Cereus Blooms At Night

Content Warning: This section of the guide directly quotes and/or discusses instances of sexual abuse, incest, and family violence.

“It is an interesting quirk of fate, I think, that for all the prattling by almost everyone at that time, sowing and tilling and reaping idle rumours about the Ramchandin family, and for all the scant attention paid my presence, I am the one who ended up knowing the truth, the whole truth, every significant and insignificant bit of it.”

Tyler makes this declarative statement as he begins his narration of Mala’s story. He notes that it is telling that he, as an outsider, is the one who gains access to the full history of Mala’s life. By framing rumors as metaphorical plants in a garden, with the rest of the town planting and cultivating them, he emphasizes that they will produce nothing. Instead, he is the one who can harvest the complete story.

“When Lavinia failed to notice him, his passion did not wane but was transformed. Embers of adoration and desire smoldered but what sprang up were flames of anger and self-loathing. He began to hate his looks, the colour of his skin, the texture of his hair, his accent, the barracks, his real parents and at times even the Reverend and his god. It began to matter to him that he and Lavinia were not in fact siblings.”

Chandin likens his desire for Lavinia to a fire, and after being told that they can never be together, he attempts to smother the flames. Instead, the fire of his affection transforms into a different kind of heat, one that is only internal. His love becomes resentment and self-hatred, compounded by the fact that his appearance—his race—means that Lavinia will always be unavailable to him. Chandin begins to hate himself, but he also grows to hate the structures that hinder his desires, including the structures of whiteness.

“Over the years I pondered the gender and sex roles that were available to people, and the rules that went with them. After much reflection I have come to discern that my desire to leave the shores of Lantanacamara had much to do with wanting to study abroad, but far more with wanting to be somewhere where my ‘perversion,’ which I tried diligently as I could to shake, might be either invisible or of no consequence to people to whom my foreignness was what would be strange.”

Tyler’s queer identity prompts him to think about the limitations and possibilities surrounding Gender and Sexual Identity. His realization that he does not fit the roles that are prescribed for him, nor does he want to, is a key part of his