Muodollisesti queer? : kertojuus, tilallisuus ja affektiivisuus Kirsti Kurosen ja Dess Terentjevan säeromaaneissa

In this article, I examine the intersections of queerness and the verse novel, a literary form that combines conventions from prose and poetry, focusing on narrative voice, spatiality, and affectivity. My theoretical framework is based on narrative theory, but I also utilize multimodal stylistics and affect studies. I examine two Finnish young adult verse novels. Dess Terentjeva’s Ihana (2021, “Gorgeous”), like Terentjeva’s other verse novels, addresses themes related to gender and sexual diversity and minorities. Kirsti Kuronen’s Merikki (2019), which is superficially less directly connected to queer thematics, explores the construction and deconstruction of selfhood and identity in both narratively and formally insightful ways that justifies the application of the queer perspective to Kuronen’s novel. In my article, I ask how the narrative and formal techniques of the verse novel construct the narrative as a whole and its themes. In what ways can the themes be concretized in the text’s layout and typographical choices? What kind of affectivity does verse novel’s concise yet complex narration produce? Can a form that combines conventions of different literary genres be understood as queer in itself?