“Automatic obedience, synthetic schizophrenia, mass-produced to order. That is the Russian dream, and America is not far behind” : Fascism as a Reaction to a Crisis of Masculinity in William S. Burroughs’s Queer

Systems of control and resistance are central to William S. Burroughs’s writing. In his second novel, Queer, written in 1952 and published in 1985, Burroughs delves into the sexual politics of control. Previous critics have discussed issues connected to queerness and the novel’s Cold War commodity culture. My aim in this thesis is to push these readings further by analyzing how fascist rhetoric functions in the novel. The guiding framework for my analysis is “Ur-Fascism,” Umberto Eco’s treatise on the fundamental features of fascism. As Eco points out, fascism is not a coherent ideology. By applying the fascist lens to Queer we can make more sense of some of the novel’s central ideological contradictions. The novel’s protagonist and Burroughs’s fictionalised alter ego, William Lee, feels subjugated to the biological imperative of homosexual desire, while also desperately trying to resist the dominant stereotypes ascribed to him by heteronormative society. As a result, Lee adopts a posture of hypermasculinity that includes the fantasy of dominating the other as a means to reassure himself, which in turn makes it impossible for him to engage in meaningful relationships with others. He is trapped in a vicious cycle of reaching out to others for intimacy which he so fiercely craves, and being rejected, further exacerbating his frustration in his identity and the ensuing need for control. This kind of identity crisis is fertile ground for fascism to grow. Lee utilises fascist rhetoric to present himself as powerful, thereby managing the crisis of masculinity he faces as a gay man in a homophobic environment. Being a wealthy, White Anglo-Saxon Protestant man, Lee finds himself on the top of many social hierarchies. Instead of looking to dismantle social hierarchies in general as a shared emancipatory horizon, Lee leans on the ones he benefits from in a way that is increasingly hostile to anyone displaying feminine characteristics, racial others and people of lesser means. Ultimately, Queer demonstrates that the fascist project of consolidating power is an impediment to genuine human connection.

Grantor dc:publisher

Helsingin yliopisto

Year dc:date.issued

2025

Author dc:creator

• Uittamo, Valtteri

• homosexuality
• fascism
• literature
• masculinity
• William S. Burroughs
• Umberto Eco

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright 1.0

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/10138/597582

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:helda.helsinki.fi:10138/597582