The Crimson Letter: Harvard, Homosexuality, and the Shaping of American Culture Paperback – Illustrated, June 1, 2004
by Douglass Shand-Tucci
Queer Places:
University of Michigan, 500 S State St, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, United States
Harvard University (Ivy League), 2 Kirkland St, Cambridge, MA 02138
University of Wisconsin–Madison, 500 Lincoln Dr, Madison, WI 53706, United States
Yale University (Ivy League), 38 Hillhouse Ave, New Haven, CT 06520
Springdale Cemetery, 750 Springdale Dr, Clinton, IA 52732, United States
Karl Young (November 2, 1879 – November 17, 1943) was a prominent American professor of English, medievalist, and theatre historian whose scholarly theories on the liturgical origins of dramatic performance gained widespread acceptance throughout the twentieth century.
Born in Clinton, Clinton County, Iowa, he was the son of lawyer George Billings Young and Frances Eliza Hinman Young. His family background was rooted in intellectual and religious traditions, with his grandfather serving as a Presbyterian clergyman. Tragically, several of his siblings—including William Hinman Young and Alma Margaret Young—died in early childhood, though his brother Henry Martin Young lived into adulthood. Raised in Ypsilanti, Michigan, Young completed his high school education there before enrolling at the University of Michigan for his undergraduate studies.
Pursuing higher education at Harvard University, Young earned his Master’s degree in 1902 and his doctorate in 1907. During his graduate studies, he paused to teach for two years at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis before returning to Harvard to complete his Ph.D. His dissertation on Troilus and Criseyde was published by the Chaucer Society in 1908. Following the completion of his doctorate, Young joined the faculty at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where he taught from 1908 until 1923, before securing a prestigious appointment at Yale University, where he spent the final two decades of his career. On August 10, 1911, he married scholar Frances Campbell Berkeley, and together they raised two sons, George Berkeley Young and Karl Young Jr.
Parallel to his formal career, Young maintained a deeply intimate, lifelong relationship with Henry "Harry" Wadsworth Longfellow Dana. Surviving correspondence from 1908 onwards reveals a profound, enduring emotional bond forged during their travels together in Europe. Over time, Young's letters reflected an increasing warmth and devotion, transitioning from formal expressions of friendship to deep declarations of affection that persevered through personal complexities. This long-standing connection formed an essential aspect of Young's inner life and character alongside his professional endeavors.
American poet Witter Bynner and medieval scholar Karl Young shared a lifelong friendship that originated during their student years at Harvard University in the early 1900s. Both men overlapped at Harvard around 1901–1903, where Young was completing his graduate studies (M.A. 1902, Ph.D. 1907) and Bynner was an undergraduate (A.B. 1902). During his Harvard years, Young spent "more than one summer" traveling and visiting abroad with Bynner, establishing a warm collegiate camaraderie that lasted throughout their lives. Following Karl Young's death in 1943, Bynner authored a retrospective memoir titled simply "Karl Young," published in The Yale University Library Gazette (Vol. 23, No. 3, January 1949, pp. 145–147). In this piece, Bynner reflected on Young's personality, intellectual devotion, and early life before Young became a renowned Yale professor and author of The Drama of the Medieval Church (1933).
Young's academic reputation was largely built upon his pioneering research into medieval "liturgical drama," which he began publishing in 1908. Building on ideas initially proposed by Charles Magnin and popularized by Léon Gautier, Young argued that modern European theatrical performance originated directly within the Catholic Mass and the Quem quaeritis trope. He synthesized these theories in his seminal work, The Drama of the Medieval Church (1933), which became a foundational, widely taught text across English-speaking universities. Although later scholars eventually reassessed and challenged his model for oversimplifying the distinction between liturgical elements and self-conscious dramatic performance, his contributions fundamentally shaped the field of early theatre history.
Throughout his distinguished career, Young received substantial professional recognition. In 1933, he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and in 1940, he served as President of the Modern Language Association. He was honored with several honorary doctorates and received the prestigious Sir Israel Gollancz Memorial Prize from the British Academy in 1941. Young passed away in New Haven, Connecticut, at the age of 64 and was laid to rest in Springdale Cemetery in his hometown of Clinton, Iowa. His personal notes, extensive correspondence, and scholarly files on medieval liturgy remain preserved as an archival collection within the Yale University Music Library.
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The Crimson Letter: Harvard, Homosexuality, and the Shaping of American Culture Paperback – Illustrated, June 1, 2004 by Douglass Shand-Tucci |
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