Perversion the Social Relation

178 Michael P. Biblerhis last hope for salvation (315). Nat finally agrees after some persuasionand thus performs the only other baptism besides his own and Willis'sthat he includes in his confession. This second baptism is extremely significantin that Brantley's oppositional relation to slave society promptsNat to rethink his genocidal vision and decide to spare the white manfrom the slaughter. And, as Nat sees it, the core characteristic that setsBrantley at odds with the power structures of society is his sexual identityas a "sotomite." In making this decision, however, Nat seems to misreadBrantley's character deliberately in order to foster an identificationwith him in a way that satisfies Nat's original experience of homo-ness.In the novel, Brantley's sexuality resituates homosexuality as crucial toNat's vision of rebellion and at least reminds us of the power of homonessboth to disrupt the web of social relations and to offer an alternativeto them. But it also shows us the truly slippery and peculiar logic thatcan accompany any attempt to make that original vision of homo-nessinto a social reality on a large scale.The encounter with Brantley at first repulses Nat in part becauseBrantley has a grotesque appearance, which Nat describes almost homophobically:"a round womanish man of about fifty, with soft plumpwhite cheeks upon which tiny sores and pustules congregated like berriesamid a downy fringe of red hair" (313). In high novelistic fashion,this description of physical repulsiveness functions also to stress the apparentmoral deformity of Brantley's sexual character, for as Nat paraphrasesfrom Brantley's own admission, Brantley has imposed himselfsexually on young boys: "He had been sent to jail once in Carolina. Nowhe was afraid again. Because—He had taken a woman—No! He hesitated,his eyes anxious behind flickering eyelids, a pink flush rising beneaththe pustuled skin. That was wrong. No, he—He had done somethingbad, yesterday, with a boy. The son of a local magistrate. He hadpaid the boy a dime. The boy had told. He thought the boy had told.He wasn't sure. He was afraid" (314). Because Brantley has molested ayoung boy, the dynamic of the sexual encounter resembles the plantation'smore common pattern of domination and submission suggestedin Eppes's attempt to dominate Nat—not the homo-ness of Nat's encounterwith Willis. The exchange of money even seems to replicate temporarilythe economic contract of chattel slavery. Nevertheless, Styronseems to suggest that Brantley's particular form of prédation still counts