Abstract
This thesis investigates the evolving portrayal of gay male characters in Western crime fiction and examines how changes in the legal and social status of homosexuality have influenced their representation within the genre. Drawing on the framework of the Bury Your Gays trope and its variants, the research explores the relationship between criminality, sexuality, and characterisation in crime fiction from the late nineteenth century to the early twenty-first century.
Through close reading and historical contextualisation, the thesis analyses three representative crime novels: Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886) by Robert Louis Stevenson, The Big Sleep (1939) by Raymond Chandler, and The Cutting Room (2002) by Louise Welsh. These texts were selected for their cultural significance, commercial success, and placement across distinct periods in the social and legal treatment of homosexuality. Particular attention is given to the narrative techniques used to construct and reinforce variants of the Bury Your Gays trope, including Tragic Endings, Disproportionate Death, Gay Guy Dies First, Homophobic Hate Crime, Out of the Closet, Into the Fire, and Gay as Entire Characterisation.
The analysis demonstrates that representations of gay male characters in crime fiction have evolved alongside broader societal shifts from criminalisation and pathologisation towards decriminalisation and greater social acceptance. While earlier works frequently position gay men as coded figures, villains, victims, or moral transgressors, later texts increasingly provide more nuanced and centralised portrayals. The thesis argues that crime fiction both reflects and participates in changing cultural attitudes towards homosexuality, with representations of queer characters shaped by the legal, social, and publishing environments in which texts are produced.
This thesis forms the critical component of a creative practice research project and informs the accompanying crime novel Poster, a contemporary police procedural that engages with and responds to the historical patterns of queer representation identified in the research.