The Same Body. Illusory "bisexual"

Anne Rice, a contemporary American writer, who is known as the crowned "Mother of Vampires", got her fame from Vampire Chronicles,. This includes 12 vampire novels. Scholars even compared her literary works as Dickenson's because people can do many studies from different aspects.Among Anne Rice's vampire novels, Interview with Vampires and Lestat are the two novels which cause people's wide attention in literary study, because her masterpieces just overturns the traditional rigid evil image of vampire, her works show us an illusion of vampire world in which we can receive a comprehension of our earthen life and the living dilemma from vampire's angle. And, furthermore, her novels reflect some social facts we have to face—the existence of queers and the way we think about them.In my thesis, I may begin from the concept "androgyny", for it illustrates women's Utopia to reach gender equality. In the text I studied, the androgyny seems still exist .As a left-winged female writer, Anne cannot be neglected to express her thought on gender equality as the second wave of Feminism Movement happened in the period she wrote her novels in U.S.A. At the same time, I found there is confusion in the description of the characteristic of Anne's vampires when analyzing sex or gender. Some people use the word androgynous, some may present the word bisexuality, so It is of vital to distinguish them or find the real word.In chapter one, I point out the significance of Anne's works concerning vampires, which is widely studied by scholars.In chapter two, I first trace back the history of novel of vampire so that I may give Anne a comparatively fixed position in the writing of this genre. I also list theories of androgyny esp. the theory from the feminist writer-Virginia Woolf. To widen my horizon also studied the works of non-feminist writer. Then I can prove the characters in Anne's vampire novels are androgynous.In chapter three, I studied bisexuality in the novel which virtually mingles with the characteristic of androgyny in the text. Through the close reading of the text, I found here androgyny is not equal to bisexuality ,and because of their mingling, androgyny really become minor factor in the novel which is far away from the Utopian ideal of gender equality.In chapter four, I analyze the erotic in Anne's novel. Through the comparison and contrast between feminist novel and Anne Rice's think Anne's works are far more Utopian in the Poetics. But also because of her erotic writing, androgyny becomes obscure. So my conclusion goes like this: We cannot simply say the vampires in Anne's novel are androgynous or bisexual. Anne's vampires are new fashion in sex and gender type. Anne's works overturn the fixed image of sex and gender, they overturn our culture and even the fixed identity of homosexual and heterosexual. In a real sense, her writings bring huge change of way of thinking which makes androgyny unimportant and illusory.