Reed and sexuality

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2013/nov/01/lou-reed-and-sexuality

Version 0 of 1.

Your obituary of Lou Reed (29 October) refers to Lou Reed's sexuality, character and environment in the diction of a homophobic 1950s judge poised to pass sentence: "aberrant sexual behaviour", "sexually ambiguous underworld", "transgressive sex", "electroconvulsive therapy intended to cure him of … homosexual instincts", "lived openly for several years with a transvestite". While sheltering behind outdated cliches and failing to consider what impact it might have had on Reed's adolescent character to be given electroconvulsive therapy to "cure" him of homosexuality – or rather bisexuality – it betrays no awareness of how far this extraordinary singer-musician-poet's creativity was surely shaped and spurred by his sexual nature and his affinity, when adult, with the sexually unconventional and stigmatised to whom the obituary merely alludes<br /><strong>Nicholas de Jongh</strong><br /><em>London</em>

Our editors' picks for the day's top news and commentary delivered to your inbox each morning.