20th Century American Literature - Post WWII - Literary Criticism, Gay & Lesbian Literary Studies, Literary Criticism - U.S. Fiction & Prose Literature - General & Miscellaneous
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Overview
William S. Burroughs is consistently thought of as a novelist who is gay, rather than a gay novelist. This distinction is slight, yet remarkable, since it has meant that Burroughs has been excluded from the gay canon and from the scope of queer theory. In this intelligent book, Jamie Russell offers the first queer reading of Burroughs' novels. He explores how the novels of Burroughs can be seen as a sustained attempt to offer a very personal rethinking of gay subjectivity and as an attempt to overturn stereotypes of gay men as effeminate. Yet in his celebration and appropriation of some of the most violent, misogynistic, and effeminophobic elements of heterosexually-identified masculinity, Burroughs' life and writing suggest a subjectivity that has been deeply troubling to many in the gay community.Editorials
Bill Savage
Convincing and compelling...accessible and understandable to any educated general reader. The prose is engaging, supple, fluid, readable, and clear.Booknews
Despite his having produced a queer fiction that is unabashed in its sexuality, unafraid of int explicit lusts, and uncompromising in its condemnation of the oppression and restriction of sexual freedom by the heterosexual dominant, Russell finds that Williams Burroughs (d. 2000) has not been remembered as a queer writer, and sets out to right the record. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)Book Details
Published
August 8, 2001
Publisher
New York ; Palgrave, 2001.
Pages
272
Format
Paperback
ISBN
9780312239237