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book review (historical romance fiction: heterosexuality and perform activities) and blog rec
First the blog rec: New YA author Kristin Cashore, author of the forthcoming YA fantasy Graceling, has written a fabulous post on an author's perspective of trying to do right by body image issues while still being true to the characters and stories in her head. How can you go wrong with a blog post which climaxes "AARRGGHHH! AT THIS RATE I WILL NEVER SAVE THE WORLD!!!"? Answer: you can't.
Secondly, a (half-assed) book review: Lisa Fletcher's brand-new Historical Romance Fiction: Heterosexuality and Performativity (Tasmania: Ashgate. 2008) First I want to give a major caveat, which is that I read this book in a hurry because it is an overdue ILL book, and even though I'm going to read it again I can't renew it right now. In fact, given that set of circumstances I feel so uncomfortable about writing any of my negative impressions I'm just going to hold off on them right now. When you read a book at this pace, I don't think initial discombobulation should count for anything.
The text's project is to show how performativity (through speech acts and the performance of gender) in historical romance novels, crossing the boundaries from "literary" to "popular" (a boundary Fletcher complicates by pointing out the high sales figures of so-called literary romances such as Possession), reinforces heterosexual norms. In a manner which I admit I didn't quite follow given my hyper-quick reading, she discusses the performance of gender through cross-dressed heroes and heroines and relates it to Judith Butler's performance of gender, paying special attention to Butler's insistence that gender performativity is not a choice that can be turned on or off at will.
One thing I found interesting in an initial misreading I gave to a passage in this text is a dichotomy I thought at first was being constructed: the essential statement of the heterosexual romance is the explicit statement of love, and the essential statement of the homosexual romance is coming out of the closet. That isn't actually what she was saying -- she was leaning towards the heterosexual declaration of love as a possible statement from the closet itself (it's complicated, and I'm going to point back to my quick reading as an excuse for not getting into it here) -- but I think I prefer my initial misreading. It's obviously incredibly flawed; for one thing, it rules out any homosexual romance that doesn't begin in the closet. But I feel like I have something there that I want to run with, and see where it goes.
I can't really say more about it it; with such a brief read I'm not sure if the book had a more overarching takeaway than what I've already stated. But there's definitely food for thought in there.
Secondly, a (half-assed) book review: Lisa Fletcher's brand-new Historical Romance Fiction: Heterosexuality and Performativity (Tasmania: Ashgate. 2008) First I want to give a major caveat, which is that I read this book in a hurry because it is an overdue ILL book, and even though I'm going to read it again I can't renew it right now. In fact, given that set of circumstances I feel so uncomfortable about writing any of my negative impressions I'm just going to hold off on them right now. When you read a book at this pace, I don't think initial discombobulation should count for anything.
The text's project is to show how performativity (through speech acts and the performance of gender) in historical romance novels, crossing the boundaries from "literary" to "popular" (a boundary Fletcher complicates by pointing out the high sales figures of so-called literary romances such as Possession), reinforces heterosexual norms. In a manner which I admit I didn't quite follow given my hyper-quick reading, she discusses the performance of gender through cross-dressed heroes and heroines and relates it to Judith Butler's performance of gender, paying special attention to Butler's insistence that gender performativity is not a choice that can be turned on or off at will.
One thing I found interesting in an initial misreading I gave to a passage in this text is a dichotomy I thought at first was being constructed: the essential statement of the heterosexual romance is the explicit statement of love, and the essential statement of the homosexual romance is coming out of the closet. That isn't actually what she was saying -- she was leaning towards the heterosexual declaration of love as a possible statement from the closet itself (it's complicated, and I'm going to point back to my quick reading as an excuse for not getting into it here) -- but I think I prefer my initial misreading. It's obviously incredibly flawed; for one thing, it rules out any homosexual romance that doesn't begin in the closet. But I feel like I have something there that I want to run with, and see where it goes.
I can't really say more about it it; with such a brief read I'm not sure if the book had a more overarching takeaway than what I've already stated. But there's definitely food for thought in there.