"artless, charmed happiness:" Brokeback Mountain

“What Jack remembered and craved in a way he could neither help nor understand was the time that distant summer on Brokeback when Ennis had come up behind him and pulled him close, the silent embrace satisfying some shared and sexless hunger.

…. Jack leaned against the steady heartbeat, the vibrations of the humming like faint electricity and, standing, he fell into sleep that was not sleep but something else drowsy and tranced until Ennis, dredging up a rusty but still useable phrase from the childhood time before his mother died, said “Time to hit the hay, cowboy. I got a go. Come on, you’re sleepin on your feet like a horse,” and gave Jack a shake, a push, and went off in the darkness. Jack heard his spurs tremble as he mounted, the words “see you tomorrow,” and the horse’s shuddering snort, grind of hoof on stone.

Later, that dozy embrace solidified in his memory as the single moment of artless, charmed happiness in their separate and difficult lives. Nothing marred it, even the knowledge that Ennis would not then embrace him face to face because he did not want to see nor feel that is was Jack he held. And maybe, he thought, they’d never go much farther than that. Let be, let be. “(Proulx 278-279)

In Brokeback Mountain by Annie Proulx, this passage portrays the last time lovers Jack and Ennis meet before Jack’s tragic death. It’s a really poignant and beautiful scene within the story, and ties a lot of things together. Jack longs for what once was, during his and Ennis’ summer up on Brokeback Mountain. This moment in time is put up against his present, which, even though it is irrevocably different, and Ennis can’t look him in the face as they embrace because he can’t accept his own sexuality, is similar in some ways, even if they are superficial. Jack views it “as the single moment of artless, charmed happiness in their separate and difficult lives.” Despite how they’ve aged and grown apart, this is a happy moment for them, and one of the few that they’ve had since their summer on Brokeback Mountain. And he accepts that Ennis may not be able to do more than embrace him from behind, because that is all that he needs. That is how much he cares for Ennis, and I think that this is just a really beautiful passage for all of its simplicity.

"Adult Things:" Butler's Bloodchild

"This was going too fast. My sister Hoa had had almost as much to do with raising me as my mother. I was still too close to her-not like Qui. She could want T'Gatoi and still love me.

"Wait! Gatoi!"

She looked back, then raised nearly half her length off the floor and turned to face me. "These are adult things, Gan. This is my life, my family!"

"But she's...my sister."" (Butler 25)

 there are a lot of themes being explored in Octavia Butler's Bloodchild, including but not limited to gender roles, racism and imperialism. Gan, as a human  under Tlic authority, is given very little autonomy, and is often treated like a child by T'Gatoi. Despite being much younger than her, it is evident that Gan is coming of age, and these issues matter just as much to him as they do to her, if not moreso. T'Gatoi exclaims "These are adult things, Gan. This is my life, my family!" when really, these things are at stake for Gan. His life is threatened by the Tlic growing inside him, and his family is incredibly tangled up in the situation. Still, T'Gatoi insists on treating him like child, despite the very mature situation which they have entered.

 For me, this relationship has a lot of parallels to a marriage as concieved pre-feminism, with the gender roles reversed. Gan views T'Gatoi as something of a betrothed or husband-his attachment is evident from not wanting to let her go to his sister. This "husband", as many people and the law treated women in a time before they had legal rights, treats him like a child. His opinion has little weight within the marriage, and even less outside of it. He fears the consequences of this childbirth, as many women did before the advent of modern medicine, because it can lead to his death. Still, he pressed into it by the dominant figures need to produce heirs. Butler's analysis of these themes is veiled, but shrewd.

"Deflate:" Blorts, by Andrew Holleran

“Eventually Joshua stopped going to the baths; and we settled into a comfortable, even happy, routine, broken only by his trips to other cities-as if he could find there what he could not in New York. Only San Francisco merited more than one journey; but even there he went straight to a gym from the airport, as if he was afraid he would deflate while flying cross-country. In fact, that was the word he used once while lying on his futon, with one pump dangling from his foot, and the cat raised high in the air above his chest: “I’m looking for someone I can deflate with,” he said. But no such person materialized.” (Holleran 148)

In Blorts, by Andrew Holleran, when the character Joshua says that he is looking for someone who he can deflate with, I think that he means someone who he doesn’t have to impress- someone who will love him even he doesn’t go to the gym or keep up with the gay community and all of its intricacies. And for him, I think that this person is Red, the story’s narrator. It’s implied at the end of the story that Joshua is romantically interested in him, and we see time and again that though the narrator seems drawn to Joshua, he doesn’t really care how in shape he is, or about the gossip Joshua brings home from the gym. Joshua can be at ease around Red,  be himself, and vice versa. The two can “deflate” around each other, and have over the course of a decade. They have even settled into a domestic lifestyle, much like a married couple, complete with a cat to take care of.  They are each other’s partners, despite how long it takes Red, and perhaps Joshua, too, to realize it.

Mirror: Perpetuation of American Cultural Norms in Gay Subculture in Lorde's Zami

“There was constant competition among butches to have the most “gorgeous femme” on their arm. And “gorgeous” was defined by a white male world’s standards.

For me, going into the Bag alone was like entering an anomalous no-woman’s land. I wasn't cute or passive enough to be “femme,” and I wasn't mean or tough enough to be “butch.” I was given a wide berth. Non-conventional people can be dangerous, even in the gay community.” (Lorde 224)

This passage is very interesting to me because it highlights the ways in which the gay culture of 1950’s New York City mirrors that of the rest of contemporary society. However different lesbians may have been from mainstream straight society, and however much they may have identified themselves as “outcasts,” they had outcasts of their own that did not fit their particular mold. In a later passage, Lorde goes into more detail about this within groups of unconventional thinkers at large that existed during this time, writing “the bars and the coffee-shops and the streets of the Village in the 1950s were full of non-conformists who were deathly afraid of going against their hard-won group” (Lorde 226). In a time when mainstream American society shunned all that was different from itself, “non-conventional people [could] be dangerous, even in the gay community” (Lorde 224).

Here, we even see this subculture operating by the same standards of beauty as mainstream American culture, and this “femme” ideal being treated as more submissive than the masculine “butch”, further perpetuating the gender roles and sexism of this society with its condemnation of femininity.

"life on other stars:" Gennie's death in Zami

“I did not know why. Only that for my beloved Gennie, pain had become enough of a reason not to stay. And our friendship had not been able to alter that. I remembered Gennie’s favorite lines in one of my poems. I had found them doodled and scrawled along the margins of page after page of the notebooks which she had entrusted to my care in the movies that Friday afternoon.

and in the brief moment that is today

wild hope this dreamer jars

for I have heard in whispers talk

of life on other stars

 None of us had given her a good enough reason to stay here, not even me. I could not escape that. (Lorde 100)

Audre’s experience here is an incredibly interesting one to explore. Gennie seems to be the person whom she cares the most about out of anyone in this narrative so far, and her loss affects Audre deeply. There are many suggestions of a romantic attachment on Audre’s part (her “beloved Gennie”), which only seems to sharpen the pain. Here, we see that death is not about the dying. Even though Gennie is acting on her own part and it is she who is passing on, it is the people who she leaves behind who experience her death and are affected by it because their lives have to go on without her. Audre is left wondering why she wasn’t enough of a reason for her best friend to keep on living and this has a huge impact on her. Gennie’s death is a part of why she later leaves home.

Her poem also says a lot about Gennie. Gennie, like Audre, was a “dreamer,” and both of them dreamed of “life on other stars.” Both girls wanted an escape from their home lives, and Audre was reasonably satisfied with her jaunts with Gennie. But Gennie sought an escape that was far more permanent. In a way, it makes sense that these were her favorite lines by Audre.

In the Dark in Hwang's M. Butterfly

“Marc: Before you know it, every last one of them- they’re stripped and splashing in the pool. There’s no moon out, they can’t see what’s going on, their boobs are flapping, right? You close your eyes, reach out- it’s grab bag, get it? Doesn’t matter whose ass is between whose legs, whose teeth are sinking into who. You’re just in there, going at it, eyes closed, on and on for as long as you can stand. (Pause) Some fun, huh?”(Hwang 8)

I see this scene in David Henry Hwang’s M. Butterfly as very telling, a foreshadowing of things to come, and also indicative of the attitudes of the male characters toward women. The darkness and anonymity of the sexual encounters described here by Gallimard’s friend Marc mirrors that of the later encounters between Gallimard and Song. There is a lack of knowledge of one’s partner described here that Gallimard will mirror later in the play. His exposure to this concept now also makes him more accustomed to it later on, and less likely to question similar encounters with Song. This passage, as mentioned before, also is exemplary of the characters’ attitude toward women.

Here, as in much of the play, a very objectifying view of women is shown by Marc. This view is often echoed by Gallimard. Women are often seen as something that men can have, as little more than objects. To Gallimard, a woman is important, but for the wrong reasons- she is seen as a mark of manhood, of status. She is also valued for beauty and little else. This could be seen as a result of Gallimard’s background- it is evident that his peers shared this view, and from cultural exposure to things like Madame Butterfly, and his interpretation of them, he gleaned what he thought were the qualities of the ideal woman. This can be seen time and again throughout the play, and in this passage in particular.

"Home" in James Baldwin's Giovanni's Room

‘She looked at me steadily for awhile and then she said, “David. Don’t you think we ought to go home?”

“Go home? What for?”

“What are we staying here for? How long do you want to sit in this house, eating your heart out? And what do you think it’s doing to me?” She rose and came to me. “Please. I want to go home. I want to get married. I want to start having kids. I want us to live someplace, I want you. Please, David. What are we marking time over here for?”’(Baldwin 160-161)

This passage, which comes toward the end of Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin, brings together several very important themes of the novel. One of these is the nuclear family structure, which is so essential to American life, that David seems to feel almost trapped into, as having no choice of whether he wants it or not. Regardless of his sexuality or true feelings on the matter (which are muddled at best), David feels that he will do these things because he has to, almost as a sign of manhood. Still, he is definitely hesitant to do this. Another, even more central theme, explored here is that of home.

Earlier in the novel, Giovanni says “you will go home and then you will find that home is not home anymore. Then you will really be in trouble. As long as you are here, you can always think: One day I will go home….You don’t have a home until you leave it, and then, when you have left it, you can never go back” (Baldwin 116).  This quote applies very heavily to the one above. David may be an American, but he has changed during his time in Europe, and America won’t be the same for him when he returns- it is no longer home for him. David, though confused and in deep denial, was able to be more open about his sexuality in France than he ever could have been in America, and this has changed him. When he goes back to America, if indeed he ever does, it will never be the same, be the home that it once was.

"The Garden of Eden" in Giovanni's Room

““You two together,” Jacques suggested, “you weren't happy together?”

“No,” I said. I stood up. “It might have been better,” I said, “if he’d stayed down there in the village of his in Italy and planted his olive trees and had a lot of children and beaten his wife. He used to love to sing,” I remembered suddenly, “maybe he could have stayed down there and sung his life away and died in bed.”

Then Jacques said something that surprised me…. Nobody can stay in the garden of Eden…”

Everyone, after all, goes down that same dark road- and the road has a trick of being most dark, most treacherous, when it seems most bright- and it’s true that nobody stays in the garden of Eden…. Perhaps everybody had a garden of Eden, I don’t know; but they have scarcely seen their garden before they see the flaming sword.” (Baldwin 25)

James Baldwin uses powerful symbolism in this passage from Giovanni’s Room, and it definitely gets his point across. It is easy to think about what could have been for Giovanni if he had never left Italy, if he and David had never met, about how unexceptional and untragic his life would have been. But Jacques’ point, about how “nobody can stay in the garden of Eden,” rings very true- temptation is inevitable, and once Giovanni saw a route to something more, something bigger, he was helpless to bite the apple, and thus  “see the flaming sword,” blocking the possibility of return forever after he left. This does happen to people, within the novel and in real life, and it happened to David. He left his garden of Eden when he slept with Joey, and could never go back no matter how much he may have wanted to. It is evident within the novel that this has affected him ever since, keeping him closeted and predominantly unhappy.

Beyond Skin Deep: Skin Color In Nella Larsen's Passing

“Brian, she was thinking, was extremely good-looking. Not, of course, pretty or effeminate; the slight irregularity of his nose saved him from the prettiness, and the rather marked heaviness of his chin saved him from the effeminacy. But he was, in a pleasant masculine way, rather handsome. And yet, wouldn't he, perhaps, have been merely ordinarily good-looking but for the richness, the beauty of his skin, which was of an exquisitely fine texture and deep copper color”-(Larsen 54)

Though throughout this section of Nella Larsen’s Passing we see that Irene and Brian’s marriage is not without its problems, here Irene admits to herself her husband’s beauty. On the surface, this is a quote about beauty and its relation to skin color, a topic which comes back later in the section, during which Irene discusses the same topic with Mr. Wentworth. In a way, according to Irene, skin color adds something exotic to a person, politically incorrect as that sounds today. It makes a person more interesting, and in the 1920s, during which this book is set, people were fascinated by the new and unfamiliar. Still, this passage is more than skin deep- it shows a richer, deeper cultural connection within the African-American community and the Redfields’ lives.

This passage does carry with it a racial undertone. Brian’s blackness is what makes him beautiful and not just “good-looking.” The way in which Larsen describes this quality lends it something much deeper- it is a “richness,” which for me correlates with the richness of the African-American culture to which Brian and Irene belong. They have a connection with their community that Clare Kendry lacks and yearns for. She is disconnected from her own culture and trapped within that of the white world, which could be viewed in light of this passage as just “good,” but lacking in the roots and vibrancy of  the cultural world of her birth. It is blackness which brings with it this richness, and it is this that Clare is seeking to find a link to.

Racial Disconnect and Homoeroticism in Passing, by Nella Larsen

“For I am lonely, so lonely…cannot help longing to be with you again, as I have never longed for anything before; and I have wanted many things in my life….. You can’t know how in this pale life of mine I am all the time seeing the bright pictures of that other that I once thought I was glad to be free of…It’s like an ache, a pain that never ceases…. And it’s your fault, `Rene dear. At least partly. For I wouldn't now, perhaps, have this terrible, this wild desire if I hadn't seen you that time in Chicago….” (Larsen 11)

This quote from Nella Larsen’s Passing sets up a lot about her novel and can be interpreted in a variety of ways. Taken from a letter written to the protagonist, Irene Redfield, from her high school friend Claire Kendry, it seems to describe (on the surface) Clare’s feeling of disconnect with her African-American roots, which she has hide to hide by “passing” as a white woman in her marriage to a deeply racist, but very rich, white man. Her “pale life” does not compare with “the bright picture of the other,” that other being her race and its culture. When she married her husband, she thought she “was glad to be free of” that “other,” but has since come to realize that this is not the case, particularly after reuniting with Irene, who does not attempt to “pass” and maintains a connection with her roots. This, however, is a rather superficial analysis of this passage. I believe that there is a deeper homoerotic interpretation that can be gleaned from it.

            Clare’s passion in this letter is undeniable, as she clearly indicates her painful loneliness, with lines like “I am lonely, so lonely” and “It’s like an ache, a pain that never ceases.” Though on the surface these remarks have to do with their race, I believe that she may be attempting to convey her passion for Irene, as these are phrases often associated with love and desire. This desire is more overtly mentioned later in the passage when Clare writes “I wouldn't now, perhaps, have this terrible, wild desire if I hadn't seen you that time in Chicago.” She explicitly blames Irene for her desire, and though Irene could be held partially responsible for Clare’s racial crisis, Clare could also be referring to a deeper desire, one considered both “terrible” and “wild,” as lesbianism was during this time. Though it is not overt, I believe that this interpretation could be drawn from an analysis of this passage.

On Mikkola and Pickett

I have several major issues with Homosexuality by Brent Pickett. While Pickett’s article, along with Mari Mikkola’s Feminist Perspectives on Sex and Gender, is very thorough analysis of its topic, it contains some content that I take issue with, especially when he writes about queer theory as a counter to essentialism, saying:

 “queer does not marginalize those whose sexuality is outside the gay or lesbian norm, such as sado-masochists. Since specific conceptualizations of sexuality are avoided, and hence not put at the center of any definition of queer, it allows more freedom for self-identification for, say, black lesbians to identify as much or more with their race (or any other trait, such as involvement in  an S&M subculture) than with lesbianism” -(Pickett 19). 

While the interpretation here is sound on a basic level, there is a fundamental problem with it: while it mentions those who fall “outside the gay and lesbian norm,” it fails to specify those between the gay and straight norm, furthering the idea of the two as opposites rather than different sides of a spectrum. In doing this, Pickett is taking part in bisexual erasure. To be fair, he does acknowledge the problems of an exclusive, essentialist gay liberation movement, and the importance of self-identification by race, ethnicity, and/or fetish culture- he just fails to acknowledge any self-identification beyond this. This is a trend that can be seen in much discussion of sexuality today that I don’t approve of. I believe that sexuality is a spectrum, a continuum, and ignoring that is highly problematic.

Mari Mikkola’s article was decidedly less off-putting than Pickett’s for me as a reader. I truly admire the way in which she analyzes and synthesizes a wide variety of viewpoints that differ radically at times. One of my favorite quotes from the article is about “white solipsism,” which she describes as

“assum[ing] that all women share some ‘golden nugget of womanness’…and that the features consecutive of such a nugget are the same for all women regardless of their particular cultural backgrounds. Next, white Western middle class feminists accounted for the shared features simply by reflecting on the cultural features that condition their gender”- (Mikkola 13). 

Here Mikkola argues by way of Elizabeth Spelman that feminism is a very wide-ranging movement that goes beyond one color or one class, as opposed to the viewpoint put forth by Betty Freidan and others that feminism was one uniform block unaffected by race, ethnicity, class, creed or culture, and that this viewpoint had major flaws.

Overall, both of these articles were very informative, even though they did have their issues. I look forward to discussing them further in class and hearing other points of view students had about them.

Writing is...

Writing is a lot of things. In its broadest sense, it is the communication of ideas through words transmitted in text. But it is also so much more than that. One of my favorite quotes from Allen Ginsberg, which comes from his poem Improvisation in Beijing, says “I write poetry because the English word Inspiration comes from Latin Spiritus, breath, I want to breathe freely.” For some, writing is essential as a means to convey ideas and express themselves- almost as much so as breathing. As someone who writes creatively, I can agree with this- writing is another way for me to “breathe freely,” to make sense of my feelings and express them.

Writing is how we preserve our past and how we shape our future. It is also how we make sense of our present. Writing is one of the most important elements of our culture, helping us to communicate pretty much every idea from faith to finance to one another for centuries.

This post is a definition, but also an introduction. With that said, hi! I’m Katie and I hail from a small town in New Jersey. I love seafood (one reason I wanted to go to school in New England), and  I watch a lot of TV, listen to The Magnetic Fields and love to read poetry- particularly Ginsberg and Lorca. I also love to write poetry and prose, and am currently attempting to write an epic of love, loss and lies set against the post-apocalyptic wasteland of America after a very different ending to the Cold War. It grapples with such questions as religion, sexuality and politics, and the plot is sort of sprawling and needs to be tamed into a cohesive narrative.

As far as academics go, I am definitely a humanities person. My favorite subject in high school was history, and I’m also passionate about film and politics, as well as creative writing and social justice issues. A big part of why I wanted to take this course is because I feel like high school literature courses don’t discuss gender or sexuality nearly enough. Nearly every opportunity to do so is ignored or downplayed. In my junior English class we discussed the racial aspect of Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston and what effect race had on Janie, the novel’s heroine, but not the effect of gender, which is just as pronounced, if not more so. These are topics that I, as feminist and advocate for the LGBTQ community, believe are incredibly important and should not be ignored, and I look forward to discussing them in this class. I also look forward to perhaps gaining a deeper understanding of myself in terms of these themes, as they are often not discussed. I want to know what being a woman and a sexual human being means for me.