Kathy Acker’s Dildos: Literary prosthetics and textual unmaking

Abstract

Reading Acker through the lenses of Paul B. Preciado, Linda Williams, Pierre Guyotat and Georgina Colby, Finch proposes to think of Acker’s literary practice as a series of “dildos”: textual prosthetics that perform protocols of textual unmaking. Finch bases her textual reading on Acker’s early typescripts, recently published for the first time, providing an original analysis of these archival materials that works to bridge ‘70s avant-garde literary practices with current queer theories of immersive embodiment.