In this column I review several works of fiction in which a transgender character, or the concept of transgender, plays a central role. Here 'transgender' has a much broader meaning than 'transsexual.' A transgender person is one who transcends or transgresses the gender role expected of them by a community. (So femme may be a trans expression in some lesbian communities, while at the same time being seen as 'normal' in broader society.)
The Well Of Loneliness, by Radclyffe Hall. 1928. This is 'the classic lesbian novel,' but is Stephen Gordon a butch lesbian or is zie transgender, long before that term came into use? How would this autobiographical novel be written today? How would its author have lived hir life if born sixty or so years later?
The Left Hand of Darkness, by Ursula K. LeGuin. 1969. A very thought-provoking work set on a world where sex/gender is not fixed, but is expressed anew in each sexual cycle in reaction with the gender of the partner.
"Our entire pattern of socio-sexual interaction is nonexistent here. They cannot play the game. They do not see one another as men or women. This is almost impossible for our imagination to accept. What is the first question we ask about a newborn baby?"
Rubyfruit Jungle, by Rita Mae Brown. 1973. I'm not suggesting that Molly Bolt would be thought of as transgender today, but this novel presents a view of what society thinks of queers that has changed very little in twenty-five years.
"I hate to lie, too, but people will say we're lesbians."
"Aren't we?"
"No, we just love each other, that's all. Lesbians look like men and are ugly. We're not like that."
Triton, by Samuel R. Delany. 1976. Delany has written about gender and sexuality in many ways, and is one of my favorite writers. I mention this particular novel because one of the central characters undergoes a sex change, though not perhaps for what we would consider the usual reasons. Many of Delany's novels make profound statements about who and what we are.
"...women have only really been treated, by that bizarre, Derkheimian abstraction, 'society', as human beings for the last—oh, say sixty-five years; ...whereas men have had the luxury of such treatment for the last four thousand. The result of this historical anomaly is simply that, on a statistical basis, women are just a little less willing to put up with certain kinds of shit than men—simply because the concept of a certain kind of shit-free Universe is, in that equally bizarre Jungian abstraction, the female 'collective unconsciousness', too new and too precious."
Written On The Body, by Jeanette Winterson. 1992. This 180 page first person narrative is told from a point of view that has no gender. Even knowing this, one constantly looks for clues and makes guesses about the gender of the narrator (which we are never told). Reading this book helps one appreciate just how gendered our lives are.
Sacred Country, by Rose Tremain. 1992. The story of a person labeled at birth as female who expresses as early as age six that zie is actually a boy. Mary/Martin is only one of a set of characters who face serious upheaval and challenge in their lives. M/M's story is just one among several in the novel; it does not stand out as the weirdest or most unusual or most tragic. That's refreshing!
Stone Butch Blues, by Leslie Feinberg. 1993. This has become the quintessential transgender novel. I suggest you read it in close juxtaposition to the works by Hall and Tremain and look at the similarities and differences. (In contrast, read Dear Sir or Madam, Mark Rees's 1996 'autobiography of a female-to-male transsexual.' Is truth stranger than fiction, or simply stylistically different?)
Nearly Roadkill: An Infobahn Erotic Adventure, by Caitlin Sullivan and Kate Bornstein. 1996. For much of the novel Scratch and Winc have shifting genders and refuse to reveal to each other what they 'really' are. Only when forced to meet in person do they find out, and even then it isn't all that clear. I know many people only as electronic messages on the Internet, so this novel really strikes a chord with me.
Does the 'T' belong with LBG? Do we share common issues? Should we work together? Can we?