Asexuality In Carson Mccullers' The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter And The Ballad Of The Sad Cafe

This thesis aims to take an in-depth look in The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter and The Ballad of the Sad Café with the idea of asexuality.Traditional studies about Cason McCullers' works tend to focus on those grotesque figures from the perspective of LGBT criticism and feminism.With the ever-expanding studies of queer theory,asexuality has gained its recognition.In this paper,studies of asexuality will be employed to have new interpretations regarding the two novels.This thesis consists of five parts.First part is the introduction,which is followed by three chapters and a conclusion.Introduction provides a review of previous McCullers' studies,the definition of asexuality,and research questions.Chapter one probes into the decoupling of “romantic attraction” and “sexual attraction”.Traditional studies of sexuality hold the view that “romantic attraction” and “sexual attraction” are identical,but studies of asexuality have suggested that the two,though overlapping,can be decoupled.In the two novels,Antonapoulos,Singer,Miss Amelia,and Lymon all represent four different kinds of asexual tendency — “homo-romantic asexual”,“semiromantic asexual”,“hetero-romantic asexual”,and “bi-romantic asexual”.Chapter Two investigates the internal marginalization that asexuality faces among queer communities.Queer theory endeavors to solidify sexual minorities to utter a monotonous voice against heterocentricism.However,it now takes a reflective examination of how some non-sexual minorities are further marginalized.This chapter tries to discuss such issue with three key terms: misrecognition,disability,and suppression.Chapter Three explores the side of interdisciplinary studies.Under the light of “food analogy”,“lesbianism(stone butch)”,and “religious celibacy”,new approaches are available to analyze Antonapoulos' obsession with food,Miss Amelia's resistance to physical touch,and Antonapoulos' devotion to his faith.In the part of conclusion,there are a round-up of the main part and the conclusion,together with suggestions for further investigation.