October 23, 1911
Dear
Maurice Magnus —
In
reply to yours of September 21st, 1911, which has only
just now come to hand, having been forwarded to me via
various comrades in the Socialist movement.
Nay — but I have always imagined Wolf Larsen and
Burning Daylight as "knowing" women — but
I did not think it necessary explicitly so to state in
my writing.
You are certainly right. A certain definite percentage
of men are so homosexual, or so nearly homosexual, that
they can love another man more than they can love any
woman. But then, I dare say, no homosexual man is qualified
to say whether a fictional woman is real or not to a normally
sexed man. A man who is normal sexually conceives of women
in ways repellant to a homosexual man.
Surely, I have studied the sex problem even in its "most
curious ways." I, however, have drawn men-characters
who are sexually normal. I have never dreamed of drawing
a homosexual male character. Perhaps I am too prosaically
normal myself though I do know the whole literature and
all the authorities of the "curious ways."
I think I know the problem you suggest, and I think I
know it fairly thoroughly and scientifically. Unfortunately,
those who figure vitally in that problem constitute too
small a percentage of the human race to be an adequate
book-buying inducement to a writer.
I think I get your point of view. Am I wrong? Do you get
my point of view? Flatly, I am a lover of women.
Sincerely yours
Jack London
