The Edible I in Kim Fu’s For Today I Am a Boy

Abstract

This article explores Kim Fu’s 2014 For Today I Am a Boy through the lens of critical eating studies. In this novel’s portrayal of Peter (see note 3), the trans woman protagonist, images of food and acts of eating (or the denial of these acts) are deployed as a meditation on the navigation of body, hence of self. This paper positions the act of eating as representing more than just a physical, biological process, but rather a placing of people in relationship with the edible matter and all the conditions of its production, including its socio-cultural/familial meanings. In interpreting Peter’s experiences of self in continuum with the experiences of both Peter’s mother and Mrs. Becker (the mistress of Peter’s father), this paper observes characters figured not only as hungry, but also as edible due in part to their battered subject positions but even more so due to the forced repression and denial of these identities.
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Author Biography

Veronica Austen

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St. Jerome's University at the University of Waterloo
Veronica J. Austen (St. Jerome’s University) is an associate professor in the Department of English at St. Jerome’s University at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada. There she serves as associate dean. With research specialities in contemporary Canadian and Caribbean literatures, she is currently completing a SSHRC-funded project which explores how representations of the visual arts are deployed in contemporary Canadian literature to navigate experiences of (un)belonging.
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