Alienated rebels : John Rechy and James Baldwin

A study of "double minority" literature deepens our understanding not only of minority experience but also of tensions and anxieties inherent in modern culture. The novels of John Rechy, who is Chicano and homosexual, and those of James Baldwin, who is black and homosexual, permit us to examine the dual minority experience. Their fiction reflects the unique sensibility that results from their psychosocial status as denigrated ethnic and sexual outsiders in a racially and sexually oppressive culture. Therefore, to understand their works--especially the themes of alienation and rebellion that recur obsessively--one must grasp the combined impact of their ethnic awareness and homosexual consciousness on their imagination.

Many significant parallels emerge between the two authors and their works: both use the homosexual underground as a nightmarish metaphor for contemporary human experience in general; they reject the religion of their childhood but persist in rebelling against a God they perceive to be arbitrary; similar patterns of imagery per vade their works; the Stonewall Riots of 1969 have had a liberating impact on their art; the WASP male, though he does not monopolize over, figures prominently in their erotic imagination; and rage at the Establishment is at the core of their fiction.

But there are differences as well. Rechy emphasizes sexual rebellion, but Baldwin gives equal stress to sexual and racial protest. While Rechy's vision is largely nihilistic, Baldwin's is affirmative. Rechy's quest for a substitute for salvation remains thwarted, but Baldwin reminds us that love is the key to personal and collective redemption.

The novels of Rechy and Baldwin familiarize us with the ethnic minority homosexual experience, an aspect of American experience that has received little scholarly attention. Our understanding of their works enhances our appreciation of other dual minority writers like Allen Ginsberg (who is Jewish and homosexual); minority women writers (who too experience the twin trauma of racism and sexism); and white lesbian writers (who are alienated because of gender and sexual orientation). Above all, Rechy and Baldwin compel us to share the anguish of the rejected and lonely outcast; by doing so, they humanize us.