Exiliado: I Need Queer Friends

I’ve often been asked why I send my work into Queer publications. There’s an intonation that perhaps I am settling for a smaller market, when my work would do well in places like Granta.

Firstly, I am not opposed to more mainstream publications. I’ve had work published in Popshot and Litro, for example. I had some good advice when I first started writing professionally, that a smaller press will often treat you better and give you more care and attention than something perceived as more prestigious that can often feel impersonal.

I have found this to be the case, and I intend to follow that path when it comes to shopping my novel. I’m not particularly here chasing the dream of being the next publishing sensation. That’s not to say I don’t love acclaim, but I’m not basing an entire career of work on that notion.

Then there’s the idea of Queer press versus something more mainstream. It remains a fact for me that a Queer press will understand and nurture my work in a way that others won’t. Not only from a Queer perspective, but from a textual one. When you live in the margins, it is much easier to understand the reasons why you may be breaking the rules, because the rules don’t apply to you when you haven’t been invited in your entire life. Which means I don’t have to waste time and energy defending or explaining my choices relating to theme, or stylistic content. You’d be surprised at how beholden people are to seeing “proper” grammar or narrative conventions in your work, even from people I would otherwise have considered to have a touch more imagination. (Although I’m also increasingly shocked at how narrowly some people read and experience literature, even when they’ve chosen to study or work in it.)

I feel the same way about friendships. I don’t think I could have spent so long in a couple of past jobs if I hadn’t had another Queer person there to connect to. And that’s not just an issue of gender or sexuality. Queer is a life outlook, a political tone, the understanding of your place in your world and the hypocrisy underneath the surface of what is often described as tolerance.

I’ve been watching RuPaul’s Drag Race for almost twenty years now, and beyond the excitement and drama of reality show drag, what I have always been attracted to is the nature of the friendships formed within it. It is refreshing to see Queer people on camera acting so unguarded and so comfortable with each other. They bring their entire selves with them, with no need for apology or shifting of tone. You can be an ally, and I applaud you, but if you haven’t lived in the trenches of what it means to be Queer in this world, then you just don’t and will never get it.

Which is not to say that the Queer experience is one of constant pain or sorrow. There is plenty of joy. But there is also no need to be looked at like a curiosity, or to have your life experience or place in the world discarded because your marriage is a “gay” one, for example. It is not difficult to begin to see when you are considered an aberration, not necessarily to be persistently oppressed (I have a very good life) but certainly often to be overlooked and undervalued.

I’ve moved to the other side of the world and what I crave now are friendships. But I want Queer ones. The people that get you because they see themselves in you. The writing groups where you don’t have to talk about the entire social history of Queer art and where you work lies in it. The book clubs where every damn month we’re not reading about a rich White lady who visits the Mediterranean to find herself in the arms of a passionate waiter. I hope when I get a job I have Queer colleagues. I hope I can find my Queer friends here. It’s a greyer world without them.

If you enjoyed reading this and want to support my work, please consider buying me a coffee by clicking here. Thank you.