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LONG, RYAN. Queer Exposures: Sexuality and Photography in Roberto Bolaho's Fiction and Poetry. U of Pittsburgh P, 2021, 321 pp.
Queer Exposures is a timely study of Roberto Bolaños fiction and poetry through the lenses of sexuality and photography, two significant but understudied themes in the Chilean author's work. Drawing from queer theory and visual studies, Ryan Long brings a fresh perspective to Bolaho scholarship. Queer characters and homoerotic themes are frequent in his fiction (Ernesto San Epifanio and Piel Divina in The Savage Detectives; Lorenza in Distant Star; Amalfitano in 2666; Amalfitano and Padilla in Woes of the True Policeman; Mauricio Silva in "Mauricio ('The Eye') Silva," among others), as are references to photography ("Photos"; "Labyrinth"; Distant Star). While the volume deals with these topics in literal ways, it also does so more figuratively, for example by examining the photographic quality of certain narratives and poems or the way a queer perspective introduces a different relationship to temporality. The book builds upon the themes of sexuality and photography in Bolaho to illustrate and pursue a mode of reading that resists closure and favors open-ended interpretations.
A key concept explored in the study is that of exposure, a notion taken from Bolaho's writings. Exposure translates to intemperie, a word Bolaho uses to signify being out in the open, without shelter, exposed to the elements. It is often associated with the young poet-wanderers who populate his poetry and fiction, who never had the benefit of any academic institutionality or economic security, and for whom the practice of literature involves both worldliness and vulnerability Long extends the semantic field of intemperie to include connotations such as the exposure of film to...