'Speak Your Mind and Speak it Clearly': Discourse and the Importance of Voices in Boy Erased, Garrard Conley.

Abstract: The voices of the autodiegetic narrator and its character counterpart in Boy Erased: A Memoir by Garrard Conley enter the debate around the ontology of voice in literary texts. Using this debate, I will provide an analysis of the voices in this memoir in order to prove the importance of assuming a voice for the narrator, to compensate for speech silenced through discourses and social contexts. The social contexts and discourses that surround the main character silence his speech, to the point that it can be actively used to control even the private self, as gay conversion therapy tries to do. This dangerous silence leads to a need to finally be heard, which is provided through the ontologically silent voice of the narrator. This evolvement of the character to the narrator is the reason why voice and the way it allows for heard speech is essential.