Famous Gay People

A list of famous gay and bisexual men through history.

Alexander the Great 356 BC – 323BC

Military leader who led Macedonians to unprecedented success.

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519)

Polymath, artists, scientist and one of greatest minds in human history.

Michelangelo (1475-1564)

Foremost sculptor and artist

Walt Whitman (1819 – 1892)

American poet. Wrote Leaves of Grass

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893)

Russian composer of symphonies, operas, ballets and choral music

Oscar Wilde (1854 – 1900)

– Irish writer and poet

 

writerAlan Turing (1912 – 1954) – Computer scientist and code breaker. Turing had one of the greatest minds of the Twentieth Century. He helped crack the German Enigma code and became a leading developer in the emerging world of computer science.

 

Marcel Proust

Author

E.M. Forster

Author

John Maynard Keynes

Economist

Siegfried Sassoon

War poet

Noel Coward

actor

Christopher Isherwood

Author and diarist

Lawrence Olivier

Actor

W.H.Auden

Author

Alec Guinness

Actor

Brian Epstein

Manager of the Beatles

David Hockney

Artists

Rudolf Nureyev

Russian ballet dancer

Freddie Mercury

Musician

Elton John

Musician

Sir Ian McKellen

Actor

Stephen Fry

Comic, writer and social activist.

People who promoted gay rights

Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) British philosopher. Bentham is credited with being the founding father of Utilitarianism.He also wrote an early defence of gay rights. Offences Against One’s Self, argued for the liberalisation of laws prohibiting homosexual sex. The essay criticised society for making a disproportionate response to what Bentham considered a largely private matter. The essay remained unpublished during his life though.

Harry Hay

Founder of US gay rights movement

Peter Tatchell

Political activist. Founded British gay rights movement – Outrage!

Ian McKellen

Actor and spokesperson for Stonewall (UK)

Stephen Donaldson (1946-996)

Hernan Ponce (born 1982), current President of LACCD Gay Rights Movement,

Harvey Milk (1930–1978), openly gay city supervisor of San Francisco, California who was

 Related pages

People who fought for human/civil rights rosa parks  – People who campaigned for equality, civil rights and civil justice. Includes Abraham Lincoln, Harriet Tubman, Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks.

Mary_Wollstonecraft_cph.3b11901 Women’s Rights Activists – Women who championed the cause of women’s rights. Including Mary Wollstonecraft, Emily Pankhurst, Susan B.Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.

Courageous people  – People who have overcome difficult circumstances and difficult odds. Includes Joan of Arc, Galileo, Harriet Tubman, Socrates, Malala Yousafzai.