Trouble on Triton: An Ambiguous Heterotopia Book

Trouble on Triton is supposed to inhabit a utopian (heterotopic) future when Earth is no longer the only hospitable planet, where personal expression has evolved through a widened acceptance of differing sexualities, and gender takes on radical new perspectives. I appreciated the gender exploration, but found it extremely hard to sympathize with the protagonist, Bron Helstrom. As a teenager, Bron was a (legal) male prostitute, but well into adulthood, he seems homophobic. This wasn't the worse of his qualities. He's also egotistical, self-centered, and unbelievably frustrating. Despite this, he manages to live in an all-male commune--the evolved living situation in Delany's imagined future. Convinced no one save himself understands his situation, Bron chooses a radical future for himself that ultimately leaves him less satisfied than before.

The homages to a quaint, ancient Earth where manners and delicate social maneuvering like tipping and gentlemanliness, are satire at its best. Delany also challenges preconceived notions of gender and sexuality that, along with his humor, make Trouble on Triton worth the read. Bron, however, ruined most of the novel for me, but he also pushed me to think the most. I wonder if using such an unsympathetic, irritating protagonist so out of his element in a free, sexually liberating universe, to impose such an anomaly, is to present a creature wholly relatable to an extant homophobic readership upon publication.

Maybe the fact that Bron goes to such lengths to discover himself is really a plea or wishful thinking rather than the indictment of white male intellectual thinking Delany presents. I'm inclined this direction only because Bron doesn't, in fact, discover anything past the stubborn limitations of his psyche, but he does seem to reach an honesty with himself at the end, if a disappointing one. Optimistically, he did try, albeit for the wrong reasons. Close-minded or not, Bron Helstrom represents the worst in all of us; our frustration with him is a frustration with the limited prejudices we recognize in our own society.

For example, men and women freely wander the pages of this book in little to no clothing without apparent embarrassment or fear. In a society where sexuality has become so evolved and the human body less of a sin than a recognizable joy, it's no wonder and an odd restoration of peace among us, that women, as well as men can exercise that right. However, Bron frequently expresses extreme irritation when propositioned and even scorns the naked physicality of his male suitors, choosing instead disgust rather than flattery if, say, Lawrence were female, over his prospects despite not being gay.

If you don't mind a book that so openly features the best and worst of human sexuality, gender (and mannerisms in regard to either), definitely pick up Trouble on Triton. The only questions I have are: does Delany ever get tired of a naked cast or do his characters ever get cold?