Queer Double Cross: Doing (It with) Comp Lit

Jarrod Hayes

The crossing of borders in both ways becomes a double-crossing in the sense of a treason in both the literal and figurative sense of the expression, of which the latter refers to bisexuality. So whereas the colloquial expression “comparatively queer” can mean queerer than some, but nonetheless not too queer, we proceeded as if there could be no such as thing as too queer. “Comparatively Queer” thus became for us a way of naming our project of queering comparative studies and making comparatist strategies central to queer studies. This particular example of going both ways was inseparable in our minds from converting (or shall I say inverting) the subject of comparison into its object. Paradoxically, this becoming-object double crosses his objectivity. Comparatively queer studies should queer the comparatist as well.