Lesbian characters in fiction

Lesbian characters are portrayed in the media, especially when it comes to marriage, parenting, feminism, and romantic relationships. Some have stated that this leads to exploitative and unjustified plot devices, such as tropes involving butch or femme lesbians and lesbian parents. In the media, lesbian marriage and parenting are depicted in shows such as the live-action television show The Fosters and the animated series Steven Universe.

During the twentieth century, lesbians such as Gertrude Stein and Barbara Hammer were noted in the U.S. avant-garde art movements, along with figures such as Leontine Sagan in German pre-war cinema. Since the 1890s the underground classic The Songs of Bilitis has been influential on lesbian culture. This book provided a name for the first campaigning and cultural organization in the United States, the Daughters of Bilitis. During the 1950s and 1960s, lesbian pulp fiction was published in the U.S. and the United Kingdom, often under "coded" titles such as Odd Girl Out, The Evil Friendship by Vin Packer and The Beebo Brinker Chronicles by Ann Bannon. British school stories also provided a haven for "coded" and sometimes outright lesbian fiction. During the 1970s the second wave of feminist-era lesbian novels became more politically oriented. Works often carried the explicit ideological messages of separatist feminism and the trend carried over to other lesbian arts. Rita Mae Brown's debut novel Rubyfruit Jungle was a milestone of this period; Patience and Sarah, by Isabel Miller, became a cult favorite. The opera, based on the novel has been described as the first lesbian opera.[4] Molly Bolt in the 1973 novel, Rubyfruit Jungle, has numerous romantic and sexual relationships with other women,[5] and she confronts the "hypocrisies of both heterosexual and homosexual societies."[6] By the early 1990s, lesbian culture was being influenced by a younger generation who had not taken part in the "Feminist Sex Wars" and this strongly informed post-feminist queer theory along with the new queer culture. Apart from this, the first lesbian-themed feature film was Mädchen in Uniform (1931), based on a novel by Christa Winsloe and directed by Leontine Sagan, tracing the story of a schoolgirl called Manuela von Meinhardis and her passionate love for a teacher, Fräulein von Bernburg. It was written and mostly directed by women. The impact of the film in Germany's lesbian clubs was overshadowed, however, by the cult following for The Blue Angel (1930). Until the early 1990s, any notion of lesbian love in a film almost always required audiences to infer the relationships.

Illustration of a character declaring that "yuri shall conquer the Earth"

Lesbian characters have made very rare appearances in scripted radio programs, almost always as killers or murder victims. Homosexuality was not discussed on television until the mid-1950s. Even so, many science fiction series have featured lesbian characters. Later, mainstream American broadcast media have created a subgenre of lesbian portrayal in what is sometimes referred to as the "lesbian kiss episode", in which a lesbian or bisexual female character and a heterosexual-identified character kiss. In most instances, the potential of a relationship between the women does not survive past the episode and the lesbian character rarely appears again. For years, there have been many LGBT couples in anime, with various characters who people feel validate their sexuality and gender, even if these characters are not canon.[7] This is because LGBTQ anime is not new,[8] although some reviewers say that there is a "wealth of LGBTQ+ focused series" within anime, especially those with earnest stories.[9] Others noted the importance of having "yourself represented in one of the world's most popular entertainment."[10] In recent years, lesbian characters have gained relative prominence in various formats, especially since 2013 with the advent of streaming platforms like Netflix[11] and Hulu.[12]

LGBT themes and characters were historically omitted intentionally from the content of comic strips and comic books, due to either censorship, the perception that LGBT representation was inappropriate for children, or the perception that comics as a medium were for children. In the 1950s, American comic books, under the Comics Code Authority, adopted the Comic Code which, under the guise of preventing "perversion", largely prevented the presentation of LGBT characters for a number of decades.[13] Within the Japanese anime and manga, yaoi is the tradition of representing same-sex male relationships in materials that are generally created by women artists and marketed mostly for Japanese girls [14] while the genre known as yuri focuses on relationships between women. In recent years, the number of LGBT characters in mainstream comics has increased greatly. There exist a large amount of openly gay and lesbian comic creators that self-publish their work on the internet. These include amateur works, as well as more "mainstream" works, such as Kyle's Bed & Breakfast.[15] According to Andrew Wheeler from Comics Alliance, webcomics "provide a platform to so many queer voices that might otherwise go undiscovered."[16]

There have been many prominent lesbian characters in animated series, film, graphic novels, and other media. In anime, Juri Arisugawa, who is explicitly in love with her female classmate, Shiori, in both the TV series and movie, is described as "homosexual" by the creators of the 1997 series Revolutionary Girl Utena in the DVD booklet.[17] Also in the 1990s, the series Sailor Moon featured two characters (Haruka Tenoh / Sailor Uranus and Michiru Kaioh / Sailor Neptune) in a romantic relationship with each other, even though in the original release of the English version of the anime, where they were made "cousins".[18][19] In later years, Futaba Aasu in Puni Puni Poemy[20] along with Fumi Manjōme and Akira Okudaira in Sweet Blue Flowers[21][22] were openly lesbian characters. Apart from these characters, the main protagonists of Yurikuma Arashi[lower-alpha 1] are presented as having various sexual encounters and romantic relationships.[23][24] There were numerous characters in Western animation and in other media which stood apart from others. For Western animation, this includes Patty Bouvier in The Simpsons,[25][26] Pearl in Steven Universe,[27][28] and Ruby and Sapphire in Steven Universe who have a romantic relationship with each other, and stay permanently fused to form Garnet.[29][30][31] One series, She-Ra and the Princesses of Power featured various lesbian characters, such as, Netossa, Spinnerella, Adora, and Catra,[32][33] the latter two around whom the story revolves.[34][35] More recently, Amity Blight in the series The Owl House has been described as a lesbian, since she has a crush on her classmate, Luz Noceda.[36][37][38]

Illustration from Carmilla, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu's 1872 story considered to be the first in the lesbian vampire genre

While anime and Western animation have lesbian characters, so do live-action television series and those in other media. In 1929, Countess Geschwitz in Pandora's Box would become cinema's first explicit lesbian character.[39] Years later, in 1989, the relationship between Lorraine and Theresa "Tee" in the series The Women of Brewster Place became the first black lesbian relationship portrayed on American television.[40][41] Additionally, Ellen in the series, Ellen came out in 1997 as lesbian, becoming one of "TV’s first openly gay main characters," seen with a female lover named Laurie, in the show's final season before the show was cancelled.[42] In graphic novels, Batwoman / Kate Kane became the highest profile lesbian in the DC Universe, after appearing in the comic series | 52 from 2006-2007.[43][44] In literature, Carmilla, published as part of the book, In a Glass Darkly, in 1872, is considered the first lesbian vampire story.[45][46] Years later, in 1966, Renee LaRoche became the first "openly out Indigenous lesbian" in the detective novel Along the Journey River.[47] and Happy Endings Are All Alike became the first novel with a "clearly lesbian main character," named Jaret Taylor who comes out in the book's first line.[48] In 2015, Moff Delian Mors became the first LGBT character in the Star Wars canon,[lower-alpha 2] with her sexuality is not a major concern in the novel, suggesting that "homophobia isn't an issue in the Empire," and something the Imperial Army doesn't worry about, even as they fight rebels.[49][50] On a similar note, the party member Juhani in Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, a video game, is lesbian, though bugged coding on the initial release allowed her to be attracted to the player character regardless of gender. In subsequent patches, she reverts to same-sex preferences, with her and another female Jedi were also heavily implied to be lovers, making Juhani the first known gay character in the Star Wars universe.[51]

• Epicenity
• Class S (genre)
• LGBT themes in comics
• List of yuri works
• List of lesbian fiction
• List of animated series with LGBT characters
• List of fictional polyamorous characters
• Lists of LGBT figures in fiction and myth