Your host returns, and this week's novel for discussion is Green Fairy by Kyell Gold. As mentioned in last week's post, Narratology, there are many ways in which a writer's style can affect how their writing is interpreted by a reader. In Gold's 2012 queer coming-of-age novel, the protagonist Sol finds a memoir that tells the story of a man charged with murder a hundred years prior. As Sol reads this memoir, he begins to have dreams in the perspective of the male prostitute who was murdered, showing how he felt in the events that led up to his untimely death.
Writing in this fashion allows for Gold to impress upon Sol, as well as the reader, how sexuality affects the actions of an individual. Sol is permitted to see both sides of the story: the murderer's standpoint as the rich but closeted son of a politician in early 1900s France as well as the victim's viewpoint, as a Russian immigrant, exiled and also closeted, who dances under the guise of a woman in a brothel. Sol is permitted the outside viewpoint to judge where either man makes mistakes, and also where the murderer lies. At the same time, the reader is allowed to see where Sol himself struggles and lies and resolves to live better in the name of the murder victim. This example of narratology is extremely simple, but also very effective because of how it impacts both the reader and the protagonist!
That's all for now, but my next post will also be on narratology, examining Gold's follow-up novel Red Devil!
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