I like to think of [Alice Notley] as queer. In the broadest sense possible. Her rejection of PoBiz, her rejection of white, middle-class values; she refuses to be categorized, shifting her poetic project from narrative to the experimental and back to lyrical in a mere second.
This question of who is or is not a queer writer is recently in my mind due to conversations with a friend of mine who has been wondering whether or not to identify as a queer poet. She is bisexual, but her personal sexuality rarely arises in her writing. On the other hand, she does a lot to question norms both social and sexual in her work, leading me to suggest to her that she is a "queering poet." That is to say, the emphasis is on what she does rather than who she is. The emphasis is on the question rather than the answer. The emphasis is on mini-narratives, not a grand all-encompassing one. The emphasis is, to my joy, on guiding the reader through a process rather than presenting said reader with an object.
With that in mind, can I identify as a queering poet as well? I want to say yes, based on the nature of my work, but I think I need some friends and colleagues to weigh in, to argue against a straight male as being able to queer. Some devil's advocates, as it were (but play nice, please, in the process of doing so).
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Once again, sociopolitical commentary gets me more views...and more spammers.
It is a curious question. One view-point is clear. If you look at gay poetry competitions, the guidelines are: it does not matter what you write (gay content is not required), but you must identify as gay in the actual world. It is a clear, but strange position in this Post-Modern world, meaning that the author rather than the text dictates. Following this view (logic?), what you write is unimportant. Your work does not "queer" you because you write from a "straight" identity. I am not offering my view-point here. That is more complex. If you look at Outside the Lines, you will find a recent post about Marie Howe. Is her poem a "queer" poem or is it a heterosexual writer playing with early adolescent feelings for young women friends? I would say the latter: it is heterosexual indulgence, a flirting with the Other... I don't think Steve Fellner has his terms right. He would "like" to think. He does "like" to think, but some of his views are flights-of-(deranged) fancy. It is a curious question...I ponder. Best wishes.
Thanks for the great point to The New Gay and the Marie Howe poem. I'll start there in my response-
Howe's poem interests me as possibly queering because of that last thought - the narrator and her friends made themselves stop. That is to say, that they are now (presumably) straight is not a more natural outcome than if they'd kept on kissing other girls. With the final line of the poem, she takes what could be just a flirtation with the Other before retreating to the safety of heteronormativity and recasts it as a rejection of heteronormativity. I'm a bit concerned with the idea that sexual preference is all choice, but that's another debate.
Putting that another way, while the poem uses her individual experience as a heterosexual experiment, it undermines heterosexuality in general as normal/natural. That, to my view, is queering writ large.
Where I think I differ from the poetry competitions you describe is that I'm concentrating on the effect on the audience. An author may not be able to queer him or her self (which is paramount to the contests), but through his or her work may be able to queer the reader? Maybe not?
Steve has actually retracted his use of "queer" to describe Notley. He goes off in unexpected directions sometimes, but I like that he's willing to put it out there and then discuss it.
Thanks again for a thought-provoking comment.
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