In contraposition to notions such as “transgression” or “marginality”, the idea of “dissidence” points towards the dismantling of binary figures and concepts that shape canonical readings of Argentinean literature. Literary writings on gender and sexual dissidence—especially after the second half of the 20th century and the first decades of 21st century—not only decenter heteronormative models  (masculine/feminine; hetero/homosexual; transgender/cisgender) but also drag with them a number of constitutive configurations of Argentinean cultural imagination, such as nationalism/cosmopolitanism, Peronism/antiperonism, lettered/non—lettered, etc. This essay analyzes a series of literary texts (from Manuel Puig´s El beso de la mujer araña to Gabriela Cabezón Cámara’s Las aventuras de la China Iron) in which sexual and gender opacity interrupts and displaces normative binarisms—at the same time bodily and cultural—showing the way in which the languages of dissidence set the ground for other cultural, as well as political, imaginaries.

Affinity with place is a complex web of emotion and sense of belonging. Britten’s creative engagement with place demonstrates a perceptive understanding of the culturally imagined, consumed, and produced places of the mid-twentieth century; a sharp ear for experiential gaps, psychological transitions, and marginalised identities; a sure handling of multi-point perspective – near and far, presence and recollection; togetherness and alienation; and finally an attention to flux and irresolution. This chapter explores Britten’s Suffolk, his attention to place-making in staged productions, and his metaphorical use of travel as a mentally demanding and transformative experience.