Postgay drama

Mark Ravenhill's critical response to postmodernity in his drama has been well established in the secondary literature. This paper expands that focus by examining the commitment to an avowedly 'postgay' perspective at work in the plays' representations of contemporary gay subcultural life and its specific exemplification of commodified social relations. In doing so, the paper highlights not merely the powerful insights of Ravenhill's Leftist project, up to and including Mother Clap's Molly House, but its attendant dangers, given the ways in which the historical articulation of gay identity through, and structuring of desire by, the market has also determined certain kinds of conventional anti-gay representations and responses, not least in the context of the theatre itself. © 2010 Taylor & Francis

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