Zdeprawowane smutki. Nick Cave i maskulinizm cienia
Corrupted Griefs. Nick Cave and Shadow Masculinism

Summary/Abstract: In this essay, the author critically examines Nick Cave’s transmedia work from 2003 to 2012, including his musical, cinematic, performative and literary output. He focuses on the albums Grinderman and Grinderman 2, Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!, as well as on his film scripts, the artist’s body/sign, and, above all, on the post-pornographic novel The Death of Bunny Munro. The latter seems to be a post-punk response to Valerie Solanas’ infamous misandric SCUM Manifesto, and at the same time to Cormac McCarthy’s patriarchal novel The Road. All these hypertexts are narratives that construct their plot and aesthetics around male identities in crisis. What is striking about them is the ruthless deconstruction of masculinity, which reaches a camp level of heteromachism. The main analytical categories employed in this essay are, on the one hand, “shadow masculinity”, developed in relation to Jack Halberstam’s queer theory and “shadow feminism”, and on the other hand, Geoffrey Gorer’s “pornography of death” and Andrea Dworkin’s “pornography as mourning”.

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