Q is for—Queerness
As I've stated, my motivation for
writing a trilogy in which the main character is gay was two-fold: A)
I was writing A Book of Tongues “for me”, and as a
slasher, that's my bag, baby, but B) around the same time I began, I
also ran across some of Hal Duncan (Vellum, Ink)'s writing
about QUILTBAG representation in popular media, and though “yes, I
can do that—complicated, tough gay dudes whose tragedy doesn't
necessarily come attached to their sexuality ahoy!” By the end of A
Book, however, I was happy to see that the spectrum of
non-default character sexuality already seemed to be expanding far
beyond the “hard gay” axis, embracing functional bisexuality and
straight-with-an-exceptionality alike. This has continued to happen
throughout the rest of the series, with A Rope of Thorns
adding polysexual relationships and lesbianism with a hint of
transgender issues, depending on how Yiska actually sees herself
(more on that later); in A Tree of Bones, those existing
currents are continued, hopefully remaining emotionally front and
centre as the characters those sexualities come attached to stay in
play. And while I'm sad to say I wan't quite able to push it far
enough to include any overtly asexual characters, who knows? I
already know this universe ain't completely done with me.
What's become particularly interesting
for me, however, is that while my original impulse contained a
healthy dose of prurience, the actual ratio of sex-to-action has gone
down in each instalment, partly due to lack of time vs. intensity of
immediate physical threat. This hopefully reduces the fetishistic
angle somewhat, which I'm happy with, but it also goes back to
Duncan's observation that while sexuality is obviously a cornerstone
of most people's motivations, it's not the be-all and end-all we
privilege it as in most narratives. And since queerness is a concept
which has its roots in a reclaimed slur, a way of self-definition
which says: “Yes, I am 'different', but there's nothing wrong with
that”, how much further do you have to push before you can note
that that sounds as much like hexes defining themselves “against”
non-hexes and vice versa as it does like it necessarily has anything
to do with who does or doesn't sleep with whom? So the spectrum
widens further, hopefully, the default shifting, until you end up in
(to my mind) an interesting world where maybe even the non-default
characters can feel pretty “queer” themselves, in certain
contexts.
(Apologies, of course, for any
interesectional toes I may have stepped on with this line of
rumination—as a straight person with a particular kink, it's never
my intention to co-opt anyone's identity, except in fiction.)
R is for—Red Weed
By A Tree, the Red Weed—Datura
nazacul, as Doc Asbury calls it, that parasite infestation of
Hell Kudzu spawned by Chess Pargeter's Xipe Totec incarnation
throughout A Rope of Thorns—has become a bit of a
non-speaking supporting character in some ways, a plot device in
others. Some people have rightly noted that it's reminiscent of the
trickster predator vines in Scott Smith's The Ruins, which
I'll totally cop to; frankly, I don't see how the two couldn't have
had some sort of relationship, considering said ruins are those of a
Mayan temple. I'd say the main difference in presentation with the
Weed this time 'round is that in Rope, Chess didn't know how
to control it, and didn't want to know—but here it's being wielded
by the Enemy, who understands innately how best to let it do his
bidding. Also, given that I'm not a big fan of the re-set mode in
storytelling, the Weed is probably here to stay, even by this part of
the saga's end...a severe ecological shift, a sort of lasting
hex-pollution. Which will have interesing implications for my version
of the Weird West in future, no doubt.
Tomorrow: S and T!
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