Does Shakespeare Even Need to Be Queer-ified? (WUmester Post)
This past weekend, I traveled to Portland, OR for the Association of Writers and Publishers (AWP) conference. It was my first time traveling so far West, as well as the first time I'd ever gone to a convention dedicated solely to writing and literature. I thought the trip would be a good opportunity to improve my creative writing, as well as prepare myself for life after my graduation this May; I was not disappointed.
The first panel I attended was at 9am on a Thursday morning. I was exhausted from traveling, and someone had to practically coerce me from my bed and into the Uber. The panel was titled "We're Here, We're Queer," and the panel consisted of authors S.J. Sindu, Rika Aoki, and Chelsea Johnson. All three of these women are part of the LGBTQ+ community, and for a 9am panel, they certainly brought their A-game.
They all had plenty of delicious hot-takes about their experiences with writing from a LGBTQ+ perspective. "Do those characters need to be gay?" No, they don't, but they are. "No one is going to read a novel with a lesbian protagonist." Yes, yes, they will, and in droves. They validated everything I'd been thinking since junior high, emphasizing the need for queer narratives and how starved queer youth become when every YA novel is "girl meets boy, boy treats girl like shit, but it's okay, because he's got baggage and is also a vampire/demon/etc." We get tired of the same old, problematic narrative and have to look elsewhere to satiate our hunger for stories.
Rika Aoki made a point that stuck with me and made me think about a conversation we had early in the class. "Literature has always been queer," she said, the audience hanging on every word. "We've always been here. You can't tell us we're not." You may be asking: What does this have to do with Shakespeare? Honestly, before this class, I would've asked the same thing. Now all I ever do comes back around to me thinking about or noticing connections to Shakespeare.
Early on in our discussion of The Merchant of Venice, we noted that there has been some discussion around Antonio and Bassanio's interactions in the play's opening scene. Bassanio is clearly besotted with Portia, to the point that it's all he talks about. And Antonio is depressed for whatever reason, but what if those two things were connected. Solanio decides that Antonio must be in love, which Antonio is quick to deny (468), but what if those throwaway lines weren't so throwaway? When Bassanio enters the scene later, the first thing Antonio asks about is Portia: "Well, tell me now--what lady is the same to whom you swore a secret pilgrimage" (470). No greeting, no talk about the weather, just, "So, uh, what about that girl you like?" Antonio is also fairly insistent on helping Bassanio out with his mission to woo Portia, even saying, "My purse, my person, my extremest means Lie all unlocked to your occasions" (470). We know very little about the history and depth of their relationship, but some part of me can't help but wonder if Antonio's enthusiasm is some sort of compensation, or even a distraction from his odd depression (i.e. heartbreak).
Now, do I actually think that Antonio was in love with Bassanio? Not really. Considering that William Shakespeare is the same man who wrote Othello and many other problem plays, I'm not going to die on any hill shouting that The Merchant of Venice was always queer in the way that Othello was always racist. But as a queer person, I tend to look at any "suspicious" interaction with a critical eye, because for a long time, any representation to be found in media lied in the subtext. It's interesting to think about how many literary works or icons were queer-coded and we'll just never know. But it also sucks that a lot of queer writers had to hide their stories in layers upon layers of subtext, forever pushed aside or lost because "not everything has to be gay."
It makes me really thankful that I live in a time where we can write and read queer narratives in any number of ways, and that we have the freedom to say things like, "Hey, maybe Antonio had the hots for Bassanio." Maybe it'll raise a few eye-brows, but I won't be killed or have my career ruined over it.
I'm not here to prove whether or not this particular play is queer-coded. But I would argue that a case could be made. Is The Merchant of Venice queer? Well, in the spirit of Rika Aoki (that makes it sound like she's passed; she's very much alive), maybe it's always been queer, and we just didn't want to see.
Shakespeare, William, et al. The Norton Shakespeare: Comedies. W.W. Norton & Company, 2016.
The first panel I attended was at 9am on a Thursday morning. I was exhausted from traveling, and someone had to practically coerce me from my bed and into the Uber. The panel was titled "We're Here, We're Queer," and the panel consisted of authors S.J. Sindu, Rika Aoki, and Chelsea Johnson. All three of these women are part of the LGBTQ+ community, and for a 9am panel, they certainly brought their A-game.
They all had plenty of delicious hot-takes about their experiences with writing from a LGBTQ+ perspective. "Do those characters need to be gay?" No, they don't, but they are. "No one is going to read a novel with a lesbian protagonist." Yes, yes, they will, and in droves. They validated everything I'd been thinking since junior high, emphasizing the need for queer narratives and how starved queer youth become when every YA novel is "girl meets boy, boy treats girl like shit, but it's okay, because he's got baggage and is also a vampire/demon/etc." We get tired of the same old, problematic narrative and have to look elsewhere to satiate our hunger for stories.
Rika Aoki made a point that stuck with me and made me think about a conversation we had early in the class. "Literature has always been queer," she said, the audience hanging on every word. "We've always been here. You can't tell us we're not." You may be asking: What does this have to do with Shakespeare? Honestly, before this class, I would've asked the same thing. Now all I ever do comes back around to me thinking about or noticing connections to Shakespeare.
Early on in our discussion of The Merchant of Venice, we noted that there has been some discussion around Antonio and Bassanio's interactions in the play's opening scene. Bassanio is clearly besotted with Portia, to the point that it's all he talks about. And Antonio is depressed for whatever reason, but what if those two things were connected. Solanio decides that Antonio must be in love, which Antonio is quick to deny (468), but what if those throwaway lines weren't so throwaway? When Bassanio enters the scene later, the first thing Antonio asks about is Portia: "Well, tell me now--what lady is the same to whom you swore a secret pilgrimage" (470). No greeting, no talk about the weather, just, "So, uh, what about that girl you like?" Antonio is also fairly insistent on helping Bassanio out with his mission to woo Portia, even saying, "My purse, my person, my extremest means Lie all unlocked to your occasions" (470). We know very little about the history and depth of their relationship, but some part of me can't help but wonder if Antonio's enthusiasm is some sort of compensation, or even a distraction from his odd depression (i.e. heartbreak).
Now, do I actually think that Antonio was in love with Bassanio? Not really. Considering that William Shakespeare is the same man who wrote Othello and many other problem plays, I'm not going to die on any hill shouting that The Merchant of Venice was always queer in the way that Othello was always racist. But as a queer person, I tend to look at any "suspicious" interaction with a critical eye, because for a long time, any representation to be found in media lied in the subtext. It's interesting to think about how many literary works or icons were queer-coded and we'll just never know. But it also sucks that a lot of queer writers had to hide their stories in layers upon layers of subtext, forever pushed aside or lost because "not everything has to be gay."
It makes me really thankful that I live in a time where we can write and read queer narratives in any number of ways, and that we have the freedom to say things like, "Hey, maybe Antonio had the hots for Bassanio." Maybe it'll raise a few eye-brows, but I won't be killed or have my career ruined over it.
I'm not here to prove whether or not this particular play is queer-coded. But I would argue that a case could be made. Is The Merchant of Venice queer? Well, in the spirit of Rika Aoki (that makes it sound like she's passed; she's very much alive), maybe it's always been queer, and we just didn't want to see.
Shakespeare, William, et al. The Norton Shakespeare: Comedies. W.W. Norton & Company, 2016.
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