The Lesbian Theory of Literary Critique

Paper Summary:

This paper explains that lesbian theory has struggled with definition. The author points out that, by its very nature, lesbian theory addresses the notion of the lesbian as 'an other', an entity marginalized beyond the dominant, patriarchal center of society. The paper stresses that, because the lesbian theory asserts its own ability to independently encompass the lesbian experience, this theory fails to acknowledge the complex and fluid nature of this otherness. The author relates that another more fundamental flaw is that, because it tries to empower the lesbian who finds her words relegated to the darker corners of the literary world, too often the theory tends toward a complete avoidance of exclusivity. The paper applies several existing modes of lesbian theory to Alicia Gaspar de Alba's book "Desert Blood" and to the poems of Emily Dickinson to reveal the extent to which these definitional flaws must be addressed.

From the Paper:

"In "The Safe Sea of Women", Bonnie Zimmerman discusses the poem "I showed her Heights she never saw" by Emily Dickinson, calling it, "suggestively lesbian". Similarly, in "What is Lesbian Literature?", Lillian Faderman cites the poem "Her sweet Weight on my Heart at Night" as reason to include Dickinson's work in the canon of lesbian fiction even though, "there are no explicit suggestions of lesbian sexual relations in her poems." . Thus, both Zimmerman and Faderman assume the authority to label these poems as lesbian texts based entirely on personal assumptions made about Dickinson."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Alarcon, Norma. "Chicana's Feminist Literature: A Re-vision Through Malintzin." This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color. New York: Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, 1983.
• Collecott, Diana. "What is Not Said: A Study in Textual Inversion." Sexual Sameness: Textual Differences in Lesbian and Gay Writing. Ed. Joseph Bristow. New York: Routledge, 1992. 93-103.
• Dickinson, Emily. The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson. Ed. Thomas H. Johnson. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1960.
• Faderman, Lillian. "What is Lesbian Literature? Forming a Historical Canon." Professions of Desire: Lesbian and Gay Studies in Literature. Ed. George E. Haggerty and Bonnie Zimmerman. New York: Modern Language Association of America, 1995. 49-59.
• Garber, Linda. "One Step Global, Two Steps Back? Race, Gender and Queer Studies." New Directions in Multiethnic, Racial, and Global Queer Studies. GLQ 10 (2003): 125-28.

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