List of LGBT characters in modern written fiction
This is a list of LGBT characters in modern written fiction. The historical concept and definition of sexual orientation varies and has changed greatly over time; for example the word "gay" wasn't used to describe sexual orientation until the mid 20th century. A number of different classification schemes have been used to describe sexual orientation since the mid-19th century, and scholars have often defined the term 'sexual orientation' in divergent ways. Indeed, several studies have found that much of the research about sexual orientation has failed to define the term at all, making it difficult to reconcile the results of different studies. However, most definitions include a psychological component and/or a behavioral component. Some prefer to simply follow an individual's self-definition or identity. See homosexuality and bisexuality for criteria that have traditionally denoted lesbian, gay and bisexual people.
Items listed here must have commenting on the sexuality of the character in question, and additional explanation may be necessary. Additionally, only notable/significant characters from a given work need to be listed here.
1800s
1900s
| Characters | Work | Year | Author | LGBTQ+ identities in story | Notes |
| Brigham Anderson | Advise and Consent | 1959 | Bisexual | Married US senator Anderson is blackmailed over a secret wartime homosexual affair for which he is unapologetic. | |
| Margaret Prior Selina Dawes | Affinity | 1999 | Lesbian | Margaret, also called "Peggy" and "Aurora", is an unmarried woman from an upper-class family, becomes a visitor at the prison, and meets Selina, but she is a prisoner in her life, "dictated by gender rules and societal expectations, as Selina is in her physical cell." This novel is set in a women's prison in London, explores the "Victorian world of spiritualism," and won the Somerset Maugham Award for Lesbian and Gay Fiction. Like her first novel, Affinity contains overarching lesbian themes, and was acclaimed by critics on its publication, and later turned into a feature film. | |
| Milo Sturgis | Alex Delaware series | 1985–2017 | Gay | Milo is a gay character. | |
| Renee LaRoche | Along the Journey River | 1996 | Lesbian | Originally published in 1996, it is the first detective novel to have "an openly out Indigenous lesbian", the protagonist, Renee. | |
| Luis Carruthers | American Psycho | 1991 | Gay | Luis is in love with the male protagonist, but later marries Courtney. | |
| Annie Kenyon Liza Winthrop | Annie on My Mind | 1982 | Lesbian | This book is a retrospective by Liza, remembering her first semester at MIT, how she met Annie, struggled to recognize her lesbian identity, and they reaffirm their love for each other on the phone at the end of the book. Due to these themes, religious fundamentalists burned a copy of the book, a Kansas superintendent removed it from school libraries, and a lawsuit ensued, with a judge ruling on the side the ACLU, ordering the book to be returned to library shelves. The book is well-regarded as "canonical lesbian-coming-of-age novel." | |
| Wes | The Arizona Kid | 1988 | Gay | Wes is a gay character. | |
| Pyrrhus Philoctetes | An Arrow's Flight | 1998 | Gay | Pyrrhus and Philoctetes are gay characters. | |
| Keren Vanyel | Arrows of the Queen | 1987 | Lesbian Gay | Keren, a minor character, is life bonded to Ylsa and then Sherrill. Lackey, in making this book, took a stand, refusing the demand of an editor that Vanyel be "straight, or single, or not in the story," and as such he is a gay character. | |
| Lark Becker | The Beauty of Men | 1996 | Gay | Lark and Becker are gay characters. | |
| Beebo Brinker Beth Ayers/Cullison Laura Landon | The Beebo Brinker Chronicles | 1957–1960 | Lesbian | These books focus on gay and lesbian love, sexual adventure, with a positive, "yet still complicated look at lesbian relationships," in all five of the books in this series. In the first book, Odd Girl Outa college girl named Laura gets seduced by Beth, and in the next book, I Am A Woman, Laura goes to a bar and meets a butch lesbian, Beebo Brinker, and talks about coming out to her father. The following book, Women In The Shadows, the relationship between Laura and Beebo continues, while Laura's first girlfriend returns in Journey To A Woman, leading to a "drama-laden lesbian love triangle" of Beebo, Beth, and Laura. The next book, Beebo Brinker looks back to the formative years of Beebo. | |
| Joan Gilling Esther Greenwood | The Bell Jar | 1963 | Lesbian | The novel has a central relationship between Joan and Esther, and it addresses the question of socially acceptable identity, examining Esther's "quest to forge her own identity, to be herself rather than what others expect her to be" while highlighting the problems with oppressive patriarchal society in mid-20th-century America. There was the 1979 film adaption of the book, and a lawsuit by Jane V. Anderson claiming that she was not a lesbian and didn't have a relationship with Sylvia Path. | |
| Berdine Raina | Blood of the Fold Temple of the Winds | 1996 1997 | Lesbian | In these books, the two Mord-Sith are in a relationship with each other. Berdine comes out as a lesbian in the third book of this series, and says she loves Raina. This was later turned into a TV series, The Legend of the Seeker. | |
| Aud Torvingen | The Blue Place | 1998 | Lesbian | Aud Torvingen, an 18-year-old coming to the U.S., who is the daughter of a rich diplomat, rents an apartment near Atlanta, and becomes an Atlanta cop, but falls into passionate encounters. One of these encounters is with Julia. She remains a protagonist in the book's two sequels,Stay and Always, and becomes "one of the most human and intriguing lesbians in crime fiction." | |
| X Andrew Joe | Boy Culture | 1995 | Gay | X has sexual and romantic relationships with Andrew, Joe and other men. | |
| Patrick "Kitten" Braden | Breakfast on Pluto | 1998 | Trans | Braden is an Irish trans woman, with "transvestism...a defiant rejection of bigotry, labels, and borders" as one reviewer put it, with Braden refusing to confirm to sexual stereotypes and even flirting with a cop. Later turned into a motion picture, another reviewer noted the prevalence of the "Irish Troubles," with Kitten wrongly arrested and charged after a "bombing in a London disco." | |
| Anthony Blanche Sebastian Flyte | Brideshead Revisited | 1945 | Gay | ||
| Jack Twist Ennis del Mar | "Brokeback Mountain" | 1997 | Gay | Jack and Ennis have a long term sexual and romantic relationship despite both being married to women and fathering children. Jack also has sexual relationships with other men and a woman, while Ennis does not. Critics have described both men as gay or variably Jack as bisexual and Ennis as heterosexual. | |
| Harold Hutchins | Captain Underpants series | 1997–2015 | Gay | ||
| Laurie Odell Ralph Lanyon Andrew | The Charioteer | 1953 | Gay | ||
| Courtney Farrell Barry Cabot | Chocolates for Breakfast | 1956 | Bisexual | Courtney develops a crush on her female boarding school teacher, and later has a sexual relationship with Barry Cabot, her mother's bisexual friend who is in a relationship with a man. | |
| Jim Willard Ronald Shaw Paul Sullivan | The City and the Pillar | 1946 | Gay | ||
| Nicholas Dawson | City of God: A Novel of the Borgias | 1979 | Gay | Nicholas has "a penchant for other men", including the gruff but handsome Stefano Baglione, a heterosexual man who has sex with Nicholas for money. | |
| Claudine Rézi | Claudine at School | 1902 | Colette | Bisexual | Claudine is unfaithful to her husband, Renaud, having an affair with her friend Rézi, who herself has a secrete liaison with Renaud. |
| Danny Slocum | The Confessions of Danny Slocum | 1980 | Gay | ||
| Anthony Malone Andrew Sutherland | Dancer from the Dance | 1978 | Gay | ||
| Dave Brandstetter | Dave Brandstetter Mysteries | 1970–1991 | Gay | ||
| Vladimir Harkonnen | Dune | 1965 | Gay | Harkonnen's sexual preference for men is implied in Dune and Children of Dune, and presented more explicitly in the Prelude to Dune prequel trilogy by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson. | |
| Dr. Ethan Urquhart | Ethan of Athos | 1986 | Gay | Obstetrician Ethan is from a future society on the planet Ethos where male homosexuality is the norm and most inhabitants have never even seen a woman in person. | |
| Simon Foster Axel Nillson | A Fairly Honourable Defeat | 1970 | Gay | ||
| Alexander the Great Hephaistion Bagoas | Fire from Heaven The Persian Boy | 1969 1972 | Bisexual Gay | Alexander is involved in a romantic sexual relationship with Hephaistion, and then the Persian slave Bagoas, but is also married three times and fathers a son. Both men are involved in romantic sexual relationships with Alexander the Great. | |
| Darvish Shayrif Hakem | The Fire's Stone | 1990 | Bisexual | Darvish is willing to have sex with anyone, whether men or women. | |
| Imogene "Idgie" Threadgoode Ruth Jamison | Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe | 1987 | Lesbian Bisexual | A friendship blossoms between Evelyn Couch, a middle-aged housewife, and Ninny Threadgoode, an elderly woman who lives in a nursing home, while her sister-in-law, Idgie, and her friend, Ruth, run a café. Idgie has a long-term romantic relationship with another woman. At the same time, Ruth is married to a man and bears his child but subsequently has long-term romantic relationship with another woman. Although it is not explicitly labeled as a lesbian relationship, every resident both knows about and accepts Idgie and Ruth's relationship, making lesbianism a theme in the novel while in the film adaptation, a story of Southern female friendship and love, Ruth had been in love with Buddy Threadgoode, Idgie's brother. | |
| Harlan Brown Billy Sive Vince Matti Jacques LaFont | The Front Runner | 1974 | Gay | ||
| David Giovanni Jacques Guillaume | Giovanni's Room | 1956 | Gay | ||
| Akhenaten Smenkhkara | A God Against the Gods Return to Thebes | 1976 1977 | Bisexual | Ancient Egyptian Pharaoh Akhenaten is married to Nefertiti, but his romance with his brother Smenkhkara contributes to his downfall. | |
| Elinor "Lakey" Eastlake | The Group | 1954 | Lesbian | Elinar is a lesbian, and graduate from Vassar College in 1933, with the lives of the stories proatgonists involving the men in their lives. The Baroness is her lesbian lover, which her fellow seven female graduates realize when she returned from Europe. It was later adapted into a film in 1966. | |
| Alluvia Fairfax Stella | Gut Symmetries | 1997 | Bisexual | Alice has romantic and sexual relationships with both Stella and Stella's husband Jove. | |
| Paul Michel The Protagonist | Hallucinating Foucault | 1996 | Gay | Openly homosexual writer, said to have many male lovers, including relationship with male main character/narrator. | |
| Jaret Tyler Peggy Danziger | Happy Endings Are All Alike | 1978 | Lesbian | This young adult book is the first one with a "clearly lesbian main character," named Jaret Taylor who comes out in the book's first line: "Even though Jaret Tyler had no guilt or shame about her love affair with Peggy Danziger she knew there were plenty of people in this world who would put it down." Jaret, a future lawyer, endures hardship and discrimination but remains strong even as Peggy, her girlfriend, "wavers in the face of family and small-town prejudices." Scoppettone would go on to write a popular mystery novel series featuring a lesbian detective named Lauren Laurano. | |
| Albus Dumbledore | Harry Potter series | 1997–2007 | Gay | Though not stated explicitly in the novels series, author Rowling said in interviews that the character is gay. | |
| Balthamos Baruch | His Dark Materials | 1995–2000 | Gay | ||
| Frank Berry | The Hotel New Hampshire | 1981 | Gay | ||
| Richard Brown Louis Waters Clarissa Vaughan Sally Seton | The Hours | 1998 | Gay Lesbian | In this novel, which has strong parallels with Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dolloway, Clarissa rejects a relationship with Richard, a gay man, for the love of her life, Sally, who is invigorated by this love. Louis is also Richard's former lover, with Richard later taking his own life, while Clarissa comes to a full realization of her own identity. | |
| Hélène Noris Tamara Soulerr | The Illusionist | 1951 | Bisexual | Tamara has a romantic relationship with both Hélène and her father; Hélène prefers men after the fair ends. | |
| Raymond Tyler, Jr. Basil Henderson | 1991 1995 1999 2001 | Bisexual | Raymond is torn between his girlfriend Nicole and his married male lover; Basil leaves his fiancée Yancey at the altar and pursues a gay lifestyle. | ||
| It | 1986 | Gay | Mellon and Hagarty are openly gay lovers. Mellon was the first of the 1984-85 killings that indicate the return of It. Phil and Tony Tracker are two brothers who are presumed to be gay by Eddie Kaspbrak's mother. Kasprak and Tozier are described as questioning their sexualities as children. | ||
| Lucy Farinelli | Kay Scarpetta novels | 1994–2003 | Lesbian | Lucy has romantic relationships and casual sexual encounters with other women. Lucy is not well accepted due to her suspectes sexual orientation, has occasionally one-night stands, mostly with women and occasionally with men, but she is seduced by Carrie Grethen, early in her career, a relationship which haunts her and those close to her across several books. | |
| Sgt. Sean Jennison/Betty | King Rat | 1962 | Trans | A British POW plays the role of a female in a play, and ultimately starts living as female full-time. | |
| Gabriel Okimasis | Kiss of the Fur Queen | 1998 | Gay | The story slowly begins to focus on Gabriel's sexuality and when he confronts this new identity, he descends into "promiscuity and prostitution with constant flashbacks of the abuse he suffered at the hands of the priests." | |
| Luis Molina | Kiss of the Spider Woman | 1976 | Gay | ||
| Vanyel Ashkevron Stefen | The Last Herald Mage trilogy | 1989–1991 | Gay | In the series, Vanyel has two sexual relationships, both with male partners. | |
| Clay | Less Than Zero Imperial Bedrooms | 1985 2010 | Bisexual | This is coming-of-age story narrated by Clay, "a sexually ambiguous eighteen-year-old student," who tries to resume a relationship with the woman he loved in high school but "leaves a party with a young man." | |
| Lord John Grey | Lord John series | 1998–2011 | Gay | Lord John has sexual and romantic relationships with various men, though he has had sex with and married women to appease societal expectations of him. | |
| Maurice Hall Clive Durham Alec Scudder | Maurice | 1913–1914 | Gay | ||
| Jeff O'Brien Lloyd Griffith David Javitz Eduardo Henry Weiner Luke West | The Men from the Boys Where the Boys Are Men Who Love Men | 1997 2003 2007 | Gay | ||
| Mr. Benson | Mr. Benson | 1983 | Gay | ||
| Clarissa Dalloway Doris Kilman | Mrs Dalloway | 1925 | Lesbian | This novel tells the day in the life of Clarissa Dalloway, a fictional woman in post–war, and she is strongly attracted to Sally Seton, with both sharing a kiss. Clarissa also recognizes that Septimus dies without revealing his homosexuality, perceiving his failure to speak out as "protecting her private lesbian passion," while Doris later encourages Clarissa to name, at least privately, her "lesbian desires." | |
| Septimus Warren Smith | Mrs Dalloway | 1925 | Gay | Septimus is haunted by the image of his dear friend Evans, his commanding officer, with implied homosexual relations to them as noted by scholar Jean E. Kennard. Septimus later dies in the novel without revealing the secret: that he is gay. | |
| Myron | Myra Breckinridge | 1968 | Trans | An attractive young woman, Myra Breckinridge is a film buff with a special interest in the Golden Age of Hollywood, and still in the process of transitioning and unable to obtain hormones, Myra transforms into Myron, and due to a car accident, is forced to have her breast implants removed, later deciding to settle down with Mary-Ann. | |
| Scratch, Winc | Nearly Roadkill | 1996 | and Caitlin Sullivan | Trans | Scratch and Winc are two lovers of an ambiguous gender identity, with the plot is told through cyberchats and emails between each other, while the FBI is engaged in a nationwide manhunt to find them. |
| Seregil i Korit Alec i Amasa Ilar i Sontir | The Nightrunner series | 1996–2014 | Bisexual | Seregil and Alec are committed lovers but both have had experiences with women in the past; Ilar is one of Seregil's former lovers. | |
| Christopher Metcalfe | Now and Then | 1995 | Gay | Main character has a sexual/romantic relationship as a boy with another boy at school; later has sexual and romantic relationships with other men. | |
| Jeanette | Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit | 1985 | Lesbian | This book is a coming-of-age story about a lesbian girl named Jeanette who grows up in an English Pentecostal community. Key themes of the book include transition from youth to adulthood, complex family relationships, same-sex relationships, and religion. A television adaptation of the book was made and aired by the BBC in 1990, starring Charlotte Coleman and Geraldine McEwan, which won the Prix Italia in 1991. | |
| Joel Harrison Knox Randolph | Other Voices, Other Rooms | 1948 | Gay | ||
| Villanelle | The Passion | 1987 | Bisexual | In this book, Villanelle is an androgynous and bisexual daughter of a boatman from Venice who crosses paths with Henri, who also has an "ambivalent sexuality." | |
| Patience White Sarah Dowling | Patience and Sarah | 1969 | Lesbian | This book, which captures "Lesbian-feminist consciousness" in the U.S. in the 1960s, is not only a love story of Patience and Sarah but also became important in the "lesbian literary-political tradition," with Miller's experience as a woman and lesbian shaping the book itself. | |
| Patrick | The Perks of Being a Wallflower | 1999 | Gay | Has a secret relationship with closeted Brad. | |
| Carol Aird Therese Belivet Abby Gerhard | The Price of Salt | 1952 | Lesbian | A married woman, Carol Aird, meets and falls in love with Therese Belivet, which results in her sexuality being used against her and relinquishing custody of her daughter, with Therese Comes out to herself after meeting Carol, while Abby is also a lesbian character. Later made into a 2015 Hollywood film. | |
| Molly Bolt | Rubyfruit Jungle | 1973 | Lesbian | Molly has numerous romantic and sexual relationships with other women. She confronts the "hypocrisies of both heterosexual and homosexual societies." | |
| Paul Denton | The Rules of Attraction | 1987 | Bisexual | In this book, set in Camden like Ellis's other books, Paul lusts for another character, Sean Bateman, saying he slept with him, while Bateman "never admits as much." This book ended up fortifying Ellis's reputation as a "nihilistic authorial presence who reports action but seldom comments on it." | |
| Francis Abernathy | The Secret History | 1992 | Gay | ||
| M. Charlus Jupien | Sodom and Gomorrah | 1921–1922 | Gay | ||
| George | A Single Man | 1964 | Gay | ||
| Renly Baratheon Loras Tyrell | A Song of Ice and Fire | 1991–2011 | Gay | Never explicitly stated in the novels, but Renly's sexual/romantic relationship with Loras is hinted, and was later confirmed by author Martin; TV adaptation makes it clear that they are lovers. | |
| Jess Goldberg | Stone Butch Blues | 1993 | Trans | The narrative follows the life of Jess Goldberg, who grows up in a working class area of upstate New York in the 1940s to 1950s, and explores her gender identity as a trans woman. | |
| Herewiss Freelorn The Goddess | The Tale of the Five series | 1979–1992 | Bisexual | This book is a fantasy with a "bisexual male protagonist whose main love interest is male," and is set in a world with normalized polyamory, with bisexuality and polyamory seeming to "be the default." | |
| Anna Madrigal Jake Greenleaf | Tales of the City series | 1978–2014 | Trans | Original character Anna is a transgender woman, and Jake is a trans man. | |
| Michael "Mouse" Tolliver Jon Fielding Ben McKenna | Tales of the City series | 1978–2014 | Gay | ||
| Beauchamp Day DeDe Halcyon Day Mona Ramsey | Tales of the City series | 1978–2014 | Bisexual | While the original series featured gay and bisexual characters who "kissed on camera and had sex in bathhouses," in the Netflix adaption of this series, Shawna is "explicitly bisexual character." | |
| Pete Balkis | The Throne of Saturn | 1971 | Gay | Astronaut Pete harbors unrequited romantic feelings for his commander, Conrad Trasker. | |
| Bill Haydon | Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy | 1974 | Bisexual | Has a girlfriend, a male lover, seduces Ann, the wife of George Smiley, and rumoured to be the lover of Jim Prideaux. | |
| Kitty Butler | Tipping the Velvet | 1998 | Bisexual | Has a sexual/romantic relationship with the main character and marries a man. | |
| Nancy "Nan" Astley Florence Banner Diana Leathaby | Tipping the Velvet | 1998 | Lesbian | Nan has sexual/romantic relationships with Florence and Diana; all three have also been with other women. | |
| North McAllister Amos Wilson and Joel | University series | 1990–1998 | Gay | North is a "tormented homosexual trying to keep his secret, but recklessly in love"; Amos is protagonist Willie Wilson's gay son, and Joel is Amos' lover. | |
| René Suratt | University series | 1990–1998 | Bisexual | René is protagonist Willie Wilson's nemesis, "a bisexual seducer of students". | |
| The Vampire Chronicles | 1976–2014 | Bisexual | Lestat, Armand and most of Rice's male vampires have intense sexual and emotional attractions and relationships with both sexes. | ||
| Nicolas de Lenfent | The Vampire Lestat | 1985 | Gay | While human, Nicolas shares a romantic sexual relationship with Lestat de Lioncourt. | |
| Clodagh Unwin Alice Meadows | A Village Affair | 1989 | Lesbian Bisexual | In this story, Alice Meadows questions her identity, having an affair with a lesbian woman named Clodagh Unwin, while she remains married, with her awakening depending on "a heart-wrenching choice between her lover and her family." | |
| Dirk McDonald Duck | Weetzie Bat Baby Be-Bop | 1989 1995 | Gay | ||
| Jack Forster | What Happened to Mr. Forster? | 1989 1995 | Gay | ||
| Stephen Gordon Valérie Seymour | The Well of Loneliness | 1928 | Lesbian | This book, a candid novel about "coming to terms with a lesbian identity," was challenged as obscene, under the Obscene Publications Act of 1857, for its "frank portrayal of lesbianism." Although the book has no language that is explicitly sexual, the lesbian themes were seen as a threat to the existing social order, seen as unpalatable, remained banned until 1959 when the Obscene Publications Act was amended, and was published in the U.S. in April 1929 when courts agreed that "lesbianism in and of itself was neither obscene nor illegal," meaning the book wasn't either. | |
| Roberta Muldoon | The World According to Garp | 1978 | Trans | One of the story's main characters is Roberta, a trans woman and former player for the Philadelphia Eagles, and has a gender re-assignment surgery, becoming the bodyguard of Jenny and one of the best friends of Garp. | |
| The Narrator | Written on the Body | 1992 | Ambiguous | Narrator of unspecified gender who has sexual/romantic relationships with men and women. Some reviewers describe the narrator as a lesbian. |