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Eva Gore-Booth and Sexuality

Eva Gore-Booth’s sexuality has been a topic for debate by many academics, some argue that she was in a same sex relationship others state that she merely co-habited with Esther Roper.

After being told that she was close to death in 1896 Eva took a trip to Bordighera in Italy to the home of George MacDonald to recuperate. It was there where she met Esther Roper who was also recovering from illness. They formed a strong mutual bond and were partners in life and work from then on. After the time they spent there together Eva further rejected her privileged rural life in Ireland and moved into the urban Manchester environment. There she purchased property with Esther and who became her partner in her sexual politics activism and suffrage work. Although Eva and Esther lived together till Eva’s death they slept in different rooms and there is no way of proving or disproving a sexual relationship or any sort of sexual encounters between them. After knowing each other for four years Eva made Esther the sole beneficiary of her estate.

Both Eva and Esther worked with a team of professionals to establish and edit Urania, a sexual politics journal that was circulated between 1916 and 1940. The formation was due to the editors being connected through a feminist revolutionary group known as the Aëthnic Union which was formed in 1911. Urania was a radical journal that contributed to the discussion on sexual politics of the Suffrage era. It was established to document and enhance the progress of the first wave feminist movement. Its aim was to promote the elimination of the glorification of heterosexual marriage and sex and gender distinctions altogether. It also became a point of reference for those worldwide who shared the editors' radical, Uranian Philosophy. ‘Sex is an Accident’ a term coined by Eva regarding biological gender distinction was used to sum up the Uranian philosophy.

The journal for most of its publication was privately circulated worldwide but was sent free to anyone who requested it to establish a network and register of supporters. Eva was seen as the figure head and founder of this journal as it tied into her theosophical feminist beliefs. Urania was ranged from eight to sixteen pages of compositions, magazines clippings, extracts and reports about sex changes and scientific methods, lesbian women in history as well as challenging and overcoming society’s gender norms.

Urania monitored birth and marriage rates worldwide and celebrated when the rates fell. It also promoted the idea of same-sex love being the ideal particularly between females and it being spiritual in nature rather than physical. Throughout all this discussion Eva was noted in Urania as an inspiration and her words and her poetry was quoted in it long after her death.

Eva is buried alongside Esther in Hampstead in England and her tombstone reads “Life that is Love is God” a quote from the poet Sappho whose love of women was reflected in her work.

Despite the debate on her sexuality Eva Gore-Booth has been honoured for her work by the LGBTQ+ community including an award in her honour at the Dublin Gay Theatre Festival. Eva has also been acknowledged by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions as LGBTQ+ and Worker’s Rights role model.