Queer Communism and the Ministry of Love: Sexual Revolution in British Writing of the 1930s

by Glyn Salton-Cox

Overview

A new reading of the sexual politics of 1930s leftist prose genres
It is well known that many of the best-known queer writers of the 1930s were involved with leftist politics. Why, then, has there been no extended examination of this striking juncture of dissident sex and socialism? Queer Communism and the Ministry of Love addresses this question, among others, to transform current narratives of midcentury literary, cultural, and intellectual history from a queer Marxist perspective. It provides a unique exploration of the transnational formation of queer leftist writing in 1930s Britain informed by detailed research on Weimar Berlin, Civil War Spain and the Soviet Union.
Key Features:
Rearticulates major figures with lesser known authorsA unique exploration of the transnational formation of queer leftist writing in 1930s Britain informed by detailed research on Weimar Berlin, British , and the Soviet Union A queer Marxist critique of anti-fascist fiction and the sexual politics of midcentury Britain Redefines our understanding of 1930s literary history, queer theory, and Marxism

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781474423311
Publisher:	Edinburgh University Press
Publication date:	05/30/2018
Pages:	240
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x (d)

About the Author

Glyn Salton-Cox is Assistant Professor of English at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Amongst other publications, his work has appeared in Modern Language Quarterly, Critical Quarterly, Comparative Literature, and Twentieth-Century Communism, and is forthcoming in The Cambridge Companion to British Literature of the 1930s and The Cambridge History of 1930s British Literature. He is currently working on a monograph on the cultural, literary, and intellectual history of the lumpenproletariat.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction: The Perverts of Modernity

1 Boy Meets Camera: Christopher Isherwood and Sergei Tretiakov

2 Sylvia Townsend Warner’s Queer Vanguardism

3 The Hymning of Heterosexuality: Katharine Burdekin and the Popular Front

4 Orwell’s Hope in the Proles

Coda: A Little Window for the Bourgeoisie

Notes

Index

What People are Saying About This

A deeply impressive, ambitious and significant work of criticism which succeeds, triumphantly, in addressing both canonical and rather more neglected texts with élan.

University of California-Irvine Tyrus Miller

Salton-Cox makes an exciting contribution to our understanding of the British literary left in the 1930s. Tracing the intricate crossings of queer sexualities, middle-class class identities and proletarian politics, this study turns a queer eye on leftist writers both canonical and lesser-known, yielding fresh critical insights into this unique period. 　 　 　 　

Leo Mellor

A deeply impressive, ambitious and significant work of criticism which succeeds, triumphantly, in addressing both canonical and rather more neglected texts with élan.

Editorial Reviews

Salton-Cox makes an exciting contribution to our understanding of the British literary left in the 1930s. Tracing the intricate crossings of queer sexualities, middle-class class identities and proletarian politics, this study turns a queer eye on leftist writers both canonical and lesser-known, yielding fresh critical insights into this unique period.

University of California-Irvine Tyrus Miller

A deeply impressive, ambitious and significant work of criticism which succeeds, triumphantly, in addressing both canonical and rather more neglected texts with élan.

Leo Mellor

...an important book that deserves to be read widely by scholars of mid-century British literature and culture. Its incisive engagement with canonical and non-canonical writers testifies to a new wave of interest in the literary and artistic culture of the 1930s. Finally, Salton-Cox’s book can help us explain why the politics of the 1930s look queer from the perspective of today, and why that queerness should matter to us.

The Review of English Studies - Benjamin Kohlmann

Queer Communism and the Ministry of Love demonstrates how literary scholarship can make the literature and art of the 1930s newly compelling to contemporary readers and critics… an important book that deserves to be read widely by scholars of mid-century British literature and culture.
— Benjamin Kohlmann, The Review of English Studies

From the Publisher