On The Queering"Border Intellectuals"in The Folding Star

As one of the most important novelists in Great Britain since E. M. Forster, Alan Hollinghurst (1954-) possesses a sharp eye for human feelings and has a lyrical gift of rendering poems in prose, presenting the emotional complexities of everyday gay life in a natural way. Different from nineteenth and early-twentieth-century writers such as Oscar Wilde or E. M. Forster, Hollinghurst does not have to present homosexuality through allusion and references. On the other hand, unlike many recent gay writers, he does not feel obliged to follow the "coming out" narrative. On the contrary, he has been appreciated for his elegant prose style and frank representation of gay sex. After Hollinghurst won the Man Booker Prize with his fourth novel The Line of Beauty in2004, domestic critics all centered on this novel and there are no researches on his other works. However, his previous novels are just as gorgeous as his awarded one.This thesis consists of five chapters. Chapter1is to give a brief introduction of Hollinghurst and his works, and survey the studies on Hollinghurst as well as his works at home and abroad.Chapter2mainly introduces the currently-popular queer theory, which lays the theoretical foundation for analyzing the "queering" characters and "queering" techniques in The Folding Star. The author traces its origin, its relationship with HIV/AIDS, as well as surveys China’s current situation of research on queer theory.Chapter3analyzes the "queering" protagonist-Edward Manners and other minor characters. In the first section of this chapter, the author presents how the protagonist-Edward Manners becomes a "border intellectual", describes his obsession in same-sex love and his peculiar understanding of beauty. In the latter section, the minor characters’"queerness" is unfolded thoroughly.Chapter4focuses on the "queering" techniques, which Hollinghurst practices to apply in The Folding Star, such as first-person point of view, complicated plot and peculiar narration. All these techniques combined with its prose style serve to further deepen the representations of the "queering" characters.In the conclusion chapter, the author tries to point out that, what distinguishes The Folding Star from other gay novels is the explicit presentation of sexual scenes and its prose style. Furthermore, the particularity of The Folding Star lies in the exactness of Hollinghurst’s observation of human feelings. Meanwhile, the new literary critical theory-queer theory offers insights into the marginal culture and brings about significant implications for the domestic studies on homosexual works.