UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO Hidden in Plain View: Where Interracial Meets Queer in Nineteenth-Century U.S. Literature and Culture A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Literature by Lauren Heintz Committee in charge: Professor Fatima El-Tayeb, Co-Chair Professor Shelley Streeby, Co-Chair Professor Sara Johnson Professor Roshanak Kheshti Professor Nayan Shah Professor Megan Wesling 2015 Copyright Lauren Heintz, 2015 All rights reserved. The Dissertation of Lauren Heintz is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication on microfilm and electronically: ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ Co-Chair ________________________________________________________________________ Co-Chair University of California, San Diego 2015 iii DEDICATION For their support and love, I dedicate this dissertation to my family: my mom, Terry, my dad, Jack, and my brother, Jacob. iv EPIGRAPH Finally she speaks and her voice is soft but stern. “I don’t know,” she says. “I don’t know whether the bird you are holding is dead or alive, but what I do know is that it is in your hands. It is in your hands.” ~ Toni Morrison v TABLE OF CONTENTS Signature Page................................................................................................................. iii Dedication....................................................................................................................... iv Epigraph.......................................................................................................................... v Table of Contents............................................................................................................ vi Acknowledgments.......................................................................................................... vii Vita.................................................................................................................................. xii Abstract of the Dissertation............................................................................................ xiv Introduction: The Ghost of Queer Time Past.................................................................. 1 Chapter 1: The Crisis of Kinship in Victor Séjour’s “Le Mulâtre”................................ 22 Chapter 2: “She passed down Orleans Street, a polished dandy”: The Queer Race Romance of Ludwig von Reizenstein’s The Mysteries of New Orleans............. 61 Chapter 3: Hidden in Plain View: A Queer Archive of Interraciality............................. 97 Chapter 4: John Brown’s Bed........................................................................................ 147 Afterword: Speculating Upon the Historical................................................................. 204 Bibliography................................................................................................................... 209 vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS There is a great deal of appreciation that I would like to give here. I am left with the unwavering sentiment that although writing can be a solo endeavor, I have been lucky enough to have rarely felt alone when writing this dissertation. I would like to thank the immense support provided by my committee. The incomparable Shelley Streeby has stuck by me for the ten years that I have spent at UCSD, from my undergraduate degree to the PhD. It is difficult to express how much her astute reading of my work, her seminar pedagogy, and her scholarship have shaped my project, but dare I say she has done so in “sensational” ways. I will keep close, also, those moments of support outside the office and the classroom, where Shelley has always shown so much care for her students. I am so happy Fatima El-Tayeb agreed to co-chair the committee along with Shelley. Chapter by chapter, Fatima always located those moments of struggle in my writing and thinking, and her eloquent engagement with my work altered my approach to the material, and especially queer theory, in ways I will take care to remember, and endeavor to replicate. Fatima’s mentorship, too, has often been an unspoken guide for how to navigate academia with a calm and careful rigor, and for that I am thankful. Sara Johnson’s two seminars, “Nineteenth-Century Inter-American Studies” and “The Age of Revolution in the Plantations Americas” altered how I understood early American studies writ-large, shaping in profound ways how I engage the nineteenth-century in my scholarship. Her “gift” of Ludwig von Reizenstein’s Mysteries became the kernel for my dissertation; and her introduction to the world of archival studies for my work has opened immense avenues of study. vii Roshanak Kheshti is both friend and advisor, and for breaking that boundary I am very thankful. Roshy has guided me through those academic struggles where efforts at world building break down, in which you have to learn to navigate academic institutions in ways that are personally sustainable. I look forward to what comes of having Roshy as advisor, friend, and now reader of my work. For giving me the opportunity to work within the field of academic publishing, I thank Nayan Shah for taking me on as his editorial assistant for the journal GLQ. Working with Nayan for GLQ and in the Critical Gender Studies program for his queer theory course has been a pleasure. I thank Meg Wesling for taking me on as her research assistant in the Literature department at UCSD. I thank Meg for her durational engagement with my work from undergrad to the PhD, for having me work with her as a research assistant, and for having those difficult conversations with me, about pedagogy, positionality, and making it through the phases of graduate school. I feel humbled and lucky to have such a committee, one in which I have to force myself to cut these gratitudes short, because there are so many more thanks to give. The community of graduate students at UCSD is a rarity, I would say. In a place like San Diego that seems to resist collectivities, I’m happy to have met so many who defy that sentiment. I want to thank first the members of the writing group of love: Rujeko Hockley, Ashvin Kini, Sara Mameni, Chris Perreira, and Davorn Sisavath. We formed this group as a way to sustain us during our qualifying years, and our dynamic of friendship, support, diverse scholarly engagement, and truly honest feedback was the first I had ever experienced. My work would not be half of what it is without learning from all viii of you. I have taken away so much from reading all of your brilliance; the awe and inspiration was never ending -- let’s never let it end. I am also lucky to have been part of such an amazing cohort (co-heart): thanks to Rosiangela Escamilla, Allia Ida Griffin (from Saint Francis to UCSD!), Anthony Yooshin Kim, Ashvin Kini, Melissa Martinez, Chris Perreira, June Ting, Megan Turner, Niall Twohig, and Ben Van Overmerire. I feel especially grateful for those who came before me, and who still remain close even as we all scatter apart: Mariola Alvarez, Caralyn Bialo, Josen Diaz, Jodi Eisenberg, Tania Jabour, Joo Ok Kim, Jason Farr, Chien-ting Lin, Viviana MacManus, Yumi Pak, and Chase Smith. Across disciplines and cohorts, there are so many more who continue to impact me: Christina Carney, Victor Betts, Sarika Talve-Goodman, Katrin Pesch, Kai Small, and Maki Smith. To those Professors who did not serve on my committee, but were nevertheless present in meaningful ways: Jody Blanco, Sharon Holland, Stephanie Jed, Sara Kaplan, and always in loving memory, Rosemary George, whose guidance led me to graduate school in the first place, and whose smile still radiates. My advisors at the University of Pennsylvania, where I completed my M.A., have continued to engage with me long beyond the call of duty; David Kazanjian and David Eng have truly supported me more than I ever could have hoped. At UPenn as well, Marina Bilbija and Sunny Yang, the infamous duo, are somehow never too far away to unload with -- and to then share a cocktail. To various friends outside of graduate school: Sophie Oller, for ripping me away to song and sound; Shannon Davis, for truly being there; Erin Becker, for being the Mac. ix This dissertation has also received generous funding support. The teaching support provided by the Muir Writing Program at UCSD, directed by Carrie Wastal and Marion Wilson, was a valuable and necessary component to my growth as an instructor and graduate student. To the Literature Department at UCSD, for providing a year of funding support to do archival and dissertation research. The Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture generously awarded this dissertation with the Lapidus Fellowship. I feel ever grateful to have received the Dissertation Completion Fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies in conjunction with the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. In the upcoming academic year, I look forward to being a Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in the English Department at Tulane University. Family sustains in ways that has made it okay to feel both pleasure and discomfort when writing the dissertation. I want to thank my extended family for their ever-present support,