Since the recent revelations about Junot Díaz’s sexually abusive and misogynistic behaviour from a host of woman writers, Alisa Valdes, Zinzi Clemmons, Monica Byrne and Carmen Maria Machado, the overwhelming masculinity of Díaz’s work has come under the scanner again. Yunior, the protagonist who recurs in all of Díaz’s work and is in many ways a stand-in for the author, is central to this. What is more frightening about men like Junot Díaz is that they resist easy categorisation. The truth is that literature and the literary establishment have humanised abusive men for too long now. As readers, our idea of diverse American literature has also been influenced by white literary establishments, which have anointed men like Díaz as gatekeepers to a particular culture.

Source: The Hindu May 12, 2018 16:18 UTC