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Friendship in the classical world was celebrated as among the highest human achievements: nothing was more likely to lead to the divine than looking for it in the eyes of a friend. In exploring the complexities of male-male relations beyond the simple labels of sexuality, Queer Friendship shows how love between men has a rich and varied history in English literature. The friend could offer a reflection of one's own worth and a celebration of a kind of mutuality that was not connected to family or home. These same-sex friendships are memorable because they give shape to the novels of which they are a part, and question the assumption that the love between friends is different from the love between lovers. Queer Friendship explores English literary friendship in three ways: the elegiac, the erotic, and the platonic, by considering a myriad of works, including Sterne's Tristram Shandy, Tennyson's 'In Memoriam A. H. H.', and Dickens' Great Expectations.
List of contents
Introduction: male friendship and Greek love; 1. Elegiac friendship; 2. Erotic friendship; 3. Platonic friendship; Epilogue: queer friendship in Isherwood's A Single Man.
About the author
George E. Haggerty is Distinguished Professor and Chair in the Department of English, University of California, Riverside.
Summary
Queer Friendship shows how love between men has a rich and varied history in English literature. Only rarely specifically sexual, these same-sex friendships are memorable because they give shape to the novels of which they are a part, and question the assumption that the love between friends is different from the love between lovers.
