Conference Agenda

2025 marks the 50th anniversary of the release of "Bohemian Rhapsody," one of the most iconic songs in the history of popular music. Given that its enigmatic lyrics and unusual musical structure have been the subject of much speculation, it is striking to note the stark contrast between the prominent role the notion of the “epic” has played in the reception of the track—especially among fans—and its near-total absence in musicological analyses. This paper approaches the epic and heroic dimensions not as casual descriptors, but as central narrative and semantic axes.

Through narrative theory, chronotopic analysis (drawing on the literary theories of Mikhail Bakhtin), topic theory, and Queer Studies, I propose that "Bohemian Rhapsody" enacts a common narrative trope of the time travel genre: a hero journeying to the past—evoked in the song through the old-fashioned operatic section—in an attempt to resolve a conflict in his present reality. Much like the film Back to the Future (1985), "Bohemian Rhapsody" builds its narrative around the protagonist’s entanglement with his mother (which evokes Oedipal resonances) and the pivotal event of a man's death. This aligns with James Gleick’s theory that time travel stories are, whether explicitly or implicitly, stories about death, symbolizing an attempt to escape the inevitability of time.

Beyond merely identifying narratological parallels with film, literature, and mythology, this article explores connections between time travel tropes and their potential queer implications. According to Judith Peraino, "Bohemian Rhapsody" is not only a tale of murder, but also a melodrama of coming out and homoeroticism—its operatic section is a queer world of Italian opera, in which male voices also perform the high-pitched “female” parts. By disrupting the linear, teleological chrononormativity embedded in Western culture, Queen’s music invites listeners to inhabit alternative temporalities that resonate with queer experiences of time, identity, and loss.