Michael Davidson (journalist)

Michael Davidson (journalist)

Michael Davidson (1897 – 1976) was an English journalist, memoirist, and an open pederast.

Life and work

Born into an upper-middle-class family in Guernsey and educated at Lancing, Davidson joined the army in 1914. Being wounded in 1916, he became a newspaper reporter and a supporter of the Communist Party. He translated a number of anti-Nazi books. After having lived in Berlin in early to mid 1930s, he wrote newspaper articles to warn England against the full implications of Hitler's ideology, which he had seen up-close, but editors showed little interest. [1] After being harrassed by the SA for being British, a communist, and presumably a homosexual, Davidson fled Germany. He spent the rest of his life serving as a foreign correspondent for, among other newspapers, The Observer, The News Chronicle and The New York Times. [2]

At age 26, Davidson met W. H. Auden, then 16, and they began a "poetic relationship". [3] Davidson mentored Auden and was the first to publish him.

Davidson's 1962 autobiography "The World, the Flesh and Myself" begins: "This is the life-history of a lover of boys." In the book, he recalls not only his reporting from various war zones, but also his encounters with adolescent boys in those areas. This aspect was the sole focus of his follow-up memoir "Some Boys" (1970).

References

  1. ^ Davidson, Michael (1962), The World, the Flesh and Myself, p. 157 
  2. ^ Aldrich, Robert (2002), Who's Who in Contemporary Gay and Lesbian History - from World War II to the present day, p. 104, ISBN 9780415291613 
  3. ^ Davidson, Michael (1962), The World, the Flesh and Myself, p. 126 
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