Dhalgren

CONTENT WARNING: Sexual violence

MINOR SPOILERS IN REVIEW

There isn't much point indicating there may be spoilers in the review, because Dhalgren is perhaps the most frustrating, yet captivating novel I have read in such a long time. It's a novel where practically nothing happens, and it requires the reader to pay close attention throughout for over 800 pages. It's not a novel you can casually read whilst there is noise around you, and demands your attention constantly and yet it's secrets are impenetrable, the prose is confusing and it can hardly be called a pleasant read. At times I felt I was reading one of the worst novels ever written, and yet by the end I felt I had experienced something special, but I just wasn't sure what. One is struck that the novel is not a pleasant, or enjoyable or easy read but would be perfect for university study, for there is so much to talk about and reflect upon.

Dhalgren is the story of 'Kid' (or The Kidd, or Kidd or... you get the idea), a man does not know his own name. He has sex with a woman who turns into a tree, and walks down a road to a city called Bellona. On his way there he meets a group of people leaving the city, one of which gives him an orchid (which is a type of pronged, bladed weapon one wears on ones fist) and some links of chains with prisms and mirrors attached. He enters Bellona and without generally spoiling everything in the novel, wanders around, has lots of sex, works for a family, has lots more sex, joins and then leads a gang, has lots more sex, writes and has a book of poems published and has lots more sex and that is pretty much your lot.

Bellona is an American city which has experienced some kind of catastrophe. Is it a virus? An environmental disaster? The site of some kind of psychological, chemical or bio weapon? It's never explained, but in the city most have evacuated and there is no law and order, no regulated activity of any kind, no services or employment and virtually no productive activity of any kind. People survive generally by looting, and there is some suggestion that shops refill their self of canned goods, there is some form of rudimentary power (presumably battery power, or some kind of connection to a grid) but there is no word from the outside world, no media or anything like that. The city exists more as a form of psycho-geography. Distances change, roads move, street signs are changed. Sometimes places are far away, and other times they are close. Bellona exists as a form of psychogeography, or is it a map of Kidd's mind or some reflection of his subconsciousness? Fires rage intermittently and homes are razed to the ground and residents start off anew.

I was loath to tag this book as related to 'anarchism' because it isn't except in respect that there is no law and no hierarchy in the city. I am interested in the relationships and critiques that Delany presents. There isn't anarchist organising and the city does contain racial and gender hierarchies which Delany explores.

I can't help but read the novel as a response to the 1960's 'tune in, drop out' culture, and what is left once people drop out. There is a commune living in the park, who seem nice people who feed others, but all their projects to get things off the ground fail quickly. The other main group in the city are the 'Scorpions' - effectively a gang who wear the links and chains with the mirrors and prisms like Kidd. They each have a battery powered projector that shows coloured animal shapes as some kind of cloak - a child's toy a symbol of gang violence. The Scorpions do nothing except for fuck, eat and beat people up and loot. They don't even cook for themselves. They live in large groups, and basically cuckoo, taking over homes where other people may be living. Whilst they sound horrific, they are generally pathetic and live without any kind of overarching purpose. I think Delany is saying, 'hey, you've dropped out of society, what are you going to do now?' By depicting racial and gender disparities within the group I think he is drawing attention to the racial and gender inequality in 'free' groups.

Reading this chapter I also reflected on my period squatting in the 90's. At the time I loved the squat and I kind of remember it as kind of a cool thing. Everyone looked out for each other, and as long as someone had a giro or a source of some 'tax free income' that day everyone ate and drank. I remember it as a time of parties, and anarchists and punks living together but that's not true. The area was prone to violence (including murder), hard drug use was endemic, illnesses like Hepatitis were common, squats got abandoned when dogs had their own room as a 'dog toilet'. Along with New Age Travellers and crusty punks there were people on the run who were quite dangerous. And yeah there was a lot of dirty sex. When I was able to house myself in a lot of respects I couldn't wait to get away - a frustration that this utopian squat community was actually doing nothing of value. I am not sure how many people reading Dhalgren would go, 'this is relatable', but there you go.

I'm not sure how much of the book is 'knowable'. The prose is at times beautiful and captivating, but most of the time it is confusing. Paragraphs often start mid-sentence. A sentence may start on a completely different subject in another time and place from the last one. The last chapter (of a good 100 pages or so) is largely a stream of consciousness trying to piece together what may be happening in the novel. In one of the major themes of the novel, Kidd finds a notebook with half the pages written in and half the pages blank. He then writes poems in the other half which are then published. One never knows if the notebook is the text of Dhalgren, if the notebook has been written on both sides by Kidd or if the novel is circular with Kidd finding his own notebook and writing in it. There is an intimation that the novel is a loop but I think it is more accurate to consider the novel in the context of Delany's dyslexia and a novel written in both left hand and right hand. Two stories that are connected, but not parallel.

Kidd is also clearly Delany placed in the novel. Delany has lived experience of mental illness (Kidd has amnesia and at some point was detained in a mental institution), the aforementioned dyslexia and Kidd's sexuality is not to dissimilar to Delany's and there are often confusions and contradictions as to his race.

The sex in the novel deserves exploration. Delany describes himself as gay but I have also read that he lived in a polyamorous relationships and marriages which have been described as ones of 'convenience' and bisexual. Delany has a long history of campaigning for LGBT rights and advocacy and yet in the 1970's held problematic views, being a supporter of NAMBLA. His 70's novel Hogg I believe has extreme depictions of paedophilia and abuse. In the novel Kidd has homosexual and heterosexual relationships. The depiction of sex is graphic yet never did I feel it was remotely sensual or erotic or loving. Part of the turn off I guess is that there are graphic depictions of the lack of personal hygiene of the participants (a tame example is after Kidd has sex with the woman who turns into a tree, he is fellated upon arriving in the city who comments on the 'dandruff' on his pubic hair). Everything is quite grubby, all the sex is unprotected and again, it felt a bit close to home when I consider some of my own activities in the 90's.

Kidd eventually enters a polyamorous relationship with a woman named Lanya and a fifteen year old boy called Denny. The relationship is broadly depicted as consensual, but the power dynamics between Kidd and Denny can only be read by me as exploitative and abusive. I am not sure that is Delany's intended reading. Kidd is either in his late 20's (or he may be a hundred years old) and he's always forcing Denny into sex or telling him to do things he may not like or want to do at the time. He's verbally and physically abusive. The dynamics of an older man dominating a child is unpleasant to read.

Lanya is the only character in the book who I think is cool. She generally lives on her own terms outside the Scorpions, or the commune, and she tries to do something useful, running a school. She is happy to be with Kidd, but doesn't dance to his tune. But even Lanya is ruined in the book. She's pimped out to see what 'prostitution is like' for 'worthless' money. Then later after depictions of men screwing whoever they want (and a very problematic depiction of a gang rape where the woman desires continuous sex with countless men, but no one asks nor cares if consent is present), Delany has Lanya and her friend turn the tables by repeatedly having sex with a group of Scorpions. It reads like another gang rape, no matter how much Delany is asking is to consider sex, gender and consensual norms.

Perhaps the most problematic and yet thought provoking element of the book relates to the treatment of race. Racial epithets are littered on almost every page. Whilst there are black characters, the wider black community are othered and largely invisible and depicted as a problem. Race riots are a presence in the city and there is an air of permanent tension. It is like Delany is reflecting back the post civil rights racism in America.

The novel contains a black figurehead called George Harrison. Posters of his naked, muscular body are plastered all over the city. His large black penis is talked about in and depicted in the most descriptive terms. He is worshipped in the city, a moon is named after him and yet his most famous claim to fame is a brutal, violent public rape of a fifteen year old white girl. The novel describes the girl's search for George with a clear indication that she wants to be raped / have rough violent sex with him again. Worse, when we hear from George there is a several page treatise on 'what is rape anyway?' with an indication that 'yes I had rough violent sex with this child, hitting her as I did it, but she liked it, she wanted it'. It's pretty horrible to read and whatever Delany thinks he is challenging it is nevertheless harrowing to read, and I think of all the victims of sexual violence who have to face, 'but she liked it'.

What Delany is saying, and it kind of is an important message despite the execution is he is showing the fetishization of black men - how they are depicted as big, strong, animalistic, somewhat brutish but a symbol of masculine power. I know many men of colour critique this fetishization by white women who objectify them constantly. The child who 'wants to be raped' is also a symbol of the paranoid fear of white patriarchal society and the 'danger' black men represent to 'our' white women. Delany is showing stark how American society overtly sexualises black men, but also shows the horrible racist paranoid fear that black men represent to the 'purity' of the white race.

Uncomfortable, challenging but definitely thought provoking.

For a novel where novel happens there is lots to hook on aside these major themes. An astronaut visiting the city is a clear Vietnam analogy. The mansion where the newspaper publisher lives and the apartment where a family continue to live as normal represent both the class divide, and also the banality and futility of middle class life as the world burns. It's a novel about mental illness, it's a novel about the craft of writing, it's a novel about nothing.

If one rates it one star or five I wouldn't disagree. A month of my life reading something infuriating, difficult, boring, unpleasant and yet so very thought provoking.

A unique piece of literature but this isn't for everyone, perhaps not anyone.