The Book of Boy Trouble hits the halls of Academe
ENGL 197:
Upper-Division Seminar : Literature and Gay Male Identity Politics, 1960-2000
Spring 2007
Instructor: Darieck Scott
Meets on: TR 1100-1215 - SH 2716
Prerequisites: Writing 2, 50, or 109; English 10; or upper-division standing
This course cannot be repeated and is limited to upper-division English majors only.
LITERATURE AND GAY MALE IDENTITY POLITICS, 1960-2000
In this course we will trace the shifts and continuities in modes of literary representation of what we’ll loosely posit as “contemporary American gay male experience” (with a side trip or two to British gay male experience), from pre-Stonewall to the literature of the post-Stonewall gay liberation generation to the mainstreaming of representations of gay men at the end of the 20th century. Amongst the themes/concerns we’ll address during the semester: What, if any, are the defining qualities of Anglo-American gay male fiction? How is the category of “gay male experience” created and defined by these works? How do we see this body of work distinguishing itself from other Anglo-American fiction by men or women? How is what it means to be gay and male enunciated in these texts in relationship to race and class distinctions in American (and British) society?
Texts:
City of Night, John Rechy
Myra Breckinridge, Gore Vidal
Dancer from the Dance, Andrew Holleran
Ceremonies, Essex Hemphill
Angels in America, Tony Kushner
The Swimming-Pool Library, Alan Hollinghurst
The Book of Boy Trouble, eds. Robert Kirby and David Kelly