Review: Blackouts by Justin Torres

Blackout or erasure poetry is an exciting form. Deftly erasing select portions of an existing work helps artists extract or “find” something new from the previous version, which is why blackout poetry is also classified under “found poetry”.

The concept of erasure uniquely applies to queer people, for LGBTQIA+ lives have forever been stripped of their histories, making it difficult for them to imagine possibilities, futures. Examples are plentiful. Attributed to George W Henry, Sex Variants: A Study of Homosexual Patterns is a case in point. Henry, who “specialised in the study and treatment of homosexuality”, appropriated the research of German-born journalist Jan Gay, who was an openly queer woman.

Born Helen Reitman, she not only visited Magnus Hirschfeld’s Institute for Sexual Science in Berlin, but also possibly met the pioneering sexologist. This visit — or interaction — was a pivotal moment in history as it influenced Gay to conduct primary research to understand and document homosexual experiences. However, whatever Gay found during the hundreds of interviews she conducted in the 1920s and 1930s was appropriated by Henry to associate queerness with deviance instead of socialising it as a variant of sexuality. At that time, women needed an expert, invariably a man, to certify their work and get such research published.

This singular act of erasure is at the core of American novelist Justin Torres’ genre-defying second novel, Blackouts. Divided into six extremely layered parts enriched with queer histories and mesmerising prose, it also includes photographs, forms of erasure literature and detailed endnotes, all of which elevate it to patchwork fiction of sorts. It won the 2023 National Book Award (US) for Fiction and was a finalist for this year’s Orwell Prize for Political Fiction and Lammy in the Gay Fiction category.

The book begins with its two principal protagonists Juan Gay and the unnamed character (whom Juan refers to as Nene throughout) reuniting at The Palace in a desert. Filthy and unattended, the location might be a metaphor for the deserted, precarious state in which several queers find themselves. The duo have met after a decade, having first made each other’s acquaintance at a mental hospital where they were institutionalised. Looking at Juan’s disintegrating body, the narrator thinks, “No way that body is my future”. He’s not only being naïve but is also representing the fantastic ignorance of queer youth. The ephemerality and intensity of queer companionship and liaising command him to hustle, with no semblance of stability. Despite that, ironically, he is convinced that his body isn’t going to fail him.

Back to The Palace: Juan and Nene begin to tell each other stories, a narrative device that becomes an instrument to course-correct historical omissions. It is also their way of using storytelling as a form of personal catharsis — a very clever meta usage. Sample this: “My parents fought over God. Physically. Then they would make up, passionately. They were teenagers. (You can imagine, Juan. Nene, I can imagine.)” Hidden in these sentences is Nene’s intergenerational trauma, his need to locate himself anywhere for he has (just like the author once upon a time) “keys to nowhere”, and the awareness that his Puerto Rican identity further marginalises him (see “Puerto Rican Syndrome” in the book).

Then, there’s Juan, offering Nene lost wisdom and making up for lost time. From the mention of “lexicological shift” in the context of coming out to queer ancestors — Zhenya Gay, Andy Warhol, Thomas Painter, and Edna Thomas, etc — in the narrative to the discourse on eugenics, their dialogue allows the book to cover a whole range of issues. The most interesting and ambitious aspect of them all, however, is gaze. There’s a moment when Juan tells Nene how the “sudden increased visibility” invited trouble for queers in the 1930s, and goes on to present its contemporary relevance:

“… If a cop walked into this room right now, with you in your little undies, lying with me, so weak, on this bed, they’d see a crime.”

“What crime?”

“You are illegally cohabiting; you’ve snuck in, have you not? And if a journalist walked in, they’d see a story, a scandal. And if a doctor walked in, they’d see illness. And not just in my body, but in your head.”

Nene indulging in conversation with a dying Juan is a form of care too; a hidden aspect of this novel. The project he must complete on Juan’s behalf is an inheritance of sorts — a rarity for queers. While Juan sleeps through the day, Nene immerses himself in “the books, the erasures,” and at night he begins to see Juan’s body rekindled, ready to deep dive into the past and relive it through storytelling. “Juan was dying, but only in the light, and only in the body. In the dark, his voice filled the room, sharper and more alive than I,” writes Torres. More than anything, this observation reveals queer people’s calculus of living. Because for most queers, night is the time of coming alive, coming out. And any form of light signals recognition, a visibility that can get them killed.

For the most part, the novel also leverages facts and documents as plot points. They naturally weave into the narrative, making readers extremely curious about the slipperiness of its fictional aspects. Additionally, it is not for nothing that Juan’s surname is Gay. Torres writes, “He asked that I finish the project that had once consumed him, the story of a certain woman who shared his last name. Miss Jan Gay.”

The award-winning writer, who also teaches at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), purposely wanted to be playful with the book, tempting readers to wonder if Juan existed in real life and whether the narrator is none other than the author himself. This blurring of fact and fiction — Blackouts’ intrinsic queerness — further increases its charm. Sample this declaration: “Juan once said, when it comes to ghosts, you can either pretend they don’t exist, or you can listen.” The latter is precisely what Torres chose to do. Through active listening and telling this story, he undoes the co-option, deliberate sanitisation, and erasure of queer ancestors’ works. Blackouts thus offers itself as history masquerading as fiction. This is totally acceptable as it doesn’t rob anyone of their futures. Instead, it empowers people with their pasts and offers them control over their own narratives.

Saurabh Sharma is a Delhi-based writer and freelance journalist. They can be found on Instagram/X: @writerly_life.