Stare, Flaunt: Seeing Trans Femininity in Literary Modernism

Journal article

Emma Heaney

Modernism/Modernity, Vol.7(1)

06/24/2022

Metrics

1 Record Views

Title: Stare, Flaunt: Seeing Trans Femininity in Literary Modernism
Author/Creator: Emma Heaney
Publication Details: Modernism/Modernity, Vol.7(1)
Annotation: Looks to Hemingway’s and Claude McKay’s differing representations of gender nonconformity in The Sun Also Rises and Home to Harlem (1928) for understanding trans femininity in memoirs by Alison Bechdel (Fun Home, 2006) and Janet Mock (Redefining Realness, 2011). Provides a close reading of the bal musette scene in which Brett appears with a group of homosexual men, contending that Jake’s fascination with the partiers, along with his angry and phobic response, stems not from their homosexuality but from their zest for life and joy on the dance floor, a joy that the glowering Jake and the author feel left out of. Suggests that while Hemingway’s gender-nonconformity was evident in his life and writings, his struggle to sublimate his difference wouldn’t allow Hemingway to accept the difference of his youngest child’s trans identity. Heaney concludes: "Gloria’s trans femininity struck a chord that set her father’s gender trouble to reverberate. And they both knew it."
Academic Unit: Hemingway Bibliography
Resource Type: Journal article
Record Identifier: 991015212699503691