Portrayal Of Queer Lives In Language And Literature: A Critical Study Of Sarah Schulman’s Novel Rat Bohemia

Abstract

As literature is a reflection of life, it captures the hardships of queer people in the difficult context of contemporary changes. The term “queer” is used to refer to non-heterosexual sexual and gender minorities. Author of Rat Bohemia, Sarah Schulman, uses her writing to highlight the difficulties queer people face and to advance their cause of being accepted as normal. Using the spectacle of literary analysis, this article challenges the reader to deconstruct the dominant culture’s constructed thinking pattern in order to reconstruct a world view of equilibrium by accepting the undeniable truth of queerness in order to expose the suffocation and suffering of queer lives under the guise of hegemonic ‘normalcy’. It focuses on the meaning, beginning, and helplessness of queer people. Hegemonic dominance, labelling and lack of democratic principle of acceptance are traced as reasons for the marginalisation of queer lives. Homelessness, isolation, public disgrace, lack of  authentic representation, the struggle for survival and hiding the reality are are the major challenges queer lives face. Resistance to the dominance, growth in the coming out process, reciprocal understanding of queer people and mutual support are positive rays of hope that one can see in the horizon of life in fraternity. In this research, Sarah Schulman’s literary work, Rat Bohemia, is used to examine the tangled lives of queer people.