Writing Singapore Gay Identities: Queering the Nation in Johann S. Lee's Peculiar Chris and Andrew Koh's Glass Cathedral

Abstract

Taking as its object of study Johann S. Lee's Peculiar Chris (1992) and Andrew Koh's Glass Cathedral (1995), this essay considers the ways in which the relationship between queer identities and (trans)nationalism is construed in two Singapore “coming out” novels. How does their status as writing emerging from a particular postcolonial urban site inflect the significance of their literary-stylistic choices? What kinds of affiliations are affirmed, what ties are disavowed? While the thematization of homosexuality in the Singapore context does not automatically make such texts “subversive”, gay writing brings sharply into focus the problematics arising from a confluence of nationalist and global discourses–in this case, globalized notions of a transnational gay identity originating largely from the West. Drawing on and explicitly announcing their participation in a larger body of gay protest literature, these texts offer a valuable opportunity for reflecting on how transnationalism might enable queer subjects to challenge and revise nationally endorsed models of masculinity; at the same time, the extent to which their efforts to articulate a queer identity might compromise their “Singaporeanness” is considered.