A review of one of the books shortlisted in the GLBTQ category of the Indie Lit Awards.
‘Krakow Melt’ - Daniel Allen Cox
Radeck is a gay man and artist who lives in Poland. He plans pieces of activist art which are centred around fire. While setting a popsicle model of Chicago on fire at a gallery he meets Dorota, a student, a political activist and artist (although as far as we know she doesn’t make art outside of her activist exploits with Radeck). Together they set fires for activism and explore life, all in the midst of tumultuous political and artistic times.
One thing I liked
The diversity of self-contained stories in this one novel is really interesting. There are regular chapters that describe YouTube videos, which appear as contained short narratives separate from Radeck’s first person narrative story. The narrative voice transfers twice to Dr Krzystof Mazurkiewicz (who is also gay) working in surgery and at least one of these (when he finds himself working on the Pope) feels fully separated from Radeck’s storyline. It’s an intriguing way of emphasising the political aspects of the culture that Radeck’s personal story exists in (the homophobic culture in Poland, the social suppression the Pope’s authority keeps in place) and making sure that the wider political aspects don’t get swallowed up by the readers interest in Radeck’s specific personal storyline.
Also worked into Radeck’s first person narrative is a retelling of a significant event form his past, which again sits like a separate short story that utterly transports the reader away from a story being retold to a story that feels like it is happening right then.
One thing I didn’t like
I can’t believe I’m going to say this for a bunch of reasons, the chapter about Nino the elephant (an elephant who has been used as a gay symbol because he seems to prefer male elephants) having sex with a female elephant. Elephants having sex is too much for me. I have been writing here for a while now so maybe you know that I like to read books with sex in them. I might also add that sometimes I like a high level of sexual detail. Such a high level of detail was probably needed in the chapter where the elephants had sex to push an artistic point home, but this level of detail on this one occasion, where there was sex between elephants, left me feeling personally squicked out .
Question
Radeck and Dorota attend a march for gay rights, which ends up using arguments like ‘God made me this way’. Radeck does not approve as he says:
'I had long refused to be part of any Divine Plan, and I don't see the point in borrowing and redressing arguments the church has devised. Subversion as cowardly that way. Sure, Ninio could help the gay cause, but his silkscreened image could do little for transphobia. And it was an anathema to atheists.'
Do you think Radeck is unnecessarily seperating himself from other members of the march as his friend Tomek suggests, or do you sympathise with his argument?
Any opinion mentioned here is my opinion and not the opinion of the whole panel, or the organisers of the Indie Lit Awards.
6 comments:
I think when you're talking about stuff it helps to use the language of the person you're talking to. If you believe in a God with a personal involvement in creation, it stands to reason you'd believe he made you the way he did. And if that's what you think, that's the language you should use. If you believe there is no God, you are likely to use the language of science. Also, it's hard to overcome so many hurdles at once--it's of benefit to use the framework of someone's existing beliefs. You could say to someone who has always believed it's a sin to be gay--well this is the way I am, I can't change, therefore there must be no god and completely shut down the conversation, OR you could say, look here's another valid way of interpreting the verses you think say this. As someone who has been on this journey, trying to take God out of it, would have sent me into despair, but showing me how I could still love God and the Bible and affirm gay relationships made much more sense.
Also I sometimes think that when you're used to feeling on the fringes or excluded your whole life, even in the group where you should feel most safe, you still feel isolated. Sometimes I think we find ways to keep the walls around us and separate ourselves out from others. If someone doesn't match up exactly to what we wish they could be, we imagine ourselves differently or better. This isn't coming out quite right, hopefully you know what i mean.
Amy what you say about becoming separated inside a group totally makes sense, especially as that's what Tomek then does to Radeck. He says people are talking about him and Dorota and that it's not cool for him to hang out with a girl so much because (praphrasing but close) surely Radeck knows what girls like her want with gay men. Basically it's one of those 'letting the side down' arguments, to which boo.
I agree that it's sometimes very productive to use the language of those you're arguing with to win them round, although I always think it's totally understandable if someone personally affected by the situation doesn't feel they wanted to negotiate with people who oppose them on their own terms. But if someone feels comfortable addressing an argument on another person's terms it can be incredibly powerful and I think it's something allies can work at (it's something I'd like to be better at).
But I also think there’s a difference between unnecessarily separating yourself within a group by saying ‘This is my in stone definition of what the cause we’re fighting encompasses’ and separating yourself within a group because you need different arguments/action because your situation is different from that of the main group. The arguments from the gay and lesbian religious community are useful to a secular member of the gay and lesbian community if they’re addressing religious people, but they’re useless in the face of secular people who don’t approve of gay and lesbian relationships. They also won’t be useful to an atheist gay man who feels guilty about his sexuality – he needs different answers for why being gay isn’t something to be ashamed of because the religious answers don’t fit his belief system. Are there Bible verses, or studies of nature that can be used as arguments for the trans community? If there aren’t (and I’d be really interested to know if there are, if you know of any) then they have a practical requirement for different answers both for themselves and for others.
In the context of the book Radeck turns up to march for gay rights, but in the midst of the march the terms are changed - placards and t-shirts come out with slogans about gay people being created by God. If he'd known it was going to be a march with that message he would have skipped it and continued with his own activism, his own way. It frustrates him to find himself co-opted into a message that isn't helpful to him.
Great review! The elephant sex was a bit much for me as well. hah.
As to his statement, I think it is strong of him to stand up to the fact that it is a very exclusionist argument to make. It might convince a few people from the other side, but at the expense of all those who are still cut out from the movement that is supposed to be theirs. If that makes sense!
That makes sense...I was a little uncertain about jumping in not really knowing the story and the full context. I agree that it can be disheartening to think you're signing up for something and then have it totally changed up on you and that you need answers that fit within your OWN framework of understanding the world doesn't contradict what I said before. I think I didn't fully understand what you were getting at in your question.
Amy so too much :) I'm still debating in my head about that statement. The march is one of the parts of the book singled out for praise in the blurbs on the back of my copy and I came to it and found it complicated. I agree with Radeck in the situation he's in in the book (especially with all the focus the rest of the book puts on the Pope's control of Poland's moral code), but I think his point could use some flexibility in a more wide reaching context like My Friend Amy says.
My Friend Amy I agree it doesn't contradict your point and I think it's always useful for us to strength the arguments that we have that will allow us to talk to people on their terms and keep communication open. What I really like about political movements is that there is so much room for flexibility and diversity of opinion within a movement, without individuals having to compromise the particular arguments that work for them, if everyone is willing to look for that possibility of flexibility. And saying 'this argument isn't right for this group within our movement, but that doesn't make it invalid for another section of our group, BUT that doesn't mean we have to ignore how invalid it is for that first part of the group' is all part of that struggle to keep everything flexible.
I really hope that made sense because it is late and I have given up on proper sentences it seems ;)
Elephant sex is certainly one way to get attention, right?
I've always been a bit uneasy with the "I was born this way" argument for gay, lesbian, and bisexual folks because the sentence that usually follows it is "Do you think I would actually CHOOSE this life/attraction/etc for myself I could help it?" It immediately makes it sound like being gay is a "problem" that one can't help because it's genetic, instead of a valid sexuality equal in morals etc to heterosexuality. I can understand the character's hesitance to use the "GOD made me this way" argument if he doesn't believe in God, and I also find it compelling when shown how that argument might not work for trans folks. (Although one could argue that for transsexual people, they are born with mind/body opposites, thereby allowing physical changes to equal out God's design. Or something.)
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