This project invests in a critical analysis of texts in English that portray and problematise ‘gay romance’ in contemporary India. It primarily deals with the representation of ‘queer’ love between men in examples of contemporary India gay literature, specifically novels and novellas, in English. I consider the term ‘queer’ to posit a heterogeneous and non-monolithic idea of non-normative and non-conformist sexualities and their discourses and praxes. The project involves the analysis of a majority of contemporary novels dealing with ‘gay romance’ as such: 1. R. Raj Rao’s The Boyfriend (2003) 2. R. Raj Rao’s Hostel Room 131 (2010) 3. Anjali Joseph’s Saraswati Park (2010) 4. Mayur Patel’s Vivek and I (2010) 5. Arun Mirchandani’s You Are Not Alone (2010) 6. Janice Pariat’s Seahorse (2014) 7. R. Raj Rao’s Lady Lolita’s Lover (2015) 8. Sahil Sood’s A Thousand Dreams Within Me Softly Burn (2016) 9. Vicky Arora’s Terminal Love (2016) 10. Akash Mehrotra’s The Other Guy (2017) [Note: For a basic idea about the plot of the novels and novellas included in this study, refer to Appendix A for the synopses of the primary texts.] (2)
---
Appendix A reveals that most of these novels are not "romance" in the sense applied in this database, due to protagonists ending up separated/dead. However, this is not the case in all of the texts so I decided to add this item but keep the entry fairly minimal.
---
I focus on same-sex love and romance between men as represented in contemporary fiction, in English in the Indian context. My use of the terms ‘queer loves’ and ‘gay romance’ is located within an understanding that the novels that I discuss and analyse work within a discourse of multivalent (and alterative) sexual modernities and that their contributions are invested with a politics of re-claiming, problematising, and diversifying the constructs of both ‘gay’ and ‘romance’ in contemporary literature. (38)
---
Appendix A reveals that most of these novels are not "romance" in the sense applied in this database, due to protagonists ending up separated/dead. However, this is not the case in all of the texts so I decided to add this item but keep the entry fairly minimal.
---