The Bond books, films and games are more than just cultural artefacts: they comprise a time capsule of seven volatile decades of social and political history - especially LGBTQ+ history. Although the lives of queer people over this period have generally improved, it’s a mistake to see this improvement as universal - or linear. Sometimes putting one foot forward has been swiftly followed by having to take two back. For seventy years, Bond has been there, reflecting and representing this ever-changing world in which we’re living.

1950s: Fleming’s flaming origins

Ian Fleming didn’t set out to make a LGBTQ+ icon - athough there IS something quite queer about the world’s greatest superspy being the result of pre-wedding jitters. We have a man’s distinctly-unheterormative anxiety about being attached to one woman to thank for James Bond; Fleming’s nerves about marriage drove him to seek distraction in his typewriter.

As far as Bond’s creator was concerned, his novels were “written for warm-blooded heterosexuals in railway trains, airplanes and beds”. While Fleming might have aspired to literary renown in private, with his public he was self-deprecating, espousing that the populism of his novels was what he was going for. Whatever the author’s real intention (see: Death of the Author), it’s often the case that more populist works are a better reflection of their periods than more ‘high-brow’ fare. This is certainly the case with Casino Royale, which weaponised the post-war frustrations and aspirations of post-war Britain as it underwent a very queer identity crisis and a slide backwards into conservatism. Although it’s quite easy to race through Casino Royale in one thrilling sitting, it’s worth slowing down and reflecting on its queer qualities. Among the novel’s many delights are Bond recognising his ‘old maidish’ fussiness with food and drink, Bond enjoying being manhandled by a male masseuse and a discomfitingly erotic man-on-naked man torture scene.

Unlike Fleming in real life, who counted many famous gay men among his closest friends, Fleming’s Bond rarely makes the acquaintance of male homosexuals directly.

In Moonraker, Bond has a few anxious minutes in the waiting rooms of the Special Branch of the Metropolitan Police. While awaiting his contact, Assistant Commissioner Ronnie Vallance, he becomes increasingly concerned that he might be mistaken for either a criminal or one of the influential people “desperately hoping to persude Vallance that their sons were not really homosexuals”. It’s a reminder that in 1955, when Moonraker was published, homosexual acts were still criminalised.

The female homosexuals do not fare anywhere near so well. Goldfinger presents a popular attitude of the time: all a lesbian needs to turn straight is the right man. In this novel, the woman who doesn’t ‘turn’ ends up dead, an example of the well-worn ‘bury the gays’/’dead lesbian syndrome’ trope which is still prevalent today.

Across Fleming’s ouevre, there are other characters coded as lesbian, such as Blofeld’s right-hand woman Irma Bunt, who has some of the butch traits associated with lesbians since at least The Well of Loneliness’ publication, thirty years before. While most people who have seen the film version beforehand come to the novel of From Russia, With Love expecting Rosa Klebb to be a lesbian, Fleming actually labels her a “neuter”. She has had sex with men and women (and animals!) but finds the act no more pleasurable than scratching an “itch”. Does this make her asexual? Aromantic? Perhaps more than most fiction writers of the time, Fleming is inclined to present other possibilities, even if the characters who deviate too far from the norm aren’t very pleasant and must pay the ultimate price.

Out of all the Fleming books, From Russia, With Love is the one which draws most on the real events in the world of espionage which were making the headlines at the time. Some of the Cambridge Five, at least three of whom were queer, are referred to directly in the novel. Indeed, the security risk of gay men being blackmailed by the KGB informs the honeytrap plot that runs through the novel. At one point, Smersh’s planning mastermind Kronsteen laments that Bond himself isn’t gay as this would make plotting his fall into ignominy that much easier.

In retrospect, Fleming’s repeated use of words such as ‘gay’ and ‘queer’ throughout his works is somewhat conspicuous. Many people think - erroneously - that ‘gay’ did not carry homosexual connotations in the 1950s, but this meaning had co-existed happily (gayly!) in certain circles for decades. Fleming himself moved in such circles. It’s reasonable to assume that a large segment of Fleming’s audience were not heterosexuals, even if they identified as such in their daily, repressed, compromised lives.

1960s: In full (or at least partial) swing

The first Bond novel of the 1960s was also the first one I read. Thunderball is therefore part of my own LGBT history. That the cover features a naked man had nothing to do with it appealing to me of course. It certainly raised a few eyebrows when I took it into school as my reading book.

By that point, I was already a Bond-addict because of the films, especially those from the 1960s, which were on the TV seemingly all the time. Little did I know, watching these early films in the 1980s, divorced of their original contexts, that they were quintessential records of their times - not just reflecting trends but setting them. The Connery films of the early 60s are the most Camp of all Bond creations - in the truest sense of the word ‘Camp’. Of course, their campness was mostly accidental: a prerequisite for Pure Camp in Susan Sontag’s conception.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, early 1960s Britain was rocked with a succession of scandals, including that of John Vassall: a civil servant caught with his pants down (literally) after being seduced by a male Russian KGB operative. The whole affair is very From Russia, With Love. The persistent threat to the security services posed by their gay spies eventually played a significant part in the partial decrminalisation of homosexuality in England in 1967. After all, as some progressive and pragmatic politicians argued, if you make something legal you can’t be blackmailed for engaging in it. The debate about decriminalisation raged from 1957 onwards and contributed to a gradual loosening of social attitudes towards unheternormative sex. Bond’s multiple conquests in the films are emblematic of this sensibility.

In the minds of many (including his gay publisher, William Plomer), Fleming went out with a whimper with the posthumous 1965 publication of The Man With The Golden Gun. Whatever you think of the novel (I love it), it’s worth reading for its portrayal of a clearly homosexual main villian: the titular character in fact. It’s obvious to everyone - except perhaps Bond himself - that the only reason non-whistling Scaramanga lets his guard down around Bond is because he wants to go to bed with him.

1967, the year homosexuality was finally decriminalised in England (for no more than two men aged 21 or over, in private) marked a shift in society and Bond films were similarly shaken up. For the first time, a Bond film diverged almost completely from its source novel. You Only Live Twice has Bond undergoing several changes of identity at a time when more people were realising they could be who they truly were, including those who would have previously been arrested just for what they got up to in the bedroom. Although whoever decided it was still acceptable to turn Bond Japanese should probably have been at least questioned by the police.

Just prior to the release of You Only Live Twice, the non-Eon Casino Royale ‘spoof’ was unleashed on cinemas. No fewer than seven James Bonds frequented the film, with four of them being women, thus presenting the tantalising possibility: does Bond always have to be a straight man?

Many consider On Her Majesty’ Secret Service to be one of the finest of the official films. Alarmingly few know it was directed by a gay man however, the same man who did more than most to define the cinematic style of 007, thanks to his revolutionary editing of the previous five films. OHMSS is a queer classic in many regards, not least of all because of the casting of gay icon Diana Rigg as Bond’s wife.

Seventies: Bond goes disco (eventually)

Connery returns, wearing a pink tie. And that’s not the only pink thing in Diamonds Are Forever: while ‘problematic’ by modern standards, the representation of a loving gay couple (Wint and Kidd) was quietly groundbreaking (and a massive influence on me personally). Diamonds also possesses one of the most Camp theme songs, a glittering jewel of a tune. And let’s not forget Blofeld in drag. Who could ever (whether they wanted to or not) forget Blofeld in drag. Simply fabulous!

Diamonds took artistic risks at the start of a decade which would see an increasing mainstreaming of queer culture, culminating in a big gay disco over Mooraker’s end credits.

The middle years of the 1970s saw Bond undergoing a crisis of identity, with Roger Moore settling - a little uncomfortably closely to Connery at first - into the role. Live and Let Die made Bond a fish out of water, having him traverse spaces where he felt like an outsider, particularly those associated with queer black culture (New Orleans, Harlem). For a significant period of the film, Bond gets to experience what it was to be ‘other’. And the film ends on a unsettlingly unresolved note, with Baron Samedi taking us into the credits rather than the usual heteronormative consummation. The next film, The Man With The Golden Gun, held up a mirror to 007 - both literally and in the person of Scaramanaga, who, while less explicitly gay than in Fleming’s novel, presents as one of the most notable ‘dark side of Bond’ villains.

Moore’s Bond became increasingly hypermasculine as the decade progressed, bedding women in an increasingly inconsequential manner. This was a time where queers were become more visible in many societies; in the year that separates The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker, we even got our first rainbow flag. These two films were produced in a reactionary period, something which often follows a period where norms (such as heterosexuality) are perceived as being under threat. Reflective of this, Bond goes out of his way to prove his heterosexual credentials by keeping the British end up over and over again.

Eighties: Depends on your definition of safe sex

Following the reactionary 70s, the 80s was a turbulent decade for queer people. Then, as now, trans people faced more prejudice than most queers. Although she was not publicly known as transexual (her preferred term), Caroline Cossey was outed by a tabloid newspaper as the first (and so far only, that we know of) trans Bond girl following the release of For Your Eyes Only. Cossey suffered horribly but rose above it and forged a successful career, blazing the trail for trans models and actresses.

British politics in the 1980s was dominated by Margaret Thatcher, so it’s apt that she is satirised in the first Bond film of the decade. It’s difficult to overestimate the damage that Thatcher’s Section 28 legislation wrought on a whole generation of queer people. Explicitly forbidding public institutions from ‘promoting’ homosexuality led to decades of shame-induced trauma.

Section 28 was enacted in a climate of fear and intolerance towards queer people, in part because of the stigma associated with HIV and AIDS. Treatments were not exactly forthcoming and it was often down to queer people themselves to solve ‘their’ problems. Thousands died unnecessarily as a result of widespread disinformation. While hardly a public information campaign for safe sex, Bond films of this late 1980s reined in 007’s libido a little, in tune with the mood of the time. Both The Living Daylights and Licence To Kill were relatively chaste in comparison with what came before. The relationships, such as they are, seem warmer - especially that with the wonderful Rosika Miklos, who, we are told, Bond has ‘worked with’ before. What this work entailed is left up to our imaginations.

The male extras (aka Hot Bond Boys With Bit Parts) seem particularly appealing in these 1980s movies, showing that Bond films are not just for straight men’s eyes only. Or maybe it was just me - I WAS at an impressionable age. Several of my first crushes crop up - all too briefly, but very memorably - in these movies. The 1980s also saw a bit of a love affair with using the music of Tchaikovsky. One must imagine the classical composer - who eventually came to terms of a sort with his homosexuality after being tortured by it - would have been happy.

Nineties: New threats

After a six year break which saw the real life end of the USSR (and the real MI6 lifting its ban on LGBTQ+ employees in 1991), Bond returned to face a foe with which he had more bromoerotic tension than any other villain to date - and that’s saying something! GoldenEye was the first film I saw in the cinema so it will always hold a place in my heart, due in no small part to the video game. The Nintendo 64 opus gave me the opportunity to not just to play as Bond but also, in multiplayer mode, Xenia Sergeyevna Onatopp, a formative experience I have in common with several other gay men.

I spent hundreds of hours on that game. I needed all the escapism we could get: the 90s was a pretty terrible time for queer people. There were some wins… which I would pretend not to be interested in when they made the news headlines. The age of consent was lowered to 18 in 1994, although it wouldn’t be given parity with the heterosexual equivalent until 2000. For me though - closeted, afraid and pretty miserable - Bond was one of the few glimmers in the dark. Shining brightest was Tomorrow Never Dies, with which I was OBSESSED. There is so much that is queer about that film (its queer re-view is one of my longest) but something I didn’t fully appreciate at the time was hiring an out lesbian to sing one of the songs. Yes, k d lang may have been relegated to the end credits, but it gives you a hell of an incentive to stay right until the end.

The World Is Not Enough contains another banging tune - another queer favourite - and the film as a whole subverts audience’s expectations in a very queer manner, particularly whenever Elektra King is onscreen.

Noughties: Gaze and gay icons

If The World Is Not Enough captured some of the anxiety about what the new millennium might bring, Die Another Day was the hedonistic release, unfettered by much in the way of reality. In the real world, some of the bugs from the previous millennium were being worked out of their system thanks to efforts of activist groups and incredible individuals. The ban on queers in the British military - Air Force, Army and Bond’s own Navy - was lifted only a few days into the year 2000, due in no small part due to the bravery of people like Flight Lieutenant Caroline Paige, who came out as trans while serving in the RAF.

Bond took a four year break on film, but Bond video games took up the slack, providing escapism and representation for queer Bond fans, including Licence To Queer contributors Sam Rogers and Spencie d’Entremont.

Section 28 was finally repealed in 2003, meaning educators could finally tell queer kids they were ok, improving their life chances no end.

When Bond did eventually return, everyone’s gaze was on him, not just the girls. Although Bond has been subjected to objectification since the Connery days, Casino Royale openly flirted with the audience, lingering on Bond’s gymbunny body and, later, faithfully recreating Fleming’s homoerotic torture scene in eye-watering detail, fifty years down the line. Finally, the filmmakers appeared to be acknowledging that these films are successful because they work for everyone - not just straight cisgendered men. While the films were still reluctant to put openly queer characters on screen, that has never stopped queer fans taking particular characters to their hearts and doomed Vesper Lynd was a hit from the moment she stepped onto the scene. And in a sense, she’s never left, haunting the Craig-era into the present day.

2010s: Brave new world?

It’s a shame that a whole decade went by with only two Bond films to reflect and interpret it. This in the period when same sex marriage became legal in the UK and USA (the Netherlands already got there in 2001) and several more countries have descriminalised homosexuality in this time.

Perhaps as a result of this growing permissiveness, Skyfall had Bond acknowledging without embarrassment that he’s no stranger to having sex with men.

Bond has always had one foot in the past and one in the future. That’s why it has worked for so long. But in many ways, Spectre represented a more regressive stance, harkening back to the past. Closing out Craig’s tenure, No Time To Die was billed as “the mission that changes everything”, and the ending made it fit the bill more than anything. It did calmly out Q, played by out gay actor Ben Whishaw, a character who had been coded as queer since Skyfall. A small step, but an important one.

One step forward…?

It’s difficult to identity patterns and trends in recent history. When we look back at this period in a couple of decades time, we may see the more recent Bond films as out of step with social attitudes. This has certainly been the case at various points in the franchise. And yet, at other times, Bond books and films have been instrumental in defining taste and planting at least the seeds of new ideas in readers’ and viewers’ minds. Will this be one of those times?

There’s no way of knowing.

But in the meantime, queer Bond fans will continue to make their own responses to the series we love. There are far more of us than many think. So make yourself a drink, put on your favourite Bond film or grab your favourite Bond book or video game, and keep an eye out for LGBT history. It’s right there: you just need to look.

This is an updated version of an article originally published in February 2021. It was revised in February 2022 and again in February 2023.

Further reading

LGBT History Month has been celebrated in the UK every February since 2004. It began 10 years after LGBT History Month started in the USA (in October 1994). The Month began as a grassroots movement by the charity Schools Out UK, co-founded by absolute hero Sue Sanders. You can support their work here: https://lgbtplushistorymonth.co.uk/

A chronological listing of my in-depth queer re-views completed so far is available here: https://www.licencetoqueer.com/find-a-queer-film-re-review

The battle for LGBTQ+ equality is far from won. I discuss this from an international perspective whenever it’s relevant, most fully in my queer re-review of You Only Live Twice, which features links to data from the OECD and other organisations.

If you’re especially interest in gay spies and the threat they posed to the British security services (through no fault of their own!) I recommend my queer re-view of From Russia With Love. This contains links to lots of podcasts and articles which deal with this fascinating topic.

In 1955’s Moonraker, Bond gets mixed up in police business at a time when it was ill-advised for gay men to do so. I explored gay men's run ins with the law in ‘Agents provocateur: Bonding with the boys in blue’: https://www.licencetoqueer.com/blog/agents-provocateur

Fenna Geelhoed tackled asexual representation in Bond here: https://www.licencetoqueer.com/blog/what-do-you-do-asexual-coding-in-the-james-bond-universe

How language has changed over time - and how Fleming may have used this to create specific effects - is discussed in-depth here: https://www.licencetoqueer.com/blog/flemings-faggots-gays-and-queers

The Spy Who Loved Me’s reactionary hypermasculinity is analysed here: https://www.licencetoqueer.com/blog/queer-re-view-the-spy-who-loved-me

007 decades of LGBTQ+ history