Alfian in turn problematises the State-propagated idea that “there are no such entities as gay Singaporeans” (33) by depicting queer subjects as being ubiquitous within his text. The purpose of this targeted erasure of queerness is to at once erase queerness and to “impos…compulsory heterosexuality” (33). Ho points out the contradiction between legalising heterosexual prostitution on the one hand, and the “bulldoz” of Bugis Street, an “iconic space” for queer sex work in Singapore on the other (31).

In so doing, this essay argues that Alfian’s queer subjects remain firmly embedded within Singapore and grapple with State censure/repression in order to continue surviving as Singaporean queers.Īs Ho argues, the “erasure of queer history on the part of Singapore institutions is quite deliberate” (30). Alternately effaced and demonised by the State, how do queer subjects in Singapore bear the psychological and phenomenological effects of State repression? This essay attempts to investigate this question in relation to Alfian Sa’at’s Corridor and his poetry collection, One Fierce Hour. In “How to Bring Singaporeans Up Straight (1960s-1990s),” Ho terms the State’s rhetoric of queerness as one “of silence, erasure and disavowal” (31) and expounds on the ways in which the State has indoctrinated “compulsory heterosexuality” (33).

It is easy to assume that the relationship between the queer subject in Singapore and the city-State is one marked by an irreconcilable rift, given that homosexuality is a criminal offence in Singapore and that homosexuality continues to be censored by State-controlled media.

Corridor by Alfian Sa'at