The Dragon Keeper "Controversial?" Hobb and sexuality. *Major Spoilers up to RWC!

[Mervi]

Hmm. Some thoughts about the Fitz/Fool relationship. I don't understand why so many people (in general terms, I don't mean in this discussion!) want to restrict it into terms of whether it's a homosexual relationship or not. The brilliant, genius, significant thing about the Fool is that he's not vague only in terms of gender but in terms of sexuality (as we understand that term) as well. I don't believe he desires Fitz or anyone else simply because they have the right kind of "plumbing". Remember that he says to Fitz

"I set no boundaries on my love. None at all. Do you understand me?"

(in GF). I believe that for him, sex is a way to express and share a deep emotion towards/with someone you love and care about. He completely rejects Fitz's suggestion to go and be intimate with [[Garetha]] because he finds it distasteful to have sex with someone merely to satisfy a physical desire, even if (or especially when?) that other really does want/love you. He comes from a culture that is completely different to the Six Duchies ways - after all, he mentions having two cousins as fathers "for that was the custom of that land". Obviously his experience of family and relationship models is much broader than Fitz's (or ours!).

I've expressed this opinion before elsewhere and the resulting discussion wasn't pretty but I do believe it makes sense that the 6D and Bingtown cultures are (latently?) homophobic, even when there doesn't seem to be a set of religious rules to cause it. Especially in the Bingtown and Rain Wilds "every child counts" - it's important that sex leads to offspring. Also, I guess I'm a pessimist , but I do believe that we humans tend to consider anything different (= minorities) "dangerous" and "wrong" even if there's no church to tell us that it's also a sin. In any case, it will be interesting to see (hopefully in the next books!) how the Rain Wilds/Bingtown culture reacts to a gay elderling couple! Will it enable the hidden Bingtown gay society to come out of the closet? Or will the elderlings be considered an expection to the rules (or so powerful with their dragons that it's best not to meddle in their ahem, affairs.)

Anyway, back to F/F! In my opinion, sex is just something the Fool would be ready to offer to Fitz as part of "the package" (that is himself, his life, his friendship and his love for Fitz). Even when he knows for certain that it's something Fitz would never want, it's there for the taking anyway because he holds nothing back. In FF, "And I set no limits on that love." is the Fool's thought that Fitz hears after breaking their Skill-session. It is ALL there, whether Fitz wants only parts of it or everything. (Fitz thinks it's too much: "No one can give that much. No one.") The Fool of course felt sad and angry when Fitz made a show of rejecting that one aspect of his love, but that didn't change how the Fool feels towards him. The "no limits" still applies even after their huge argument, even though he knows for sure now that Fitz would never even consider taking him up on that offer.

Interestingly, Fitz describes that Skilling experience

"The intensity of it went beyond any joining I’d ever experienced. It was more intimate than a kiss and deeper than a knife thrust, beyond a Skill-link and beyond sexual coupling, even beyond my Wit-bond with Nighteyes"

(in a perfectly Fitz-like way he of course freaks out and breaks the connection, although I have to admit he actually has a good reason to do it because he's hiding the secret plan to "save" the Fool from his destiny.)

So basically, Fitz is saying the same thing as the Fool but with different words: their love is something bigger, something deeper than friendship or sexual attraction or Wit-bond or the relationship between members of the Skill coterie. It REALLY "knows no boundaries" even though Fitz (and later also the Fool) sets them.

I'm not saying that sex isn't awesome and important and all that. But I think the F/F relationship makes a pretty rare and important argument that there are other, possibly more important and permanent aspects to the best relationships - whether or not sex is included in the deal.