Confusion

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From Summer Sisters (1998)

  9 UNTIL THE NIGHT BEFORE Vix hadn’t realized Lamb’s full name was Lambert Mayhew Somers the Third, or that Sharkey was named Lambert Mayhew Somers the Fourth, like some king, some king who pumped gas at the Texaco station on Beach Road. They’d planned on calling him Bert, Caitlin told her, to distinguish his name from Lamb’s, but when he was little he became so fascinated by sharks they started calling him Sharkey and the name stuck. “When they made Jaws Lamb took him down to the lagoon to meet Steven Spielberg,” Caitlin said, “but all Sharkey cared about was that huge mechanical monster. Then Lamb made the mistake of taking him to see the movie and Sharkey totally freaked out. He hasn’t gone swimming since. Did you see it?” “The shark?” “The movie.” Vix shook her head. “My parents wouldn’t let me.” “If they show it again we’ll go together. It doesn’t scare me,” Caitlin told her. “You know what a shark bite feels like?” “No, what?” Caitlin suddenly jumped onto Vix’s bed and bit her on her rear end. “Cut that out!” Vix yelled. When Sharkey joined them at the house for lunch, Grandmother bopped him over the head with her purse. “Straighten up, Bertie. Walk tall. You’re a Mayhew.” Sharkey slumped into a chair at the porch table, set for lunch with Abby’s blue and white dishes. Vix could feel the tension building and wished she could escape to the beach with a peanut butter sandwich and a book. Maybe she’d run into Bru and Von again. Now that would be interesting! Dorset sat across from her, a blank expression on her face. Her eyes were unfocused, as if she were already somewhere else, probably back at the fish market with Von. She fiddled with the combs in her hair, first taking out one and repositioning it, then the other. The conversation at the table centered on Grandmother’s health. “But you’re looking so well, Mrs. Somers,” Abby told her. “Oh, pfoo,” Grandmother said. Vix had to remind herself that this woman was Regina Mayhew Somers, that she’d once read Valley of the Dolls and Peyton Place. She probably knew all about coitus interruptus. “I’m not well at all,” Grandmother continued. “And those Florida doctors can’t find the problem. But you know who you get down there ... doctors looking for sunshine, doctors who want to fish all day or sail boats ... and so many of them of the Jewish persuasion. Not that they don’t make good doctors,” she hastily added. “Now, Grandmother ...” Lamb said, putting down his fork. “Oh, I knew you would take that wrong!” she cried, as if she were a naughty girl. “But Abby understands, don’t you, dear?” “Yes, I understand completely,” Abby said. “We all understand, Grandmother,” Caitlin added. “Well, that’s good, isn’t it?” Grandmother asked lightly.

• From Delta of Venus (1977)

  “NO ONE KNEW exactly what she was. She dressed like a man. She was small, lean, flat-chested. She wore her hair short, straight. She had the face of a boy. She played billiards like a man. She drank like a man, with her foot on the bar railing. She told obscene stories like a man. Her drawing had a strength not found in a woman’s work. But her name had a feminine sound, her walk was feminine, and she was said not to have a penis. The men did not know quite how to treat her. Sometimes they slapped her on the back with fraternal feelings. “She lived with two girls in a studio. One of them was a model, the other, a nightclub singer. But no one knew what relationship there was among them. The two girls seemed to have a relationship like that of a husband and a wife. What was Mafouka to them? They would never answer any questions. Montparnasse always liked to know such things, and in detail. A few homosexuals had been attracted to Mafouka and had made advances towards her or him. But she had repulsed them. She quarreled willingly and struck out with force. “One day I was quite a little drunk and I dropped into Mafouka’s studio. The door was open. As I entered I heard giggling up on the balcony. The two girls were obviously making love. The voices would get soft and tender, then violent and unintelligible, and become moans and sighs. Then there would be silences. “Mafouka came in and found me with my ear cocked, listening. I said to her, ‘Please let me go and see them.’ “‘I don’t mind,’ said Mafouka. ‘Come up after me, slowly. They won’t stop if they think it is just me. They like me to watch them.’ “We went up the narrow stairs. Mafouka called, ‘It’s I.’ There was no interruption of the noises. As we went up, I bent over so that they could not see me. Mafouka went to the bed. The two girls were naked. They were pressing their bodies against each other and rubbing together. The friction gave them pleasure. Mafouka leaned over them, caressed them. They said, ‘Come on, Mafouka, lie with us.’ But she left them and took me downstairs again. “‘Mafouka,’ I said, ‘What are you? Are you a man or a woman? Why do you live with these two girls? If you are a man, why don’t you have a girl of your own? If you are a woman, why don’t you have a man occasionally?’ “Mafouka smiled at me. “‘Everybody wants to know. Everybody feels that I am not a boy. The women feel it. The men don’t know for sure. I am an artist.’ “‘What do you mean, Mafouka?’ “‘I mean that I am, like many artists, bisexual.’

• From City of Night (1963)

  About to speak to Skipper—almost hypnotized by him—the skinny man backed away quickly. He looked at the fatman—the fatman challenging him from the distance. Suddenly, abandoning in bewildered rashness the pose of virginal novice, the skinny man says something to Skipper, who turns slowly to face him, answers. The skinny man rushes to the bar. Avoiding looking in our direction, he returned with a drink, which he handed hurriedly to Skipper, as if he were giving away, at last, a treasured, guarded part of himself which he was nevertheless compelled to give.... “Well!” the fatman sighs triumphantly. He seems somehow vindicated by the skinny man’s submission, like a bullish sergeant justifying his own existence by enlisting recruits. “Do you know him—the guy in the black T-shirt?” he asks me. Without the cigar, his face looks blank, incomplete, the dough-flesh smeared carelessly over his face. “Sure—hes a great guy.” “Well, Christ, why doesnt he give up—hes been around for years!”

• From Summer Sisters (1998)

  Gus HE DECIDES AGAINST the job offer in Albuquerque. He likes being around water too much. Blame it on all those summers on the Vineyard. He’s lucky to get a second offer and jumps at the chance to write for the Oregonian. Aside from all that chauvinistic crap about keeping outsiders out, the people in Portland are friendly and the women are fresh, outdoorsy types. When he’s sent to Seattle in March to get a story on Microsoft he calls Caitlin and arranges to meet her for a drink. Abby’s sent him her phone number. She’s the chronicler of their lives. Caitlin arrives with two guys in tow. James and Donny. Can you believe I once tried to seduce this guy, she tells them, pressing her thigh up against his. She and James and Donny fall all over themselves laughing, as if the idea of her seducing him is a sick joke. He’s sorry he called. He doesn’t need this. So how’s the Cough Drop? he asks to change the subject. You mean you haven’t heard? Heard what? She eloped with Bru. Just last week. No way ... Does that surprise you? Yeah, it surprised him. Only joking, darling Gus! she tells him, taking his hand. And she dissolves into laughter again. He gets out of there as soon as he can. Doesn’t tell anyone he saw her. 37 ANOTHER PRESIDENTIAL election but this time Vix and Paisley were less than thrilled with the candidates. “At least Barbara will be better than Nancy,” Paisley said, as if the election were over and the votes counted. “She’s got a sense of humor. And she wears the same pearls as my grandmother.” Maia found their political discussions hilarious. “I don’t see how you can defend the Republican party after what happened to you,” Paisley told her. “Please,” Maia said, “if your guys had been in office we’d be in the middle of a serious depression.” When the phone rang Vix couldn’t find it. “Check in the bathroom,” Paisley called. “Next to the toilet.” It was Caitlin. “Vix ... where are you?” “In the bathroom, actually.” “I mean where are you, as in, when are you coming? I’ve found the perfect place for us to live. It’s furnished in antique wicker and there’s a small garden. Roses, Vix ... all year round. But you have to give me a date. They won’t hold it for long.” What was she talking about? “Vix ...” “Wait a minute. I’m losing you.” She walked with the phone back to the kitchen. “I never said I was moving to Seattle ... did I?” “No ...” she began. “But you’d mentioned you were disappointed with your job, so I assumed ...” She paused. “I must have misunderstood.” “Besides,” Vix said, “you never stay in one place long enough ...” Why was she making excuses? “It will be a year in November.” “Well, I’d love to come for a visit.”

• From Summer Sisters (1998)

  She’s wobbly but she makes it down to the water, where she pulls off the stupid T-shirt, wets it, then holds it to her face and neck. “Now that’s more like it,” Gus says, eyeing her dress, still a big kid with hormones. “And just for the record,” she tells him, “I was the one with the yellow bathing suit.” She’s sandwiched between Daniel and Gus at dinner. When Gus catches Phoebe’s boyfriend giving Vix a sleepy-eyed once-over, he turns to Daniel. “Cough Drop attracts guys like a magnet.” Caitlin was the magnet. She was just a particle in her magnetic field. After dinner they’re asked to gather on the beach for a display of fireworks honoring the bride and groom. Daniel covers her shoulders with his linen jacket. She leans back against Gus, who, she thinks, sniffs her hair as the sky lights up, taking her back to other fireworks on other beaches. You’re not scared of me, are you? No, I’m scared of these feelings. When the party breaks up, Caitlin offers to drive her back to the B&B. “Aren’t you going home with Bru?” Vix asks. “Not tonight. It’s bad luck for the bride and groom to spend the night before the wedding together.” Vix never heard that one but she gets into Caitlin’s white Jeep. The top is down and as they head out of town the wind whips their hair. “This isn’t too hard for you, is it?” Caitlin asks. “I mean, seeing us together?” Vix is grateful for the darkness and the champagne. “It was over between the two of you so long ago ...” Vix would like to be generous, to reassure Caitlin, but she can’t find the right words, so she says nothing. “I hate it when you clam up that way!” Caitlin shouts. The Jeep swerves. Vix shuts her eyes and hangs on, sure Caitlin is going to kill them. But no, she just makes a sudden decision to pull into the Tashmoo Overlook where she cuts the engine and rests her head on the wheel. “Oh, God ...” she cries. “I don’t even know if I want to marry him.” Vix stiffens. “That shocks you, I suppose?” Caitlin says. “You’ve never done a single thing you’ve regretted, have you?” At that moment Vix feels such a rush of ... what? She’s not sure. She’s not sure if she hates Caitlin or herself, or maybe Bru, for creating this situation in the first place. “Oh, hell ...” Caitlin wipes her nose with the back of her hand. “It’ll be a good party, anyway.” She turns the key in the ignition and revs up the engine, then drives to the B&B where she drops off Vix. “Sleep tight ...” she calls, blowing Vix a kiss. “You, too.”

• From Birthday Girl (2018)

  Y la otra noche mencionó apagar velas, pedir deseos... No pudo hacer eso correctamente en su cumpleaños, las donas no cuentan, así que me sentí mal aunque no fue mi culpa. Comprarlo parecía una buena idea en ese momento. Sin embargo, llevarlo a casa se sintió sentimental. Demasiado sentimental. Lo metí en el refrigerador, escondido en la caja rosa, esperando ver si el estado de ánimo me golpeaba de nuevo antes de botarlo. —Pero sí, es tuyo, así que deja que lo coma —digo finalmente, mirándola de reojo antes de volver a mirar mis cartas. —¿No ibas a decirme que estaba allí? Me encojo de hombros. —Me olvidé, supongo. La mentira no suena convincente, pero su voz emocionada me salva del calor de los ojos de todos en mí. —Bueno, en ese caso, entonces no —afirma firmemente—. No puede comerlo. Es mío. Mi corazón se calienta y no puedo evitarlo. Miro hacia arriba lentamente. Me sonríe mientras asciende el resto de las escaleras. —¡Gracias! —dice, y luego escucho la puerta abrirse y la música inundar el espacio antes de cerrarse de nuevo. Rosado. Le compré un jodido pastel rosado como si tuviera siete. Con rosas. ¿Vio el pastel? ¿Se ve como el pastel de una niña? O peor, ¿algo romántico? Tenían pasteles con globos. Tenían pasteles sencillos. Mierda, soy un idiota. Ni siquiera pensé. Tiro mis cartas, cierro los ojos y deslizo mi mano por mi cabello. —Solo un minuto, muchachos —digo, empujando mi silla hacia atrás y rodeando la mesa, hacia las escaleras. Estallan algunas risas y carcajadas detrás de mí cuando salgo del sótano y corro detrás de la chica. Sabes, no fue hace mucho tiempo que podía pensar claramente. No dudaba constantemente de cada movimiento que hacía y enumeraba todos los resultados posibles para una sola acción y cómo respondería Jordan a ella. No he estado tan confundido sobre nada en mucho tiempo. Saliendo por la puerta en la parte superior de las escaleras, escucho el estruendo de I Love Rock 'n Roll que viene del patio y el chapoteo de alguien que salta a la piscina. Le pedí a Jordan que recogiera las llaves de cualquiera que bebiera,

• From Birthday Girl (2018)

  —¿Dónde están todas tus cosas de la casa? —pregunto. —¿Qué? Respiro hondo, preparándome. —Hay muebles, pero no mucho más. No parece que vivas allí. ¿Por qué? El otro lado del teléfono está en silencio, y dejo de respirar, con miedo de no escucharlo hablar. ¿La pregunta fue insultante? No quise que lo fuera. Me di cuenta que él sabe mucho sobre mí, y apenas sé nada sobre él. Sabe quiénes son mis padres, qué le pasó a Cole y a mi amigo, que amo las cosas de los 80, que crecí sin una madre, lo que estudio en la universidad... Pero él todavía es un gran misterio. —Lo siento si eso sonó mal —le digo cuando no responde—. Es una hermosa casa. Es solo que Cole mencionó que tú y su madre se conocieron en la secundaria, donde eras una especie de estrella de béisbol. Debes amar el deporte. Solo tengo curiosidad por qué no veo trofeos o imágenes, o algo así en la casa. No hay fotos recientes de ti y Cole, tampoco música, ni libros... Nada que describa lo que te gusta. Respira, se aclara la garganta y un sudor frío recorre mi cuello. —Está todo empacado en el sótano —me dice—. Supongo que nunca lo saqué después de mudarme a la casa. —¿Cuánto tiempo has estado en esa casa? —Eh... —se voz se desvanece como si estuviera pensando—, supongo que la compré hace diez años. ¿Diez años? —Pike... —digo, tratando de no reírme. Exhala una risa en mi oído, y sonrío, sacudiendo la cabeza. —Supongo que suena raro, ¿eh? —pregunta. ¿Que todavía no hayas desempacado todo? Sí. Giro sobre mi espalda, manteniendo mi brazo metido debajo de mi cabeza. —Entiendo que botemos ciertas cosas a medida que envejecemos —le digo—. Pero has tenido una vida desde que te mudaste a ese lugar, ¿cierto? No veo nada de tu personalidad. Lugares que has visitado, baratijas que has recogido a lo largo de los años... —Sí, lo sé, yo eh...

• From Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (1990)

  What about the notion, suggested by Kate Bornstein, that a transsexual cannot be described by the noun of “woman” or “man,” but must be approached through active verbs that attest to the constant transformation which “is” the new identity or, indeed, the “in-betweenness” that puts the being of gendered identity into question? Although some lesbians argue that butches have nothing to do with “being a man,” others insist that their butchness is or was only a route to a desired status as a man. These paradoxes have surely proliferated in recent years, offering evidence of a kind of gender trouble that the text itself did not anticipate. 2 But what is the link between gender and sexuality that I sought to underscore? Certainly, I do not mean to claim that forms of sexual practice produce certain genders, but only that under conditions of normative heterosexuality, policing gender is sometimes used as a way of securing heterosexuality. Catharine MacKinnon offers a formulation of this problem that resonates with my own at the same time that there are, I believe, crucial and important differences between us. She writes: Stopped as an attribute of a person, sex inequality takes the form of gender; moving as a relation between people, it takes the form of sexuality. Gender emerges as the congealed form of the sexualization of inequality between men and women. 3 In this view, sexual hierarchy produces and consolidates gender. It is not heterosexual normativity that produces and consolidates gender, but the gender hierarchy that is said to underwrite heterosexual relations. If gender hierarchy produces and consolidates gender, and if gender hierarchy presupposes an operative notion of gender, then gender is what causes gender, and the formulation culminates in tautology. It may be that MacKinnon wants merely to outline the self-reproducing mechanism of gender hierarchy, but this is not what she has said. Is “gender hierarchy” sufficient to explain the conditions for the production of gender? To what extent does gender hierarchy serve a more or less compulsory heterosexuality, and how often are gender norms policed precisely in the service of shoring up heterosexual hegemony? Katherine Franke, a contemporary legal theorist, makes innovative use of both feminist and queer perspectives to note that by assuming the primacy of gender hierarchy to the production of gender, MacKinnon also accepts a presumptively heterosexual model for thinking about sexuality. Franke offers an alternative model of gender discrimination to MacKinnon’s, effectively arguing that sexual harassment is the paradigmatic allegory for the production of gender. Not all discrimination can be understood as harassment. The act of harassment may be one in which a person is “made” into a certain gender. But there are others ways of enforcing gender as well. Thus, for Franke, it is important to make a provisional distinction between gender and sexual discrimination. Gay people, for instance, may be discriminated against in positions of employment because they fail to “appear” in accordance with accepted gendered norms.

• From Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (1990)

  Page and his coworkers made the following hypothesis: There must be some stretch of DNA, which cannot be seen under the usual microscopic conditions, that determines the male sex, and this stretch of DNA must have been moved somehow from the Y chromosome, its usual location, to some other chromosome, where one would not expect to find it. Only if we could presume (a) this undetectable DNA sequence and (b) prove its translocatability, could we understand why it is that an XX male had no detectable Y chromosome, but was, in fact, still male. Similarly, we could explain the curious presence of the Y chromosome on females precisely because that stretch of DNA had somehow been misplaced. Although the pool that Page and his researchers used to come up with this finding was limited, the speculation on which they base their research, in part, is that a good ten percent of the population has chromosomal variations that do not fit neatly into the XX-female and XY-male set of categories. Hence, the discovery of the “master-gene” is considered to be a more certain basis for understanding sex-determination and, hence, sex-difference, than previous chromosomal criteria could provide. Unfortunately for Page, there was one persistent problem that haunted the claims made on behalf of the discovery of the DNA sequence. Exactly the same stretch of DNA said to determine maleness was, in fact, found to be present on the X chromosomes of females. Page first responded to this curious discovery by claiming that perhaps it was not the presence of the gene sequence in males versus its absence in females that was determining, but that it was active in males and passive in females (Aristotle lives!). But this suggestion remains hypothetical and, according to Anne Fausto-Sterling, Page and his coworkers failed to mention in that Cell article that the individuals from whom the gene samples were taken were far from unambiguous in their anatomical and reproductive constitutions. I quote from her article, “Life in the XY Corral”: the four XX males whom they studied were all sterile (no sperm production), had small testes which totally lacked germ cells, i.e., precursor cells for sperms. They also had high hormone levels and low testosterone levels. Presumably they were classified as males because of their external genitalia and the presence of testes.... Similarly ... both of the XY females’ external genitalia were normal, [but] their ovaries lacked germ cells. (328) Clearly these are cases in which the component parts of sex do not add up to the recognizable coherence or unity that is usually designated by the category of sex. This incoherence troubles Page’s argument as well, for it is unclear why we should agree at the outset that these are XX-males and XY- females, when it is precisely the designation of male and female that is under question and that is implicitly already decided by the recourse to external genitalia.

• From The Glass Castle: A Memoir (2005)

  Finally, we entered hill country, climbing higher and deeper into the Appalachian Mountains, stopping from time to time to let the Oldsmobile catch its breath on the steep, twisting roads. It was November. The leaves had turned brown and were falling from the trees, and a cold mist shrouded the hillsides. There were streams and creeks everywhere, instead of the irrigation ditches you saw out west, and the air felt different. It was very still, heavier and thicker, and somehow darker. For some reason, it made us all grow quiet. At dusk, we approached a bend where hand-painted signs advertising auto repairs and coal deliveries had been nailed to trees along the roadside. We rounded the bend and found ourselves in a deep valley. Wooden houses and small brick buildings lined the river and rose in uneven stacks on both hillsides. “Welcome to Welch!” Mom declared. We drove along dark, narrow streets, then stopped in front of a big, worn house. It was on the downhill side of the street, and we had to descend a set of stairs to get to it. As we clattered onto the porch, a woman opened the door. She was enormous, with pasty skin and about three chins. Bobby pins held back her lank gray hair, and a cigarette dangled from her mouth. “Welcome home, son,” she said and gave Dad a long hug. She turned to Mom. “Nice of you to let me see my grandchildren before I die,” she said without a smile. Without taking the cigarette out of her mouth, she gave us each a quick, stiff hug. Her cheek was tacky with sweat. “Pleased to meet you, Grandma,” I said. “Don’t call me Grandma,” she snapped. “Name’s Erma.” “She don’t like it none ’cause it makes her sound old,” said a man who appeared beside her. He looked fragile, with short white hair that stood straight up. His voice was so mumbly I could hardly understand him. I didn’t know if it was his accent or if maybe he wasn’t wearing his dentures. “Name’s Ted, but you can call me Grandpa,” he went on. “Don’t bother me none being a grandpa.” Behind Grandpa was a ruddy-faced man with a wild swirl of red hair pushing out from under his baseball cap, which had a Maytag logo. He wore a red-and-black-plaid coat but had no shirt on underneath it. He kept announcing over and over again that he was our uncle Stanley, and he wouldn’t stop hugging and kissing me, as though I was someone he truly loved and hadn’t seen in ages. You could smell the whiskey on his breath, and when he talked, you could see the pink ridges of his toothless gums. I stared at Erma and Stanley and Grandpa, searching for some feature that reminded me of Dad, but I saw none. Maybe this was one of Dad’s pranks, I thought. Dad must have arranged for the weirdest people in town to pretend they were his family.

• From Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (1990)

  The discussion of drag that Gender Trouble offers to explain the constructed and performative dimension of gender is not precisely an example of subversion. It would be a mistake to take it as the paradigm of subversive action or, indeed, as a model for political agency. The point is rather different. If one thinks that one sees a man dressed as a woman or a woman dressed as a man, then one takes the first term of each of those perceptions as the “reality” of gender: the gender that is introduced through the simile lacks “reality,” and is taken to constitute an illusory appearance. In such perceptions in which an ostensible reality is coupled with an unreality, we think we know what the reality is, and take the secondary appearance of gender to be mere artifice, play, falsehood, and illusion. But what is the sense of “gender reality” that founds this perception in this way? Perhaps we think we know what the anatomy of the person is (sometimes we do not, and we certainly have not appreciated the variation that exists at the level of anatomical description). Or we derive that knowledge from the clothes that the person wears, or how the clothes are worn. This is naturalized knowledge, even though it is based on a series of cultural inferences, some of which are highly erroneous. Indeed, if we shift the example from drag to transsexuality, then it is no longer possible to derive a judgment about stable anatomy from the clothes that cover and articulate the body. That body may be preoperative, transitional, or postoperative; even “seeing” the body may not answer the question: for what are the categories through which one sees? The moment in which one’s staid and usual cultural perceptions fail, when one cannot with surety read the body that one sees, is precisely the moment when one is no longer sure whether the body encountered is that of a man or a woman. The vacillation between the categories itself constitutes the experience of the body in question.

• From Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (1990)

  For the young girl as well, the Oedipal complex can be either “positive” (same-sex identification) or “negative” (opposite-sex identification); the loss of the father initiated by the incest taboo may result either in an identification with the object lost (a consolidation of masculinity) or a deflection of the aim from the object, in which case heterosexuality triumphs over homosexuality, and a substitute object is found. At the close of his brief paragraph on the negative Oedipal complex in the young girl, Freud remarks that the factor that decides which identification is accomplished is the strength or weakness of masculinity and femininity in her disposition. Significantly, Freud avows his confusion about what precisely a masculine or feminine disposition is when he interrupts his statement midway with the hyphenated doubt:“—whatever that may consist in—” (22). What are these primary dispositions on which Freud himself apparently founders? Are these attributes of an unconscious libidinal organization, and how precisely do the various identifications set up in consequence of the Oedipal conflict work to reinforce or dissolve each of these dispositions? What aspect of “femininity” do we call dispositional, and which is the consequence of identification? Indeed, what is to keep us from understanding the “dispositions” of bisexuality as the effects or productions of a series of internalizations? Moreover, how do we identify a “feminine” or a “masculine” disposition at the outset? By what traces is it known, and to what extent do we assume a “feminine” or a “masculine” disposition as the precondition of a heterosexual object choice? In other words, to what extent do we read the desire for the father as evidence of a feminine disposition only because we begin, despite the postulation of primary bisexuality, with a heterosexual matrix for desire? The conceptualization of bisexuality in terms of dispositions, feminine and masculine, which have heterosexual aims as their intentional correlates, suggests that for Freud bisexuality is the coincidence of two heterosexual desires within a single psyche. The masculine disposition is, in effect, never oriented toward the father as an object of sexual love, and neither is the feminine disposition oriented toward the mother (the young girl may be so oriented, but this is before she has renounced that “masculine” side of her dispositional nature). In repudiating the mother as an object of sexual love, the girl of necessity repudiates her masculinity and, paradoxically, “fixes” her femininity as a consequence. Hence, within Freud’s thesis of primary bisexuality, there is no homosexuality, and only opposites attract.

• From Birthday Girl (2018)

  Las suelas de mis botas de trabajo se pegan al suelo con cada paso que doy por la habitación. Nunca he entendido el atractivo de este lugar o por qué ha durado tanto. Veo a Jordan en el otro extremo de la barra, su puño cubierto con una toalla blanca y enterrado en un vaso mientras lo seca. No estaba seguro de que estuviera aquí, pero cuando no está en la casa, es aquí donde está. Todavía lleva la misma ropa de anoche cuando la vi salir, y un bostezo se extiende por su rostro. Su cabello está atado en una coleta alta, y sus labios rosados con un toque de lápiz labial. Estaba bonita ayer. Esta mañana, mi sospecha está desdibujando todo. De repente, tengo veinte años nuevamente y estoy preguntándome dónde estuvo la madre de Cole toda la noche. Pero Jordan no es así. Es una buena chica. Simplemente, no tiene sentido que haya dicho que estaba con Cole cuando no era así. A menos que estuviera metida en algo que no debería. No quiero que Cole pase por eso con Jordan. No como lo hice con su madre. ¿Qué pasa si la deja embarazada y se queda atascado, tratando con una persona así? No quiero que se quede solo para siempre, porque cree que no es suficiente para ella. Me obligo a calmar mi respiración. Estoy sacando conclusiones. Relájate. Ella me ve acercándome, y sus ojos se iluminan un poco. Abre la boca para decir algo, pero hablo primero. —¿Estás bien? —pregunto—. ¿Tuviste una buena noche? Ladea la cabeza, titubeando un poco. —Um, sí, supongo. Así que, nada malo pasó entonces. Está en una sola pieza y parece feliz. —¿Tú y Cole se divirtieron? —presiono, y mi pulso comienza a acelerarse. Deja caer su cabeza evitando mis ojos mientras coloca el vaso debajo de la barra. —Sí. —Asiente. Y tenso mi mandíbula, mi temperamento se eleva. Acaba de mentir otra vez.

• From Summer Sisters (1998)

  Was she going to waste her Harvard degree on some career that wouldn’t pay chicken feathers or was she going to get out there and make him proud! “I am not going to law school,” Jocelyn told Vix. “I’ll get myself a decent day job, someplace where I have access to editing equipment, and I’ll make him proud my way!” Vix’s parents weren’t pushing for anything. Tawny had dropped out of her life, dropped out of all their lives, and her father’s hopes and dreams for her, if he had any, were never articulated. Maia thought she was lucky. “You don’t have to live up to anyone’s expectations but your own.” Caitlin called from Buenos Aires. “I’m studying dance.” “Dance?” “Yes. Flamenco. I think I’ve found my true calling.” “Flamenco dancing?” “Yes. I think it’s important to pursue my talents at this time. I can always take academic classes but the day will come when I won’t be able to dance.” The only kind of dancing she’d ever seen Caitlin do was disco. “Is this a career move?” Vix asked. “God, Vix … listen to yourself! Not everything has to lead to a career. I’d rather have talent than a career.” “You mean a career based on your talent?” “No … I mean just have the talent.” “But what would be the point?” “Not everything has to have a point. Some things just are.” “That doesn’t make any sense.” “Half of what I say doesn’t make any sense to you.” “I’m listening. I’m trying to understand.” “No, you’re not. You’ve already made up your mind.” “That’s not fair.” “Maybe it’s not … but that’s what I’m hearing.” “Tell me about Argentina.” “I adore it here. I adore Argentine men.” “Tell me you’re not going to be the next Evita.” “I’m not going to be the next Evita.” “Good.” “I suppose if I ask you to come for the summer you’ll refuse?” “Not necessarily.” “Vix … that would be incredible! Is it really a possibility?” “I don’t know. It all depends on jobs … and things … ” “Things being Bru?” “Things being things.” “You’ll let me know?” “I’ll let you know.” The children she interviewed were excited about sharing their ideas of heaven with her. Sometimes, in the middle of taping them, she’d find herself choking up, missing Nathan. Heaven? I’m gonna get there real soon. I could try to let you know what it’s like, if you tell me where you live. I’ll call , Hey, Victoria … and when you look up you’ll see me flying in the sky and I’ll be wearing this beautiful blue dress and my hair will be so long it’ll trail behind me. I might be on a horse, one of those angel horses with wings . I think you gotta work up there. You gotta sign up for either angel or messenger or something like that. You got so many people down here to watch out for.

• From Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (1990)

  The language of usurpation suggests a participation in the very categories from which s/he feels inevitably distanced, suggesting also the denaturalized and fluid possibilities of such categories once they are no longer linked causally or expressively to the presumed fixity of sex. Herculine’s anatomy does not fall outside the categories of sex, but confuses and redistributes the constitutive elements of those categories; indeed, the free play of attributes has the effect of exposing the illusory character of sex as an abiding substantive substrate to which these various attributes are presumed to adhere. Moreover, Herculine’s sexuality constitutes a set of gender transgressions which challenge the very distinction between heterosexual and lesbian erotic exchange, underscoring the points of their ambiguous convergence and redistribution. But it seems we are compelled to ask, is there not, even at the level of a discursively constituted sexual ambiguity, some questions of “sex” and, indeed, of its relation to “power” that set limits on the free play of sexual categories? In other words, how free is that play, whether conceived as a prediscursive libidinal multiplicity or as a discursively constituted multiplicity? Foucault’s original objection to the category of sex is that it imposes the artifice of unity and univocity on a set of ontologically disparate sexual functions and elements. In an almost Rousseauian move, Foucault constructs the binary of an artificial cultural law that reduces and distorts what we might well understand as a natural heterogeneity. Herculine h/erself refers to h/er sexuality as “this incessant struggle of nature against reason” (103). A cursory examination of these disparate “elements,” however, suggests their thorough medicalization as “functions,” “sensations,” even “drives.” Hence, the heterogeneity to which Foucault appeals is itself constituted by the very medical discourse that he positions as the repressive juridical law. But what is this heterogeneity that Foucault seems to prize, and what purpose does it serve? If Foucault contends that sexual nonidentity is promoted in homosexual contexts, he would seem to identify heterosexual contexts as precisely those in which identity is constituted. We know already that he understands the category of sex and of identity generally to be the effect and instrument of a regulatory sexual regime, but it is less clear whether that regulation is reproductive or heterosexual, or something else. Does that regulation of sexuality produce male and female identities within a symmetrical binary relation? If homosexuality produces sexual nonidentity, when homosexuality itself no longer relies on identities being like one another; indeed, homosexuality could no longer be described as such. But if homosexuality is meant to designate the place of an unnameable libidinal heterogeneity, perhaps we can ask whether this is, instead, a love that either cannot or dare not speak its name? In other words, Foucault, who gave only one interview on homosexuality and has always resisted the confessional moment in his own work, nevertheless presents Herculine’s confession to us in an unabashedly didactic mode. Is this a displaced confession that presumes a continuity or parallel between his life and hers?

• From Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (1990)

  Unfortunately for Page, there was one persistent problem that haunted the claims made on behalf of the discovery of the DNA sequence. Exactly the same stretch of DNA said to determine maleness was, in fact, found to be present on the X chromosomes of females. Page first responded to this curious discovery by claiming that perhaps it was not the presence of the gene sequence in males versus its absence in females that was determining, but that it was active in males and passive in females (Aristotle lives!). But this suggestion remains hypothetical and, according to Anne Fausto-Sterling, Page and his coworkers failed to mention in that Cell article that the individuals from whom the gene samples were taken were far from unambiguous in their anatomical and reproductive constitutions. I quote from her article, “Life in the XY Corral”: the four XX males whom they studied were all sterile (no sperm production), had small testes which totally lacked germ cells, i.e., precursor cells for sperms. They also had high hormone levels and low testosterone levels. Presumably they were classified as males because of their external genitalia and the presence of testes.… Similarly … both of the XY females’ external genitalia were normal, [but] their ovaries lacked germ cells. (328) Clearly these are cases in which the component parts of sex do not add up to the recognizable coherence or unity that is usually designated by the category of sex. This incoherence troubles Page’s argument as well, for it is unclear why we should agree at the outset that these are XX-males and XY-females, when it is precisely the designation of male and female that is under question and that is implicitly already decided by the recourse to external genitalia. Indeed, if external genitalia were sufficient as a criterion by which to determine or assign sex, then the experimental research into the master gene would hardly be necessary at all. But consider a different kind of problem with the way in which that particular hypothesis is formulated, tested, and validated. Notice that Page and his coworkers conflate sex-determination with male-determination, and with testis-determination. Geneticists Eva Eicher and Linda L. Washburn in the Annual Review of Genetics suggest that ovary-determination is never considered in the literature on sex-determination and that femaleness is always conceptualized in terms of the absence of the male-determining factor or of the passive presence of that factor. As absent or passive, it is definitionally disqualified as an object of study. Eicher and Washburn suggest, however, that it is active and that a cultural prejudice, indeed, a set of gendered assumptions about sex, and about what might make such an inquiry valuable, skew and limit the research into sex-determination. Fausto-Sterling quotes Eicher and Washburn:

• From Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (1990)

  Interesting, then, is Page’s willingness to settle on the active DNA sequence as the last word, in effect giving the principle of masculine activity priority over the discourse of reproduction. This priority, however, would constitute only an appearance, according to the theory of Monique Wittig. The category of sex belongs to a system of compulsory heterosexuality that clearly operates through a system of compulsory sexual reproduction. In Wittig’s view, to which we now turn, “masculine” and “feminine,” “male” and “female” exist only within the heterosexual matrix; indeed, they are the naturalized terms that keep that matrix concealed and, hence, protected from a radical critique. III MONIQUE WITTIG: BODILY DISINTEGRATION AND FICTIVE SEX Language casts sheaves of reality upon the social body. —Monique Wittig Simone de Beauvoir wrote in The Second Sex that “one is not born a woman, but rather becomes one.” The phrase is odd, even nonsensical, for how can one become a woman if one wasn’t a woman all along? And who is this “one” who does the becoming? Is there some human who becomes its gender at some point in time? Is it fair to assume that this human was not its gender before it became its gender? How does one “become” a gender? What is the moment or mechanism of gender construction? And, perhaps most pertinently, when does this mechanism arrive on the cultural scene to transform the human subject into a gendered subject? Are there ever humans who are not, as it were, always already gendered? The mark of gender appears to “qualify” bodies as human bodies; the moment in which an infant becomes humanized is when the question, “is it a boy or girl?” is answered. Those bodily figures who do not fit into either gender fall outside the human, indeed, constitute the domain of the dehumanized and the abject against which the human itself is constituted. If gender is always there, delimiting in advance what qualifies as the human, how can we speak of a human who becomes its gender, as if gender were a postscript or a cultural afterthought? Beauvoir, of course, meant merely to suggest that the category of women is a variable cultural accomplishment, a set of meanings that are taken on or taken up within a cultural field, and that no one is born with a gender—gender is always acquired. On the other hand, Beauvoir was willing to affirm that one is born with a sex, as a sex, sexed, and that being sexed and being human are coextensive and simultaneous; sex is an analytic attribute of the human; there is no human who is not sexed; sex qualifies the human as a necessary attribute.

• From Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (1990)

  This construction of “sex” as the radically unconstructed will concern us again in the discussion of Lévi-Strauss and structuralism in chapter 2. At this juncture it is already clear that one way the internal stability and binary frame for sex is effectively secured is by casting the duality of sex in a prediscursive domain. This production of sex as the prediscursive ought to be understood as the effect of the apparatus of cultural construction designated by gender. How, then, does gender need to be reformulated to encompass the power relations that produce the effect of a prediscursive sex and so conceal that very operation of discursive production?

• From Summer Sisters (1998)

  Caitlin had her there. “When?” Vix asked. “Six weeks ago. It was a mistake. I’m still not sure how it happened. The condom broke, I think.” “Are you still seeing him?” “No. He’s married.” “The producer?” “What producer?” “The one who took you to the play in London?” “What play in London?” “You told me ... when you called.” “I don’t remember.” “It wasn’t that long ago.” “Well ... I’ve been busy. A lot of things happen. I don’t necessarily remember all of them.” How come Vix remembered if Caitlin didn’t? “Did you love him?” She didn’t know why she bothered to ask when she already knew the answer. “No, I didn’t love him. But I enjoyed his company, in and out of bed.” Could she say the same about Bru? They hadn’t spent that much time together out of bed, but in it ... “I left the Sorbonne. I felt claustrophobic there. Everyone was so ... French. It really got to me after a while. I’m better off in London, don’t you think?” Vix had no idea. Suddenly, Caitlin’s face lit up. “I’ve just had the most brilliant idea. Take junior year abroad. Wherever you decide to go, I’ll go with you.” She was dancing across the room now, singing out the names of cities. “Paris, London, Rome, there’s even a program in Grenoble.” She flopped back on the bed then rolled over to face Vix. Paris, London, Rome ... Maia had considered spending junior year abroad but her parents urged her to wait. Paisley’s family didn’t have the money. We have fallen into genteel poverty, she’d told them, doing Scarlett O’Hara. “Well? ...” Caitlin asked. “I can’t.” Caitlin’s mood shifted. “I’m so sick of hearing you say that!” She jumped off the bed, unzipped her dress, yanked it over her head, and dropped it on a chair. She was wearing black lace underwear, probably

• From Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (1990)

  If to become a lesbian is an act, a leave-taking of heterosexuality, a self-naming that contests the compulsory meanings of heterosexuality’s women and men, what is to keep the name of lesbian from becoming an equally compulsory category? What qualifies as a lesbian? Does anyone know? If a lesbian refutes the radical disjunction between heterosexual and homosexual economies that Wittig promotes, is that lesbian no longer a lesbian? And if it is an “act” that founds the identity as a performative accomplishment of sexuality, are there certain kinds of acts that qualify over others as foundational? Can one do the act with a “straight mind”? Can one understand lesbian sexuality not only as a contestation of the category of “sex,” of “women,” of “natural bodies,” but also of “lesbian”? Interestingly, Wittig suggests a necessary relationship between the homosexual point of view and that of figurative language, as if to be a homosexual is to contest the compulsory syntax and semantics that construct “the real.” Excluded from the real, the homosexual point of view, if there is one, might well understand the real as constituted through a set of exclusions, margins that do not appear, absences that do not figure. What a tragic mistake, then, to construct a gay/lesbian identity through the same exclusionary means, as if the excluded were not, precisely through its exclusion, always presupposed and, indeed, required for the construction of that identity. Such an exclusion, paradoxically, institutes precisely the relation of radical dependency it seeks to overcome: Lesbianism would then require heterosexuality. Lesbianism that defines itself in radical exclusion from heterosexuality deprives itself of the capacity of resignify the very heterosexual constructs by which it is partially and inevitably constituted. As a result, that lesbian strategy would consolidate compulsory heterosexuality in its oppressive forms. The more insidious and effective strategy it seems is a thoroughgoing appropriation and redeployment of the categories of identity themselves, not merely to contest “sex,” but to articulate the convergence of multiple sexual discourses at the site of “identity” in order to render that category, in whatever form, permanently problematic. IV BODILY INSCRIPTIONS, PERFORMATIVE SUBVERSIONS“Garbo ‘got in drag’ whenever she took some heavy glamour part, whenever she melted in or out of a man’s arms, whenever she simply let that heavenly-flexed neck … bear the weight of her thrown-back head.… How resplendent seems the art of acting! It is all impersonation, whether the sex underneath is true or not.” —Parker Tyler, “The Garbo Image” quoted in Esther Newton, Mother Camp