Italy: Street named after gay codebreaker Alan Turing
A street in the city of Catania, Sicily is to be named in honour of gay codebreaker Alan Turing.
The gay war hero helped to crack the Enigma machine, before being persecuted for his homosexuality later in life, and eventually driven to suicide.
The city – which is the seventh largest metropolitan area in Italy, and the second-largest city in Sicily – took submissions while planning out a number of new roads.
Councillor Nino Vullo put forward Mr Turing’s name, after it was suggested by his brother, Pierluigi Vullo.
The proposal was unanimously accepted by the local council, alongside a plan to name a street after gay Italian singer Lucio Dalla, who died in 2012.
Mr Vullo told PinkNews: “I am very proud that my native city has named one of its streets after Alan Turning.
There are a number of roads named after Alan Turing in the UK, including at Surrey Research Park.
A film based on the codebreaker’s life, The Imitation Game, has been nominated for eight Oscars. Benedict Cumberbatch is nomintated for Best Actor, while Kiera Knightley is up for Best Supporting Actress.
Cumberbatch attracted criticism after he defended the absence of gay sex in the film, saying: “If you need to see that to understand that he’s gay, then all is lost for any kind of subtle storytelling. It’s not something that needed to be made obvious.”
However, The Sunday Times reported that there was indeed a sex scene involving Turing and another man present in early drafts – but it was mysteriously left out of the final version.
