Sandi Toksvig reveals coming out forced her family to go into hiding: ‘There were death threats’
Sandi Toksvig’s new book Friends of Dorothy explores chosen family and lesbian romance. (Getty Images)
Sandi Toksvig has said death threats arrived “immediately” after she came out in 1994, forcing her family to go into hiding for their safety.
Speaking at the Cheltenham Literary Festival, the presenter, comedian and author said: “The death threats came immediately, and the entire family had to go into hiding. I don’t know why anybody was surprised. In an old-school, typical way, I think it was easy to spot. Partly my shoes and partly my tremendous ability with power tools.”
Toksvig, 68, also spoke about the impact the hostility had on her life. She said that, after another woman spent the night in her room, she almost faced expulsion from her Cambridge college at the end of her first year. Toksvig added that when she returned to Cambridge three years ago, she was still regularly receiving death threats for being a lesbian.
She also said she and her wife, Debbie Toksvig, had to have police protection on their wedding day. The couple married in 2014. Toksvig shares three children with her ex-partner Peta Stewart.
Toksvig says she still has to ‘stand up and be counted’
Toksvig said she still feels she has to “stand up and be counted” because “homophobic hate crimes, hate crimes of all kinds, are on the rise”. She added that she finds media representation “really disappointing”.
“Lesbians are often either serial killers or dead. That’s pretty much it,” she said, listing examples including Cat in Lip Service and Kate in Last Tango in Halifax, who she said were killed off in car crashes. She also cited Skins, where Naomi dies of cancer beside her girlfriend Emily, Sarah in Hollyoaks, and Maddie in Coronation Street.
Re-writing the lesbian death trope
Toksvig said she has written a book titled Friends of Dorothy, describing it as being about the families people build for themselves. Explaining the title, she said: “Friends of Dorothy, if you don’t know it, it’s an old expression for a gay person… And the book is about the families that we create, and that’s not just true of gay people, it’s true of families that split up, it’s true of foster families, all sorts of things.”
Toksvig said the novel features a young female couple, Amber and Stevie, adding: “It’s a book for everybody, not just gay people. But it does have two women in it who love each other, and spoiler alert, they don’t die or kill anybody.”
