FLASHBACK | An Englishman in NY, Sting honours Quentin Crisp

February 20, 2009 at 12:00 am · Filed under America, England, Faves, Healthy Living, Musicians, Musings™, Poetry, Politically INcorrect, Queer, Video, VIP and tagged: 1987, Denis Charles Pratt, Sting

Sting was both shocked and fascinated and decided to write the song. It includes the lines:

It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile,
Be yourself no matter what they say.

Sting visited Crisp in his apartment and was told over dinner – and the next three days – what life had been like for a homosexual man in the homophobic Great Britain of the 1920s to the 1960s.

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