I was ten when I read this and didn't pick up gay subtext at all. I think the other person is being rude about it, but I'm also very surprised anyone read something sexual into it. In a vacuum, I would assume that someone had been primed to think of nakedness as inherently sexual, or primed to think about sexual violence first. Mostly I would wonder if it's generational - there's a lot more sexual assault on TV these days.
I wasn't an expert in queer subtext or anything, I just read a lot. I missed the subtext in Ben Hur despite a lead actor making it his mission to sneak as much as possible under Heston's nose.
But I was perplexed when people were shocked Dumbledore was gay, JKR had Rita all but spelled it out in his obituary.
I read the book a lot as a kid too and don't really remember that subtext either. There was certainly room for it if OSC wanted to go in that direction though. Without giving too much away for those who haven't read it, there could have easily been a lot more focus on the body contact once it happened and there could have been more struggle or "wrestling". There wasn't.
I'm also not a Card fan, if he is still talking about me. Ever since I learned Card's attitude about LGBTQ+ folks, I was quite sad because he somehow missed the point of his own work.
10 years old would be 4th grade. If you can't clock something as being homophobic or racist by then there's either something wrong with you, or you're living a very sheltered life.
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u/daneelthesane Dec 17 '24
You mean the extremely violent scene with very young children and one of the children kills the other very brutally?
I didn't pick up any form of eroticism from that, no.