| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立中興大學 === 外國語文學系 === 93 === The Married Man is a romance of an American scholar, Austin, who meets Julien, a married French young man, in Paris. In this novel, Edmund White deals with not only homosexual desire, but also with bisexual involvement. The main concern is homosexuality being marginalized by heterosexual hegemony, how do homosexuals build a relationship with bisexuals?
In my thesis, I will trace the path of Austin and Julien’s relationship to expose the hierarchy and myth of sexualities. Throughout the novel, Julien’s sexuality remains unstable; therefore, Austin doubts his faithful vows. It is not until Julien’s death that Austin realizes the two are actually a married couple. I will start from Foucault’s opinions on homosexuality to examine the invention of this term and how heterosexuality and homosexuality interact. After that, I will discuss how bisexuality is regarded as a disrupting element in the interdependent relationship of heterosexuality and homosexuality. Finally, I will appropriate Susan Sontag’s comment on AIDS to scrutinize the impacts that AIDS brings to Austin and Julien to reveal that Edmund White’s detailed depiction of AIDS does not reinforces its stereotyped connection with homosexuals. Instead, it exposes how ridiculous this connection is and breaks the myth of sexuality. Through this revelation, Edmund White’s The Married Man proposes that some traits of characteristics are shared by all human beings, whatever their sexuality is.
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