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yaoi
Sign in to saveAlso known as boys' love, BL, boys love, shonen ai
fiction genre that depicts homoerotic relationships between male characters
Wikidata facts
- Subclass of
- anime and manga
- Main subject
- gay
- Image
- Yaoi Books by miyagawa.jpg
- Said to be same as
- boys' love
Show 9 more facts
- Commons category
- Yaoi
- topic's main category
- Category:Boys' love
- facet of
- gay literature
- native label
- やおい
- hashtag
- yaoi
- fandom
- fudanshi
- depicted by
- Tweek x Craig
- different from
- Danmei
- opposite of
- yuri
via Wikidata · CC0
~40 min read
Encyclopedic overview
An example of BL-inspired artwork. The svelte, semi-androgynous physical features of the characters are typical of bishōnen (transl. 'beautiful youth' or 'beautiful boy') common in BL media.
Boys' love (Japanese: ボーイズ ラブ, Hepburn: bōizu rabu), also known by its abbreviation BL (ビーエル, bīeru), is a genre of fictional media originating in Japan that depicts homoerotic relationships between male characters. It is typically created by women for a female audience, distinguishing it from the equivalent genre of homoerotic media created by and for gay men, though BL does also attract a male audience and can be produced by male creators. BL spans a wide range of media, including manga, anime, drama CDs, novels, video games, television series, films, and fan works.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “yaoi” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.