重建之路:论《天使在美国》中的身份危机

Perestroika: On Identity Crisis in Angels in America by Tony Kushner

美国当代戏剧家托尼·库什纳的《天使在美国——关于国家主题的同性恋幻想曲》集中描述了五个男同性恋者的生活,但其意义超出了同性恋主题,再现了少数群体在美国的身份危机。本文运用苏珊·桑塔格在《疾病的隐喻》中论述的对艾滋病的污名化的概念、福柯的《规训与惩罚》中关于宗教对教徒的规训的论述、以及他的酷儿理论中对于异性恋霸权的挑战来探讨戏剧中艾滋病患者的身份危机、宗教信徒的身份危机、同性恋的身份危机。在此之上探讨库什纳对于多重危机的解决办法,从同性恋走向酷儿,有意识地建立文化身份;从个体走向群体,在公共空间上提出政治诉求。

Tony Kushner’s Angels in America:A Gay Fantasia on National Themes focuses on the life of five gay men,but its significance is beyond the homosexual concern.At a deeper level,the play examines the predicament of minority groups,such as AIDS patients,Jews,Mormons,homosexuals and so on.This paper attempts to investigate the identity crisis of AIDS patients,religious believers and homosexuals with the theoretical insights made by Susan Sontag in Illness as Metaphor and ADIS and Its Metaphors,and Michael Foucault’s idea of discipline and punishment as well as his contention about heterosexual hegemony.Based on these explorations,this paper further studies Kushner’s solutions to prior mentioned crises:going from homosexual to queer and from individual to collective,which requires these groups to cultivate a distinguishable cultural identity,uniting with other minority groups and putting forward political appeals in public spaces.