Author2Author: Tennessee Jones & Charlie Anders, pt. 4

The final installment in our conversation between Tennessee Jones and Charlie Anders, the two lead members of this spring's "Cross Gender Caravan" reading tour, hints at scenes of graphic violence; squeamish readers may want to just skip ahead to the next post, but Charlie makes a strong case for these scenes being integral to the work.

Tennessee Jones: There are two instances of self-mutilation in Choir Boy: one where Berry cuts his scrotum and another where he cuts one of his breasts after he has begun taking hormones. Are you concerned some readers will see these instances as expressions of internalized transphobia?

Charlie Anders: Feeling betrayed by your body, and wanting to do violence to it in retaliation, is a major theme in Choir Boy. I sort of hoped that this would come across as a human issue, not a transgender issue--everybody has experienced situations where his or her body rebelled or failed. From adolescence to old age, our bodies change and act without our consent. And I think I managed to work in all that weird stuff in the Bible about cutting off your hand if it offends you.

I would say there's no way the first mutilation incident could reflect internalized transphobia, but you could definitely read that into the second incident. Berry is feeling freaked out by the way his body has changed since he's been on female hormones. In the context of the novel, it has to do with a lot of other stuff besides the fact that he's grown breasts, but yeah, he's partly feeling freaked out by his own trans-ness. I think it's important to talk about internalized transphobia, because most transpeople have dealt with it at one time or another. It's pretty impossible not to feel some self-loathing at times, when you have the whole arsenal of our culture aimed at telling you that you're sick or disgusting. Admitting to those feelings isn't the same as validating them, it's the first step to confronting them and telling them to go fuck themselves.