Queer Angels in Post-1945 American Literature and Culture: Bad Beatitudes

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From Allen Ginsbergs angel-headed hipsters to angelic outlaws in Essex Hemphills Conditions, angelic imagery is pervasive in queer American art and culture. This book examines how the period after 1945 expanded a unique mixture of sacred and profane angelic imagery in American literature and culture to fashion queer characters, primarily gay men, as embodiments of 'bad beatitudes'. Deutsch explores how authors across diverse ethnic and religious backgrounds, including John Rechy, Richard Bruce Nugent, Allen Ginsberg, and Rabih Alameddine, sought to find the sacred in the profane and the profane in the sacred. Exploring how these writers used the trope of angelic outlaws to celebrate men who rebelled wilfully and nobly against religious, medical, legal and social repression in American society, this book sheds new light on dissent and queer identities in postmodern American literature.

Reviews

Queer Angels performs an exciting reorientation of twentieth-century gay mens writing around the figure of the angel, highlighting how writers as different as Nugent, Rechy, Ginsberg, and Alameddine reconceive experiences of degradation as epiphanic, filled with grace and bad beatitude. * Steven F. Kruger, Professor, Queens College and The Graduate Center, CUNY, U.S. *
David Deutschs book is a heaven-sent addition to our deep knowledges of queer U.S. literature. Queer Angels in Post-WWII American Literature and Culture will be widely embraced by scholars invested in sexuality and gender studies and religious studies alike. * Scott Herring, Professor of American Studies and Womens, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Yale University, USA *

Author Bio

David Deutsch is Associate Professor of English at the University of Alabama, USA.