It is now time to challenge that suppression, to recover these histories, and to appreciate the full diversity of what LGBTQIA+ lives have been, and can be in the future.

I use social media to tell these stories - through YouTube videos and a website. I want the stories to be accessible to anybody in the world with a mobile phone or PC, rather than being locked away in a university library.

The switchingview.com website gives more information.

EDWARD CARPENTER ARCHIVE MAIN INDEX
Books \|Pamphlets \|Music \| Unpublished Works \| Police Investigation

Part 1 - BOOKS	My Days and Dreams - (Edward Carpenter's Autobiography)
	Towards Democracy
	Pagan and Christian Creeds: Their Origin and Meaning
	Intermediate Types among Primitive Folk
	The Intermediate Sex
	Anthology of Friendship - Iolaus

My Days and Dreams - (Edward Carpenter's Autobiography) Text used on website - First Edition - 1916
Title Page and Preface	bibliographic information and list of illustrations
Chapter 1	Brighton
Chapter 2	My Parents
Chapter 3	Cambridge
Chapter 4	University Extension and Northern Towns
Chapter 5	Bradway and Towards Democracy
Chapter 6	Manual Work and Market Gardening
Chapter 7	Sheffield and Socialism
Chapter 8	Trade and Philosophy
Chapter 9	Millthorpe and Household Life
Chapter 10	Millthorpiana
Chapter 11	The Story of My Books
Chapter 12	Personalities - I
Chapter 13	Personalities - II
Chapter 14	London and Lectures
Chapter 15	Translations and Translators
Chapter 16	Rural Conditions
Chapter 17	How the World Looks at Seventy
Appendix 1	Appendix 1 - Congratulatory Letter and Reply
Appendix II	Appendix 2 - Bibliography

Towards Democracy Text used on website - Complete Edition. 18th Impresion. 5th Edition. Reset with a foreward by Gilbert Beith. London, George Allen and Unwin, 1949.
Title Page, Foreward, and Bibliographic Information	-
Extracts from Towards Democracy	Selected extracts from parts 1 to 4
A Note on "Towards Democracy"	By Edward Carpenter - Reprinted from The Labour Prophet (May 1894)

Pagan and Christian Creeds: Their Origin and Meaning Text used on website - First Edition - 1920
Title Page	Bibliographic information
Chapter 1	Introductory
Chapter 2	Solar Myths and Christian Festivals
Chapter 3	The Symbolism of the Zodiac
Chapter 4	Totem-Sacraments and Eucharists
Chapter 5	Food and Vegetation Magic
Chapter 6	Magicians, Kings and Gods
Chapter 7	Rites of Expiation and Redemption
Chapter 8	Pagan Initiations and the Second Birth
Chapter 9	Myth of the Golden Age
Chapter 10	The Saviour-God and the Virgin-Mother
Chapter 11	Ritual Dancing
Chapter 12	The Sex-Taboo
Chapter 13	The Genesis of Christianity
Chapter 14	The Meaning of it All
Chapter 15	The Ancient Mysteries
Chapter 16	The Exodus of Christianity
Chapter 17	Conclusion
Appendix I	On the Teaching of the Upanishads, part 1 - Rest
Appendix II	On the Teaching of the Upanishads, part 2 - The Nature of the Self

Intermediate Types among Primitive Folk Text used on website - American edition. New York, Mitchell Kennerley, 1914.
Title Page and Introduction	Including bibliographic information
Part 1 - The Intermediate in the Service of Religion
Chapter 1	As Prophet or Priest
Chapter 2	As Wizard or Witch
Chapter 3	As Inventors of the Arts and Crafts
Chapter 4	Hermaphrodism
Part 2 - The Intermediate as Warrior
Chapter 5	Military Comradeship among the Dorian Greeks
Chapter 6	The Dorian Comradeship in Relation to the Status of Woman
Chapter 7	It's Relation to Civic Life and Religion
Chapter 8	The Samurai of Japan: and Their Ideal
Chapter 9	Conclusion

The Intermediate Sex Text used on website - London, George Allen & Unwin, 1930 reprint.
Title Page and Introduction	-
Chapter 1	Introductory
Chapter 2	The Intermediate Sex
Chapter 3	The Homogenic Attachment
Chapter 4	Affection in Education
Chapter 5	The Place of the Uranian in Society
Appendix	-

Anthology of Friendship - Iolaus Text used on website - Third edition. Title changed to Anthology of Friendship (Iolaus). Published by George Allen & Unwin, 1915.
Title Page and Preface	Including bibliographic information
Chapter 1	Friendship Customs in the Pagan and Early World
Chapter 2	The Place of Friendship in Greek Life and Thought
Chapter 3	Poetry of Friendship among Greeks and Romans
Chapter 4	Friendship in Christian and early mediaeval times
Chapter 5	The Renaissance and Modern Times
Additions [1906]	Supplements to earlier chapters, added in the enlarged Third Edition - 1906

Part 2 - PAMPHLETS

Homogenic Love

In 1894 Carpenter produced four pamphlets on issues around gender and sexuality. Three of them, "Sex-Love", "Marriage" and "Woman" explored these topics from a heterosexual perspective and were published openly. The fourth pamphlet, "Homogenic Love" was Carpenter's first attempt to discuss homosexuality and was printed privately only for limited distribution amongst friends.

The story is told Here, and a scanned copy of Homogenic love is available as a PDF document Here.

Part 3 - MUSIC

Edward Carpenter is best known today for his writings, and for his courageously honest gay lifestyle.

Carpenter is rarely thought of as a musician or composer, yet a search through the Carpenter Archive in Sheffield, or a quick glance through the bibliography, will show that Carpenter left behind a quantity of both published and unpublished music.

MEDITATION - Composed by Carpenter

The Carpenter's Music web-page attempts to bring Carpenter's music to wider notice, both as downloadable soundfiles in downloadable sheet music for your own performance.

Part 4 - UNPUBLISHED WORKS

Through this website I am occasionally made aware of various interesting but unpublished documents by or about Edward Carpenter. The most important document in this section is probably Carpenter's biography of his partner and lover George Merril. Other letters and texts may also be of interest, however, and fill small gaps in what we know about the man and his life.

If you are aware of any document that could be put on-line in this section then please get in touch.

George Merrill - a true history, & study in psychology	Carpenter's own biography and pen-portrait of George Merrill - the story of how they met, a description of Merrill's early life, and a good source document for social historians keen to learn about life for a young and attractive gay man in the slums of a Victorian northern town.

George Merrill - Letters to Edward Carpenter	George Merill is well known for the life he shared with Edward Carpenter, his same-sex lover and partner for almost forty years. But as is common with the lives of working-class men from that era, much of what we know about Merrill does not come from Merrill himself, but is in the words and opinions of other more "educated" people, and especially in the words and opinions of his lover Carpenter. Merrill's own voice is much less present. In an attempt to remedy that deficit, this web-page gives a number of letters written by Merrill to Carpenter, and gives us a chance to hear Merrill speaking for himself.

A letter from Alfred Carpenter	A letter to Edward Carpenter from his younger brother Alfred - written in 1916 and containing Alfred's thoughts and comments after reading My Days and Dreams. The letter was found inside a copy of My Days and Dreams which appears to have been owned by Gilbert Beith.

Part 5 - EDWARD CARPENTER, GEORGE MERRILL, and THE POLICE INVESTIGATION for INDECENCY

In May 1909 Herbert Gladstone MP, the Home Secretary, received a letter making a complaint of indecency against Edward Carpenter. This triggered a Police investigation, both into Carpenter's books, and into his private life with George Merrill.

There can be a tendency to present Carpenter's life with Merrill as some form of rural gay idyll, but that is far from the case. George Merrill was a child of the slums and had been at times almost a gigolo, and some of that behaviour persisted into his new life.

These web-pages tell the story of that police investigation, reconstructed from a Home Office file still available in the National Archive at Kew, London. I think this story has value for two reasons.

Firstly, they present a more accurate picture of Carpenter's life with Merrill. There are descriptions of Carpenter's attempts to secuce a 21 year old farm-hand, and Merrill's unsuccessful attempts at cruising the locals.
Secondly, they help us to understand the social attitudes to homosexuality at that time; the attitudes held both by civil servants in Whitehall, and (a less-told story) the attitudes of farmhands in rural Derbyshire.

Return to top of page

Books |Pamphlets | Music | Unpublished Works | Police Investigation

Introduction to the Edward Carpenter Archive

Announcing My New Teaching Project - switchingview

EDWARD CARPENTER ARCHIVE

MAIN INDEX

Books |Pamphlets |Music | Unpublished Works | Police Investigation

Part 1 - BOOKS

My Days and Dreams - (Edward Carpenter's Autobiography)

Towards Democracy

Pagan and Christian Creeds: Their Origin and Meaning

Intermediate Types among Primitive Folk

The Intermediate Sex

Anthology of Friendship - Iolaus

Part 2 - PAMPHLETS

Homogenic Love

Part 3 - MUSIC

Part 4 - UNPUBLISHED WORKS

Part 5 - EDWARD CARPENTER, GEORGE MERRILL, and THE POLICE INVESTIGATION for INDECENCY