What Is The Relationship Between Aye And Gomorrah

“Aye, and Gomorrah” by Samuel Delany tells the tale of the relationship between the Spacers, who are specially trained humans that have been sterilized and neutered before puberty, and the Frelks, who are a culture of humans who are attracted to the Spacers, out of both desire and curiosity. This attraction often manifests in the form of payment for pseudo-sexual activity. Specifically, the story focuses on the narrator’s relationship with a Turk named Yuri Pasha, who is trying to initiate one such activity with the narrator. In the passage above, the Narrator and Yuri Pasha discuss the idea of Yuri paying the narrator for some sort of sexual experience. The Narrator, however, desires not monetary payment, but something else from Yuri, anything
This passage begins with the Narrator asking Pasha “You’re not going to pay me for it… You’re not, are you?” (Delany 133). Because this remark is in response to Pasha’s attempt to initiate a sexual encounter, it evokes an image of an indignant prostitute who has been deprived of her fee. This negotiation is characteristic of the Spacer-Frelk dynamic, and is extremely dehumanizing to the Spacer. Their physical differences are exploited by the Frelks as a way to fulfill their own fantasies, in exchange for something so superficial as money. In fact, the Narrator is extremely upset with this standard, as he exclaims “I don’t want [/need] money!... Anything would do!” (Delany 133). The Narrator is fed up with the ritual prostitution of Spacers, and expresses his derision at the idea of selling his body for something as callous as a quick buck. Of course, the Spacers cannot actually perform the same sexual acts that regular humans can, due to their aforementioned spaying and neutering as part of their transition into being a Spacer. This leads to their interactions with Frelks being fairly mysterious, as the reader is actually never given account of what occurs in these encounters entail. It is implied that the Spacers’ allure is due largely to their unique forced anatomy, as Frelks such as Pasha seem to be attracted to the Spacers in eccentric ways- for instance, when Pasha “Lay her cheek on
If their interaction had occurred in its entirety in nearly any other setting, it surely would not hold the same meaning and weight. At the most basic level, an apartment is a home- a place where the people living there can relax, unwind, and most of all, feel safe. In a way, the idea of the “home” in literature is quite similar to the concept of the inner self of the psyche, both of which hold the truest representation of a person’s essence. Their vulnerabilities, their strengths, their hopes and desires, are all encompassed in the idea of the inner self. Therefore, it is extremely significant that the encounter between Pasha and the Narrator occurs in Pasha’s home. In a sense, she is showing the reader that she truly trusts the Narrator, as she has taken him into her true self. However, when she asks the Narrator “Don’t you think you should… leave?” (Delany 133), she implies that she has realized that their relationship could not come to fruition, and thus wants to remove him from this intimate setting. As the Narrator is about to leave the apartment, the Narrator notices that “She [Pasha] lay her cheek on the wrinkled place where I had sat” (Delany 133). This is a simple detail, but it holds vast meaning. There are very few places in an apartment which have wrinkle-able surfaces, the most notable of which is a bedroom. The fact that the aforementioned