"Sir, We Have a Breach of the Heteronormative": Straight and Queer Romance in the Raven Cycle
How a Slow Burn Queer Romance Echoes a Gas Fire Straight Love Story, and the Question of Subtext Versus Sub[tle] Text
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Here’s a story about me.
I like to annotate my books. They’re rarely useful annotations, because I don’t really think on the page. I am no Wallace, no Nabokov. It’s underlining, primarily, for that which seems important; arrows, for that which seems linked to to other sections on the page but not explicitly done; little comments here and there, for if something’s amusing/surprising/terrible.
One of my first comments for The Raven Boys, all those moons ago when I had finished my thesis and was in the market for a reward, was that it seemed to me Adam Parrish’s descriptions of men were distinctly not platonic.
I forgot it though. It’s important I say this: I absolutely, and totally, forgot all about it. Blue happened and I accepted it was an aberration and moved on with my life. So I am not, by this piece, attempting to suggest it obvious. I am also not trying to suggest that it is solely the wicked hand of the heteronormative shielding our eyes from the truth, or that Ronan/Adam as a pairing has been obvious from day one, page one.
One of the pleasures of the Raven Cycle though is the way it asks the reader, as it does its characters, to reconsider their interpretations of characters and events with each new novel–to examine whether those interpretations come from an objective point of view, or are based on certain expectations fed to you by either the characters themselves or society. Reading each book, individually as they have come, I understand a reading of Blue/Gansey as obvious and Ronan/Adam as a series of reveals. Reading Blue/Gansey as obvious, and Ronan/Adam as a series of reveals, is arguably the way it is meant to be experienced, at least the first time through.
Especially since, after all:
credit: ladygeekgirl.wordpress.com
Ignoring entirely my own feelings on whether the above common slash couples are plausible/any accusations of queerbaiting are valid, the feelings are real, and often loud. The concept, in itself, is also real–and most desired queer relationships are not. There are, ultimately, so few queer relationships taken seriously or presented seriously that any suggestion can be either ignored or essentially put on trial.
When it comes to re-experiencing the previous three novels however, it seems to me this: Ronan/Adam can also be seen as a clear and obvious pairing, lying in wait to be discovered only by they themselves.
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