This essay provides insight into some of the content of Britten and Pears’s book collection. It draws attention to why certain volumes were used as the source material for various musical works. The essay also emphasises how friendships with writers, such as art historian Kenneth Clark and novelist and critic E. M. Forster, influenced key aspects of Britten and Pears’s lives: their passion for fine art and their faith in pacifism. This survey of the collection underlines why their books are often useful bases of information for biographical background about both musicians. Their library tells us stories about their childhoods and discloses their interests in topics ranging from classic English literature to gardening to the developing genre of gay fiction. Additionally, it adds context to fundamental aspects of their lives, such as their anti-war stance and their enduring commitment to one another.

Within contemporary Western gay communities, Alexander the Great is often championed as a hero and an inspirational figure – the ultimate high-status homosexual. This chapter explores the various ways in which he has been visualised within the gay community and its wider – more closeted – community. The chapter explores his literary image in the novels of Mary Renault, in stage musicals and pornography and in mainstream Hollywood cinema. The darker, anti-gay, reading of Alexander is also explored in the context of right-wing nationalism and the military.