Qiou Miao-jin, born in 1969, took psychology at the National Taiwan University. During her undergraduate degree, she wrote fiction and non-fiction alike and was widely regarded as belonging to the new generation of writers. She was awarded first place in the Central Daily Newspaper Short Novel Award and in Lian Heng Wen Xjuan Novel Award. After graduation, she worked for the Teacher Zhang Foundation before becoming a journalist for Journalist Magazine. After several years of work, Qiou went to Paris to take a postgraduate degree from the Psychology at Universitaire de Paris VIII.
In Paris, Qiou Miao-jin became friends with Xu, a Taiwanese woman, and their relationship developed quickly. After a year, they broke up and Xu returned to Taiwan, becoming involved in a heterosexual relationship. Qiou committed suicide in Montmartre on June 25, 1995, at the age of 26. Her last book, Dying Testament in Montmartre, was published in Taiwan, to much popular acclaim. The book depicted Xu’s abandonment, Qiou’s separation from Taiwan and her decision to commit suicide.
How does Qiou identify herself as a lesbian? In what ways does Qiou explore lesbianism in her literary works? What drives her to suicide? Oppression from society, from the family or was it merely the result of a failed relationship? In the following, issues concerning the lesbian body and desire will be discussed in reference to Qiou’s three novels - The Journal of Crocodile , and Dying Testament in Montmartre . The epistolary form in Dying Testament in Montmartre will also be considered as a posthumous work, expressing the ambiguities, consciously and unconsciously, towards homosexual love, an enthusiasm for art, and a comprehension of the meaning of life.
I.
Body, Desires, and Butch Lesbian Identity in The Journal of Crocodile, and Dying Testament in Montmartre
Becoming aware of the category of “woman,” I finally realised why I am crying. Crying to find that I am also a “woman”! … I have not noticed gender difference beofore, nor the masculinity or femininity I represent in front of others. As far as I am concerned, everyone belongs to one category, “human being.”
Before, I believed that every man kept an “ideal type” of woman whom he adores the most in his heart. Even though I am a woman, the “ideal type” of a person is still a woman.
Qiou Miao-jin is a significant and controversial presence in Taiwanese lesbian writing. It was not until the publication of her first long novel, The Journal of Crocodile that the “identity politics” of lesbianism emerged in Taiwan. The term “La Z,” originating from “les(bian),” and the figure of the crocodile were used by her to represent homosexual women. Chi Da-wei agrees that, “the protagonist ‘La Z’ in Qiou’s The Journal of Crocodile comes to represent the name of and identity in lesbianism. Through ‘alligator,’ she criticises heterosexual society, and encourages lesbians to be aware of their sexual subjectivity.” Qiou is controversial in that her protagonists fall into butch and femme categories. In addition, she explores the potential tragedy of lesbianism. Liou Liang-ya indicates that the first-person narrator under Qiou Miao-jin’s description identifies that a lesbian must be a masculine woman who loves woman, that is T (meaning “butch”). Such identification is considered as an unchangable essence. As for the feminine lesbian, she is a “normal” woman who is capable of marrying a man and having children of her own. This kind of division should be questioned again and again.
智慧 Chih-Hui Fang
英國Exeter大學英國文學博士
現任亞洲大學外國語文學系助理教授
專長英美文學、性別研究與文化研究
曾翻譯：
Sociology社會學，第九版，Schaefer, R. T. （台北：麥格羅‧希爾 McGraw Hill, 2005）
出版 Lesbian Identity in British and Taiwanese Contemporary Novels( Lambert Academic Publishing, 2010)，長篇小說<黃熙>(2012)以及其他關於性別議題的文章與專書
