Review: Fashion Design (A Review Of Gayowulf By G.R. Tomaini)

By Peter Mladinic

 

A reader must have only an overview of the Anglo-Saxon epic Beowulf to appreciate G.R. Tomaini’s Gayowulf. One can sense, in reading, the author’s familiarity with the Beowulf legend. Tomaini’s epic, three books, fifty-four cantos, is the first queer epic in contemporary literature. Imaginative, rich in insights and sounds, succinct in its narrative timing, Gayowulf is humorous with serious undertones, boldly irreverent, and ultimately original.  

     The great fun in Gayowulf is underscored by the fact that homosexual acts between men are punishable by imprisonment in some counties and in others by death. This reality is noted in conjunction with the prejudices and abuses toward queer individuals and communities that persist today. That said, Gayowulf, the hero, is death-defying. Readers are mindful of Coleridge’s suspension of disbelief. Part of the fun in reading is that the poet evokes an Anglo-Saxon tone in a modern setting. “Gloom, tragedy, and melancholy — / these shall fall upon Grendel the foe !” This outrageously funny epic, organized into cantos of eleven lines each, casts love and death in new light. Gayowulf and Grendel are “star-crossed foes.” Grendel, a sculptor, and Gayowulf, a student of fashion design, meet in the Museum of Modern Art, in New York City. At the end of Book One, they kiss, and Grendel, “falling backward” breaks the arm of his self portrait. Part of the fun is the story, a narrative consisting of fantastical events and sensual, erotic scenes. After Grendel dies, his mother entices Gaywulf to her lavish apartment and from there onto the S.S. Oscar Wilde to accompany her to Greece, but she has other plans. Waking in a ship’s cabin at sea:

 

Gayowulf discovered himself naked and tied - up !

Now you shall suffer the fate of Grendel’s father !

First comes copulation, then comes prayer:

then comes your own decapitation, Gayowulf !

Are you satisfied with that ? All hail Hecate !

Mommy prepared herself for the ritual:

Gayowulf would yield her a son most fine !

 

But would he? The astute reader can’t help but want to know. 

      The poem is boldly irreverent. In Book II, Grendel, distraught that he has destroyed his creation of beauty, overdoses on Xanax and dies in his mother’s arms. She herself dies when the three witches cause the ship, The Oscar Wilde, to sink. Like Wilde, Tomaini does not hesitate to cross boundaries. The narrator goes where they must go, and no individual or group or societal norm is going to stand in the way. “After Gayowulf inherited Mommy’s money—/ he started his own fashion design firm!” As he contemplates his next move Wiglaf, his personal assistant, gives him a “triple shot venti iced macchiato”and “a foot massage.” And then 

 

fluid entered the syringe then Gayowulf’s arm:

blood and heroin mixed together pleasurably:

Gayowulf slumped forward in his chair:

he had injected a lethal dose this time:

now he foamed bubbles at the mouth:

it had been six months since his last overdose…

 

Worried about bankruptcy, Gayowulf slips into decadence but is rescued by Wiglaf. Good news arrives in the mail. A retired businesssman in Japan offers Gayowulf a large sum of money to redesign his palace. Gayowulf asks Wiglaf, “So who the fuck is this Kimono Dragon character?” / He lit the spoon as usual: the syringe was readied…” Gayowulf, with Wiglaf, eventually enters the Dragon’s palace of decadence and violence where “anything goes.” And on the way, they encounter a beautiful “guardswoman” with “a pink machine gun !” Book III: Section II: Canto V begins. “Vision: the mating of two rabid hyenas.” Nothing stops Gayowulf’s author from going where he wants to go!

     Gayowulf, wildly fantastical and erotic, is above all original. There is no other epic like it. Part of its achievement lies in the narrative. Readers are on edge, wondering what will happen next, or, more precisely, how will Gayowulf get out of this fix?  Like Grendel’s Mommy (Dearest), the Dragon has ulterior motives. A retired businessman, the Dragon turns out to be a psychopath who chops off his servant’s hand and proposes a challenge to Gayowulf.

 

Complete three challenges to earn your freedom!

First: sew for me a kimono worthy of the Dragon…

Second: groove on my Disco Dance Floor of Death…

Third: out-snort me while playing Cocaine Roulette…

 

Just as the Dragon kept Wiglaf “on his toes to the bitter end,” Greg Tomaini keeps readers on the edge of their seats, turning the page, delighted with the imagery, lyricism, and fantastical events that comprise the three books, the fifty-four cantos of this epic. The product of a wild imagination, Gayowulf is executed by a poet whose poetical powers, like those of the witches, are alive and well. Gayowulf instructs and definitely delights. Readers come away knowing they’ve been somewhere, to places where the epic’s hero has journeyed, to places where genuine poets drink their drams of truth.

 

 

 

 

 

Peter Mladinic's most recent book of poems, Maiden Rock, is available from UnCollected Press. An animal rights advocate, he lives in Hobbs, New Mexico, United States.