Heather Rose Jones's Blog, page 111
November 7, 2017
From a Certain Point of View
bookreview.jpg
Readers and writers both have strong opinions about point of view, even when that strong opinion is, “Any point of view can work if you’re skilled enough.” I’ve heard authors proclaim that they’ll only use one specific type of point of view because that’s the only one that works for them. Fair enough. One can’t argue with what works.
I’ve found two ways in which point of view can be the key to telling the story I want to tell. One is in limiting what the reader is allowed to know, and thus positioning them with respect to specific characters in the story. One of the reasons I’ve stuck to a very tight third person POV in the Alpennia stories (at least so far—don’t count on it staying that way!) is to manipulate what the reader knows about the events of the story and the motivations of the other characters. An omniscient point of view can either remove suspense or leave the reader annoyed about selective omissions of information.
But a second reason I’ve found to choose a particular point of view is to break myself out of specific storytelling modes. This is particularly the case when I’m working with traditional tale forms, such as the Merchinogi stories. The immense weight of the original literary style of medieval romances can be hard to fight if you use the same tools as the original tellers. Medieval romances can be wonderful for their flights of description and their use of repetition and cadence, but they’re really bad at showing interiority. King Arthur may have done great deeds, but we don’t get a lot of insight into what he thought about those accomplishments, or why he made the choices he did. When I first started writing “Hoywverch,” I used the third person to match the original Mabinogi, but found the result more flat and simplistic than I cared for. Shifting to the heroine’s voice helped me break free of that flatness.
Retold fairy tales are another genre where the stylistic weight of the original material can feel overwhelming. In my first draft of “The Language of Roses”—my Beauty and the Beast retelling--I followed what has become my default mode: tight third person rotating between key viewpoint characters, with events allocated carefully to keep the reader in suspense regarding important plot points. And it felt like it was working fairly well until I decided to bring in the fairy who laid the crucial curse as a viewpoint character. She had an important role to play in setting up certain elements of the backstory that no one else had put together yet. But I found the scenes I’d given to her somewhat lackluster. She was thin. A cardboard prop. And the crucial world-building information she supplied felt wrong as something a character would ruminate over on her own.
And then, on this morning’s drive, the first line of her first scene came to me in a different voice. An accusing, critical, second person voice. And things clicked. It’s an omniscient voice: someone who knows everything that has happened in the past and who hints at knowing how the story will come out when none of the characters themselves do. (I have a suspicion just who that voice is, and that may shape some of the rewriting.) This isn’t a second person POV where the reader is being addressed, which is the version that people who dislike second POV tend to rail against—the “choose your own adventure” type that tries to force the reader into being a participant. It’s a voice that allows the fairy to remain a cipher while providing the reader with a very personal glimpse of her.
Ah, Peronelle! You are patient now. Patient enough to stand outside the gates of Betencourt for days to see what might befall. You were not so patient when you were…but no, you were not young. It has been very long since you were young, hasn’t it? The fée are young only once and old for a very long time. But one may be foolish and impatient at any age. Do you remember when you were young, Peronelle? Do you remember your parents and the glittering tower where you dwelt with them? Do you remember the guests and the balls and the hunting parties when they would ride out to slip between the worlds and tease those in mortal lands? Do you remember learning to walk the worlds for yourself and how to draw glamour after you to hide the truth from mortal eyes?
And having made that choice, I now needed to know what to do with all my other points of view. That second person wasn’t going to work for all of them. I wanted differentiation. But at the same time, having one character’s scenes in second and the other three POV characters all in third felt unbalanced. Well, it isn’t really three—more like two and a single chapter from the remaining character. What if (I thought)…what if I gave one of them a first person approach? What if my Beauty (who isn't named Beauty) tells her own story? That would work well for her: the confused innocent who is still sorting out her place in the world and how she feels about it. Yes, that feels right. While the third primary viewpoint character (who is definitely not the Beast) is more knowledgable, more controlled, more deliberately distanced. Third person works for her.
Now my immediate reaction to this idea was, “You know, this is one of the features of N.K. Jemisin’s award-winning novel The Fifth Season—a feature that is a key element of the plot—and maybe it’s going to look a little bit like you’re being a copycat?” Well, heck. If you’re going to be a copycat, copy a great writer. You can make any approach to point of view work if you do it well, and if you don’t do it well, it doesn’t matter that someone else did make it work. But I’ll acknowledge that the idea of mixing first, second, and third person in the same story isn’t some fantastic new invention I came up with.
Maybe I’ll make it work, maybe I won’t. Maybe I’ll finish up the whole story and decide I need to unravel it and do something different. But when I heard that voice snarking at Peronelle, something clicked into place. And any author can tell you that when you feel that click, you should pay attention.
Major category: Writing ProcessTags: writingthe language of roses
November 5, 2017
Book Review: Ancillary Mercy by Ann Leckie
If Ancillary Justice was a fascinating tour in non-linear exposition, and Ancillary Sword felt like a cozy mystery set in the midst of a space opera, Ancillary Mercy struck me as an interstellar version of the folktale motif “six go through the world”. That is, a protagonist accumulates a set of unlikely and improbable allies simply due to treating those she encounters with honesty, empathy, and (if you will forgive the word) humanity, to find that those allies come through with a vengeance when the chips are down. And the essence of Breq’s success in gaining allies is the question "what counts as 'humanity?" Who deserves to be treated as having equal significance and whose consent is worth respecting? Issues of colonialism and class consciousness play out at multiple levels and there are additional mythic resonances to reward the observant reader. (For example, the motif of redemption through willing self-sacrifice.) If the resolution relies overmuch on the triumph of good will and virtue, I’m happy to see those things triumph on occasion at the moment. This was a very satisfying conclusion to the trilogy.
Major category: ReviewsTags: Reviews: Books
November 4, 2017
The Lesbian Premodern or More Theory Than You Can Shake a Stick At
The Lesbian Historic Motif Project
This collection centers around the general problem that it is anachronistic and unhistoric to pursue “pre-modern lesbians” from a desire for identity and connection, but that without this desire, the forces and filters of heteronormativity, sexism, and anti-identitarianism work to erase or dismiss the historic data that an identitarian approach is ideally suited to uncover. Historiography challenges the modern lesbian to ask “who or what would I be if I were born in a different era?” And to recognize that individual personal identity is not as fixed as current fashion holds it to be. The foundation of late 20th/early 21st centuery queer identity is the concept of “born that way”--that our identities are intrinsic, immutable, and essential. But the consequence of this position is to say that, if we cannot find “us” in the past, exactly as we are, then we didn’t exist in the past and have no history at all.
If I were to follow my usual schedule of one LHMP post per week, this book would hold me for the next four months! And while that’s tempting because of both the end-of-year holidays and the unknown added workload in January and beyond to deal with the podcast story submissions, I think that would be entirely too long to give my readers a steady diet of historical theory. So I’m doubling up and posting entries on both Mondays and Thursdays through the end of January 2018. Many of these entries will be fairly brief, as the theoretical discussions are difficult to summarize for my intended audience. But the structure of the blog drives me to cover them all, one at a time, so this seems the best compromise.
Major category: LHMPTags: LHMP
LHMP #162 Lochrie 2011 Preface
About LHMP
Full citation:
Lochrie, Karma. 2011. “Preface” in The Lesbian Premodern ed. by Noreen Giffney, Michelle M. Sauer & Diane Watt. Palgrave, New York. ISBN 978-0-230-61676-9
Publication summary:
A collection of papers addressing the question of what the place of premodern historical studies have in relation to the creation and critique of historical theories, and especially to the field of queer studies.
Lochrie, Karma. 2011. “Preface”
Lochrie expresses uneasiness with the premise of the collection--that there is such a thing as “lesbian” in the pre-modern era. She suggests that heteronormativity does not exist across time but is a modern/post-modern phenomenon. This collection operates within a general critique of historicism, chronology, and periodization. It questions the idea that pre-modern scholarship constitutes a type of historical theory in itself.
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November 1, 2017
Musings on New Promo Activity
Alpennia Logo
It may seem premature to think about the results of some of my recent activity, but the fact is that there have already been significant results—and most of them are all in my head.
To recap: two weeks ago I took a weekend to master the workings of Hootsuite in order to automate regular promotional postings on twitter and facebook. (Also Mailchimp for maintaining a mailing list, see below.) It literally took an entire weekend (in part because coming up with the catalog of content was very draining) but now I have a rotating set of hundreds of different posts, referencing all my projects and publications (both on sale and available for free), with a variety of target links, posting at variable times of day, such that both twitter and facebook will see two to four posts per day, but (ideally) no one will always be seeing the same content in the same place at the same time. Someone who religiously follows my every post in either location may feel that it’s a bit relentless (and I plan to do a reality check with some of them at the end of the month), but the casual reader will just get the occasional reminder without it feeling repetitious. Having done the initial set-up and created a content spreadsheet (you knew there was going to be a spreadsheet, didn’t you) I anticipate that regular maintenance will only take a couple hours a month.
And there have already been results. The most concrete is the additional sharing that the posts are getting. I hardly expect anyone to boost all of the posts (and I’m immensely grateful for anyone who interacts with them in any way). But the “limited shotgun” approach makes it easier and more likely that my existence will be reflected into places where people may not have encountered me before. In essence, I’ve set up an automated pitching machine, making it very simple for people to hit things out into the world when one of the posts arrives in a convenient batting zone. Another benefit of having automated my promo is that I find myself having a lot more emotional space for focusing on promoting other people and their work. (As well—to be sure—as feeling the incentive to be sure my feeds have a proper mix of non-self-promotion content!)
But, for me, the most important consequence that I’m already seeing is that I no longer have that sense of each individual promotional post being a major emotional project that leaves me feeling drained and depressed. By separating the act of content creation and the act of sending that content out into the world, I’ve removed a major emotional weight from the process. (Or at least displaced it into a concentrated period set aside for the purpose.) I no longer feel like I’m drowning in invisibility and struggling just to draw one gasping breath at a time. I look at my timelines and I’m there. I’m present. I exist. To the best of my recollection, I haven’t had an episode of book-related depression in the last three weeks. I’m sure I’ll still have them, but maybe I can reduce the frequency. And—before anyone thinks to do so—please do not say anything along the lines of, “Don’t you wish you’d done this sooner?” This was a massive amount of emotional work. I had to fight through a lot to get to it. I did it when I could, and not sooner.
Along with automating the promo, I’ve put two major new things out into the world. One is a monthly author newsletter. The first issue went out this morning, and to encourage new subscribers, I’ll be giving away some books to a random selection of people subscribed by November 30. (I’ll put up a separate posting with the details about that.) Originally I was figuring that the November newsletter would be a “test run” to make sure the system worked properly, but I have over 30 subscribers already! The newsletter certainly won’t replace the writing-related content on my website (though I may be cribbing from some older essays on Alpennia world-building to recycle). There are people who simply don’t follow blogs who are happy to have a mailing list appear in their in-box. Once a month is a manageable schedule. Besides the hypothetical benefit to my fans/readers, it’s much easier to track numbers of dedicated fans via a mailing list than by trying to decipher blog traffic or other open-access contact points. The newsletter will provide two additional intangible benefits. Because I plan to use it as an outlet for material that is either exclusive to the newsletter or that will only be made publically available later, I’ll have more of a sense that I’m creating things for people who genuinely appreciate it, rather than tossing messages in bottles out into the waves. That gives me more incentive to create things like non-commercial short fiction. Secondly, the newsletter provides an opportunity for fans/readers of my work to feel a sense of community—at least I hope so! It’s a phenomenon I’ve never entirely grasped as an experiencer, but I know it’s important to many other people. Important enough to be worth creating.
The second new project might not seem like a promotional thing, but I assure you that I have only selfish purposes in doing it. The lesbian history podcast will be publishing some original short fiction, and I expect to get two certain and one less certain return from this. 1) Lots more people will know about the LHMP blog and podcast. There’s nothing like a call for submissions to get the word out about a project, especially one that comes with the chance of professional-level payment. 2) One of the goals of the LHMP has always been to promote the creation and enjoyment of great lesbian historical fiction. Publishing stories is a very direct way to achieve that goal. 3) This is the less certain item. I hope that taking on this project (and succeeding at it) will enhance my professional reputation in ways that will improve the chances of future opportunities, whether in the same genre or more on the SFF side. My current limited plan to publish two stories is a manageable project, whether it’s wildly successful or whether it flops. If it’s successful (even if not wildly), there’s a better chance that I may be able to take on similar projects in the future. If successful, it may help connect the LHMP with parts of its intended audience that have been resistant so far.
So, all in all, I think it’s been a very productive last couple of weeks.
Major category: PromotionTags: promotionwriting
October 30, 2017
Women Bonding over Sorrow
The Lesbian Historic Motif Project
Margery Kempe seems to be a popular historic figure for "queering", that is, for identifying ways in which her actions and writings (and even her person) disrupted gender and sexual norms of medieval society. I'm not entirely a fan of this sort of approach. Just as the "search and rescue mission" approach (as labeled by Valerie Traub) popular in early gay and lesbian studies framed historic figures in terms of whether they could be "claimed" for modern sexual identities, the "queering history" approach similarly prioritizes the imaginations and interpretations of modern viewers over the historic material they examine. Studies like this that focus on women's social and emotional relations with each other are quite fascinating in their own right, but it seems to me that they do more to show that what we think of as the "norms" of pre-modern society perhaps are wrong-headed to begin with, rather than viewing Kempe as disrupting those norms.
Major category: LHMPTags: LHMP
LHMP #158 Lavezzo 1996 Sobs and Sighs Between Women: The Homoerotics of Compassion in The Book of Margery Kempe
About LHMP
Full citation:
Lavezzo, Kathy. 1996. “Sobs and Sighs Between Women: The Homoerotics of Compassion in The Book of Margery Kempe” in Premodern Sexualities ed. by Louise Fradenburg & Carla Freccero. Routledge, New York. ISBN 0-415-91258-X
Publication summary:
This is a collection of papers looking at issues in the historiography of sexuality, that is: how to study sexuality in historic contexts with consideration of the theoretical frameworks being used. In general, the approach is to dismantle the concepts of universals and essences, by which “history” has been used to define and persecute “others.” The papers are very theory-focused around how the study of the “other” points out the narrow and distorted picture of history in the mainstream tradition. One feature that these papers challenge is a clear dichotomy between a pre-modern understanding of sexuality as “acts” versus a modern understanding as “identity”. The papers cover not only queer sexuality by a broader variety of sexualized themes in history. As usual with general collections like this, I’ve selected the papers that speak to lesbian-like themes, but in this case I’ve included on with a male focus that provides an interesting counterpoint on issues of gender identity.
Lavezzo 1996 “Sobs and Sighs Between Women: The Homoerotics of Compassion in The Book of Margery Kempe”
The medieval mystic Margery Kempe wrote her book partly in response to interrogation for suspect religious views. One specific anxiety that was voiced against her was that she would “lead...wives away” to join her in her own personal forms of worship. This article looks at the use of sorrow and compassion for the passion of Christ, but also for the figures of Mary mourning as a form of homoerotic bonding between women. This had the potential to create a female community of religiously-oriented mourning, identified with the Virgin, but with the women’s relationships made acceptable by being mediated through the figure of Christ.
Time period: 15th cPlace: EnglandMisc tags: female comrades/friendsemotional /romantic bonds between womenEvent / person: Margery Kempe
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October 29, 2017
Historiography Turns Me On
The Lesbian Historic Motif Project
This is a very theory-intensive book -- historiography rather than history, and not well suited for the casual reader. But there are some great discussions that made it worth tackling. The writing is very dense and my summary only touches on the outlines of the discussion rather than its specifics. Although theories about how we study and interpret history might seem rather removed from the process of writing lesbian historical fiction, from another angle, the two fields have a great deal of overlap. Consider the question of whether our approach to history is focused on finding identity with our own specific experiences and relationships, or whether we are seeking to understand and appreciate people whose lives have connections with ours but also wide areas of difference. Do we seek to find/write "lesbians in history" from a very narrow definition of the word "lesbian" or do we seek to find/write themes of women's same-sex relationships expressed in a multitude of ways? Do we consider sexual activity to be a necessary defining aspect of those persons we study/write under the rubric of "lesbian" or is it only one of a cluster of important themes? Historical fiction (not just lesbian historical fiction but the entire field) has a pervasive uneasiness around how closely similar historical figures need to be made to modern mindsets in order to be sympathetic to modern readers. In the specific case of lesbian historical fiction, this concern can work to delegitimize the very concept of lesbians in history, just as some historical theories work to erase lesbians as a topic of valid study. And that's why I love finding the parallels in books like this to my own thought processes around the project of writing.
Major category: LHMPTags: LHMP
LHMP #161 Traub 2016 Thinking Sex with the Early Moderns
About LHMP
Full citation:
Traub, Valerie. 2016. Thinking Sex with the Early Moderns. University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 978-0812223897
Publication summary:
Theoretical considerations of studying sexuality in the early modern period.
Chapter 1 - Thinking Sex: Knowledge, Opacity, History
This book is historiography rather than history, that is, it takes a strongly theory-intensive look at the ways in which sex and sexuality are studied and raises questions about the current process of doing history around the topic of sex. Sexuality is used as a lens to examine how people in history (and today) think. In particular, it’s concerned with the concept of knowledge and what it means for a person to “know” something sexual, whether as an individual in history or as a historian studying the topic. Different approaches to the identification and understanding of knowing make sex a difficult topic to study as well as a site of conflict.
One example of these approaches is the question of how we divide the world between passionate friendship and eroticism. When is a kiss (or an embrace, or the sharing of a bed) just a kiss and when is it erotic? The book has a strong focus on women’s experience and the ways it has been excluded from study. Because of this, Traub is very inclusive of female same-sex experience, and often focuses specifically on the ways in which female same-sex eroticism has been excluded or erased from larger theoretical movements in historical study.
Chapter 2 - Friendship’s Loss: Alan Bray’s Making of History
This chapter examines how historians have understood the interface between friendship and eroticism, focused through the lens of Alan Bray’s study of friendship and homosexuality among men in Renaissance England. He’s concerned with the contradictory position of intimate relations between men in the Renaissance which treated friendship and sodomy as clear contrasts, despite massive overlap in practice.
Although the chapter is mostly concerned with male relations, it also touches on the phenomenon of marriage between women. Traub emphasizes the different social receptions of the ideal of male versus female homoerotic relationships. One historiographical problem is that of researchers who impose moral judgments on asexual versus sexual friendships. There is a brief consideration of the intersection of documented cases of erotic desire with rituals associated with sworn friendship, as we find in the diaries of Anne Lister. Also noted are friendship rituals that partake of the forms of marriage, such as the co-burial of Ann Chitting and Mary Barber.
Chapter 3 - The New Unhistoricism in Queer Studies
This chapter examines historicism and teleology, that is, the question of whether history “moves” in a meaningful direction. Do historical phenomena have systematicity and coherence or are they discontinuous? In particular, is there a connected “history of homosexuality” across the ages? What are the hazards of studying sexuality from a point of view that assumes a present enlightened truth.
Chapter 4 - The Present Future of Lesbian Historiography
Traub critiques the usefulness of an assumption of a “sameness/difference” polarity in framing women’s same-sex relationships. She notes previous major works that take a “continuist” approach to history (i.e., looking for a single continuous narrative of lesbianism) including Faderman, Castle, and Brooten. These historians are critical of Foucault’s periodization model that splits the history of sexuality into a focus on “acts” versus a focus on “identity”. Traub notes the conceptual simlarity across time of lesbian concepts, e.g., female intimate friendship as examined by Vicinus and others. She urges that the “present future of lesbian history” should look at these recurring patterns across time. Thus circumstances and behaviors in other times may look like the modern definition of “lesbian” because they emerge from similar sets of continuing preoccupations about women’s bodies and behaviors. She considers studies of various historic types of representations or relationships that contributed to or have been retroactively connected with the modern lesbian. She presents a recapitulation of various images and interpretations of female same-sex relations from the 17th century to today and then draws up a list of themes relevant to these recurring patterns. (A very long list, or I would include it here.)
Chapter 5 - The Joys of Martha Joyless: Queer Pedagogy and the (Early Modern) Production of Sexual Knowledge
This chapter looks at sexual knowledge and ignorance, riffing off an example of dialogue in the 1638 play “The Antipodes” by Richard Brome, in which a still-virgin wife of three years is speculating on heterosexual knowledge (complaining to a friend about not knowing how to get her husband to perform), while recalling a same-sex erotic encounter. The woman’s request for her female friend to instruct her about sex is portrayed as naïveté. In contexts like this, there is no concept that a male versus female sexual partner indicates a particular orientation or identity, although “spouse” versus “non-spouse” is a relevant category. Similarly there is no hint in this dialogue of a concept of “the closet” or an expectation of negative reactions from others to her relation of the same-sex encounter. The only aspect of the scenario that is considered problematic is her husband’s sexual indifference.
The chapter then considers various other examples of sexual dysfunction in drama, and how the situations are addressed by non-marital sexual activity, regardless of gender. What do we, as moderns, “know” about early modern sex and how do we know it? Among the motifs available from literature are the older woman who sexually initiates a younger one--a cross-over motif from pornography. These texts question the “natural, innate” nature of sexual knowledge. Rather, it is a type of cultural knowledge and practice.
Chapter 6 - Sex in the Interdisciplines
Traub examines the overlapping contexts of history, literary criticism, and queer theory for studying the history of sexuality. There is an extensive description of the state of the field as the author experiences it. This includes a comprehensive catalog of the understanding of English sexual culture in 1550-1680 and a discussion of sexual vocabulary in use by 1650.
Chapter 7 - Talking Sex
This chapter examines descriptive, metaphoric, and humorous language around sex. How were people represented in historic records and literature as speaking of erotic and sexual acts? What language was used for sex workers? And what shades of meaning did the various terms carry? There is an extensive catalog of sexual vocabulary (which would be extremely useful to a writer setting bawdy scenes in this era). In the discussion of sexual humor, Traub discusses how to edit, translate, and annotate texts containing early modern sexual language in order to convey all the layers and nuances of meaning it held. There is a special discussion of language around dildos.
Chapter 8 - Shakespeare’s Sex
This chapter looks at interpretations of Shakespeare’s personal sexuality as embodied in his sonnets (as opposed to the sexual themes in his plays or the evidence of his biography). The study is less concerned with Shakespeare’s actual life than the shifting “knowledge” of that life. That is, how people have come to conclude the things they think they know about him.
Chapter 9 - The Sign of the Lesbian
Traub addresses the question, “Why do we need a history of lesbianism?” That is, why would we need one that focuses on “lesbian” as a specific and defined field of study, as contrasted with the need or usefulness of lesbian history to lesbians in particular. Traub notes a conjunction of “queer history” doubts about history itself along with disinterest in lesbian identity in the context of queer studies. This seems to require identifying a general benefit from the field if a continued interest in “lesbian history” is to survive. To this end, she suggests destabilizing the meanings of both “lesbian” and “history” to ask, “What does it mean to identify ‘lesbian’ in the context of ‘history’?” Why and how does the concept of “the lesbian” become pivotal in history?
Traub’s answer begins, “My purpose is to supplement these revisionist accounts of queer theory by suggesting that it is precisely the history of lesbianism, when reconceived as a problem of representation and epistemology, that offers a valuable heuristic for crafting an analysis that is simultaneously feminist and queer. Reasoning that one impediment to recognizing these interventions as queer theory is that many of these innovations have been produced by means of analysis that is explicitly historical, I argue that ‘the lesbian’ presents not only a limit case for queer theory, but a methodological release point for anyone interested in sexual knowledge--past, present, and future.”
Traub discusses different approaches and concerns of lesbian and gay historical studies versus queer studies. The field currently privileges the queer studies approach. She looks at works in which the figure of “the lesbian” is foregrounded but is concerned that they dismiss the contributions of historicity. Must history be discarded to include the lesbian in queer theory? The lack of interest in lesbian history outside the field producing it means that it rarely influences the construction and debate of larger theories. There is a conflict between the tendency to see lesbian history as rooted in identity, with queer theory associated with post-identitarianism.
Traub suggests that dismissal of the lesbian from theoretical consideration on the basis of rejecting identitarianism assumes the narrowly modern identity associated with the label, and ignores the varied and discontinuous histories of lesbianism. That is, queer theory narrows lesbian identity to a concept easy to dismiss and to consider historically irrelevant. If “the lesbian” can be confined to a 20th century identity, then all pre- and early modern evidence of female homoeroticism becomes “not queer enough” to contribute to queer theory.
The denigration and marginalization of lesbian studies, even by some of those engaged in it, comes from multiple sources: the marginalization of sexuality studies, the tendency of those engaged in lesbian studies to have a broader focus to their work, and shifting popular attitudes that consider the label “lesbian” as retrograde and associated with the white middle class. There is a false belief that the recency of the label “lesbian” represents a lack of a historic subject for study. This attitude persists in the face of awareness of the term’s long history.
A more historic approach would be to examine women’s understandings of their own experience, rather than viewing lesbian history as a “search and rescue” project. Traub notes the valuable data in Anne Lister’s self-examinations and self-reporting of her sexuality. Traub draws attention to how, of all “queer” identity labels and categories, only “lesbian” seems to be deemed retro and essentializing--in the face of no logical difference from similar uses of “gay” or “trans”. She suggests (without quite using that term) that systemic misogyny can’t be ruled out as an explanation for the marginalization of lesbian history within queer studies.
Chapter 10 - Sex Ed: or, Teach Me Tonight
This chapter focuses on the process of learning, especially with regard to sexual knowledge. Literary examples are given of a character learning or teaching sexual techniques. Sexual knowledge in particular is often communicated in allusions and slang, or in meaningful omissions. The chapter mostly contains discussions of theory and modern pedagogy and provides a summary of the book’s main points.
Time period: 16th c17th c18th c19th cPlace: EnglandMisc tags: co-burialfriendshipmarriage between womensex between womenphysical affection (general)Event / person: Diaries (Anne Lister)Mary Barber of Suffolk and Ann ChittingThe Antipodes (Richard Brome)William Shakespeare
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October 28, 2017
Death Did Not Them Depart
The Lesbian Historic Motif Project
One of the contradictory features of reasoning about same-sex relationships in the past is the circular logic that same-sex romantic relationships could not have been socially approved, therefore evidence showing social approval for conjunctions of two people of the same sex must not represent romantic relationships. And while the careful historian avoids making claims beyond the known evidence, the imagination is sparked by examples such as this one where two women are given a commemoration after death--a commemoration that was within the control, and therefore with the approval of, their families--that represents them with the forms and symbolism normally attributed to married heterosexual couples.
Major category: LHMPTags: LHMP
LHMP #160 Bennett 2008 Two Women and their Monumental Brass, c. 1480
About LHMP
Full citation:
Bennett, Judith. 2008. “Two Women and their Monumental Brass, c. 1480” in Journal of the British Archaeological Association vol. 161:163-184.
Publication summary:
An examination of a joint memorial brass for two women.
The parish church in Etchingham (East Sussex) has a memorial brass jointly commemorating two never-married women: Elizabeth Etchingham who died in 1452, and Agnes Oxenbridge who died in 1480. This article considers both the specific life circumstances of these two women and the general context of funeral monuments dedicated to same-sex pairs.
As might be guessed, the church in Etchingham was built by, and served as a resting place for, the Etchinghams and might in some senses be considered a family church. When designed in the late 14th century, the chancel was created to serve as a family mausoleum for generations of Ethchinghams to come, and most of the funeral brasses commemorate the principle heirs of the dynasty. But in 1480 a brass was laid in the church commemorating someone who was not only not a male heir, but an unmarried daughter: Elizabeth Etchingham. Her exact relationship to the main line (and consequently her exact age) are not conclusively determined. But it is clear that she had some significant relationship to the woman she shares the memorial with: Agnes Oxenbridge, a daughter of another prominent east Sussex family.
Bennett notes Alan Bray’s exploration of the social place of intense same-sex friendships in European society (The Friend) and the evidence that the Christian church has accommodated and celebrated those friendships both in life and in death. Examples are given of the joint tomb from 1391 of the English knights William Neville and John Clanvowe in Galata near Istanbul, which depicts their coats of arms displayed impaled in the style normally used for married couples. Most of Bray’s examples are more modern (from the 17th through 19th centuries) and (virtually?) all were male. Bray emphasized that these monuments celebrated emotional intimacy and friendship and cannot be taken as proof of sexual relationships, but they do establish a genre of memorials that treat same-sex couples with the symbolism and dignity similar to that given to married couples.
The Etchingham-Oxenbridge brass survives in complete form and is clearly readable. It shows two women with their hands raised in prayer, turned in semi-profile toward each other. Elizabeth Etchingham is depicted as a smaller figure on the left, with the loose flowing hair down to her hips, a motif associated with a young unmarried woman. Agnes Oxenbridge, on the right, is depicted larger, and her hair is pinned up but not covered, again indicating an unmarried state but not indicating youth. Both wear narrow bands about their hair decorated with a triangular ornament, and they wear identical fashionable gowns.
The text appears in two columns separated by a vertical line, clearly associating each of the two passages with a specific figure. On the left, for Elizabeth, the text identifies her as the first-born daughter of Thomas and Margaret Etchingham, died December 3, 1452. For Agnes, the text identifies her as the daughter of Robert Oxenbridge and gives her death date as August 4, 1480, concluding with her request for God’s mercy on both women. While this sort of separated text was not unknown from other memorials, the more usual format for married couples is a single joint text. The lack of any mention of husbands in either woman’s entry is very strong presumptive evidence that they never married, especially in combination with the depicted hairstyles which mark them as unmarried.
Their exact position within the Etchingham and Oxenbridge families is difficult to pin down, as neither is mentioned clearly in family genealogies (which focus more on the lines with descendents), and due to the tendency not only for names to repeat within a family, but in some cases for multiple children to be given the same first name. (As children were typically named after a godparent, there wasn’t always a choice of a unique name available, given the socio-political constraints on godparent choice.) But after much analysis, Bennett concludes that most likely Agnes Oxenbridge was the daughter of the second Robert Oxenbridge listed in the genealogies, and thus was born around 1425. This means that she would have been in her twenties when Elizabeth Etchingham died and in her fifties when she herself died. Elizabeth Etchingham’s exact position is less certain: depending on which generation she was born into, she herself might have been in her twenties when she died (and thus of an age with Agnes) or might have been a child at her death.
Their unmarried status was unusual for the time--less than 10% of women of their social class remained unmarried. But during this time in England a religous life was not generally considered a viable option for unmarried daughters and they remained within the family. The normative life pattern for well-born 15th century English girls was to be raised at home until adolescence and then be placed in another similarly-positioned household to learn adult skills, expand social networks, and enhance their marriage prospects. Depending on the relative status of the families, the girls might be treated as quasi-daughters or might be treated more as servants, but they would generally be part of a group of girls (and boys) of similar age and background who developed social bonds that would have consequences for the rest of their lives.
Women of this class and era might marry young and therefore not be sent away in this fashion, but more often would marry in their twenties or later, either while serving in another household or after returning to their household of birth for a time. Unmarried daughters were generally provided for in some fashion, sometimes sufficiently to establish an independent household, and there was an acknowledgement that a woman might “be not disposed to marry.” But generally they remained living with their families and contributed to the household administration and duties.
Given this context, it is a strong likelihood that Elizabeth and Agnes were friends from childhood, given the proximity of the two families and their relative status. They might have met while both serving in a third household, or it’s possible that Elizabeth remained at home and Agnes was placed with the more established and prestigious Etchinghams. Beyond that, several possible scenarios can be proposed. If Elizabeth fell in the younger generation (and thus died young), Agnes may have served as her nurse--which would have to have been an unusual bond to have been commemorated in this fashion thirty years later. In the scenario where Elizabeth was older, they most likely would have met and began their friendship during the adolescent outplacement of either both of them or of Agnes with the Etchinghams.
How did they end up both buried at Etchingham church? This would be the natural location for Elizabeth Etchingham’s grave. But the expected place for an unmarried Oxenbridge daughter to be married would be their family church at Brede, where her parents and siblings were buried. One possibility would be that Agnes lived at Etchingham after Elizabeth’s death and was therefore buried locally, though the two churches are not so far separated (12 miles) to make that a requirement. But almost certainly the burial location was due to a strongly expressed preference on the part of Agnes--not only to be buried in Etchingham but to be buried specifically next to Elizabeth. And the commissioning and placement of their joint memorial brass almost certainly would have been specified by Agnes in her will (which doesn’t survive) as no other explanation would make sense of this unusual event. It was extremely common for wills at this time to specify not only the church of burial but the specific placement of the grave next to other named individuals. Again, it is not unusual to wills to specify the imagery and text for an individual’s memorial, particularly in regard to soliciting prayers for God’s mercy. While this is the only currently known funeral brass commemorating two women, there are several other known medieval English joint burials of “unrelated” women or records of wills specifying such joint burial.
Bennett gives the background on the London workshop that produced this brass (and many others), including shifts in stylistic features that provide context for interpreting the image, as well as the general dynamics of memorial brasses. Much of the imagery was conventional, but within that there was a range of symbolism in the placement and nature of the figures. At this time there was a shift from showing the human figures face-on (in imitation of sculptural effigies), to turning them in profile, and especially showing couples facing each other, or with the wife turned more toward the husband. Elizabeth and Agnes are shown in complete profile, not only facing each other, but with their gaze meeting. Among various possible positions for the figures, this choice aligns with depictions of familial intimacy and physical closeness. Other possible design options at the time included the older front-facing style, or showing a lower status figure turned more toward a higher-status front-facing one, or with a devotional object placed between them to be the focus of a profile gaze. (There is a great deal of discussion of the specific nuances of this composition from among the range of known examples.)
For married couples, typically the man was placed at the viewer’s left in the higher-status location. Elizabeth Etchingham occupies this position in the joint memorial, possibly due to the higher status of her family and the location of the tomb on their property? The relative size of the figures also needs interpretation. Age is one factor represented by relative size, and the smaller figure of Elizabeth may represent her younger age at death, rather than specifically a difference in ages when they were both living.
Even given the presumption that Agnes may have specifically requested the joint memorial brass in her will, the approval and execution of the design would have fallen to her surviving relatives and the brass workshop. This means that the idea of commemorating the women’s close relationship was something considered unremarkable and desirable by their family circle. Interestingly, generations of historians describing the piece have gone to some lengths to avoid recognizing it as a commemoration of a relationship between two adult women, either describing it as depicting “two children” or mistakenly claiming that it was two separate brasses, positioned coincidentally, or even going so far as to claim that one of the figures was male! (An example is given of a different 14th century brass that clearly shows two men in calf-length garments and both wearing swords that a historian has labeled “civilian and wife”.) None of these earlier interpretations stands up to scrutiny. That said, while the memorial clearly commemorates a strong emotional and social bond between the two women, we can’t know for certain what the nature of that bond was beyond that. But the surface form of the memorial indicates that their families honored that relationship as being worthy of equivalent respect as that given to marriage.
Time period: 15th cPlace: EnglandMisc tags: co-burialEvent / person: Elizabeth Etchingham & Agnes Oxenbridge
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Halloween Treats
But Heather (you say), you don't write horror! You don't write supernatural fiction! What do you mean you want to feature Halloween content today?
Halloween marks the end of the ancient Celtic year--the time when doors open between this world and the next--and what better day to have set the beginning of the action of "Hyddwen", my Mabinogi-inspired story about a woman who repays her debt to an otherworldly queen by being her champion in a very strange battle. Morvyth follows the footsteps of many an ancient Welsh hero in crossing that boundary on the day that falls between the years. No one who does so comes back unchanged. And one of these days I'll start writing "Gwylan" which deals with some unexpected fallout from that visit.
For my other Halloween-themed link, I invite you to re-visit the podcast I did last year for the Lesbian Historic Motif Podcast, where I discuss Christina Rosetti's poem "The Goblin Market", including a full reading of the poem at the conclusion of the podcast. It's a spooky and frightening poem, but what I loved most was the shifting musical rhythms of the verses, with their repetitions and change in tempo. I've really started enjoying reading poetry as part of these podcasts just for the delicious taste of the language. (Hmm, maybe "delicious taste" isn't the best metaphor when talking about Goblin Markets!)
Major category: PromotionPublications: HyddwenTags: promotionLHMPpodcastHyddwen
Book Review: Jackalope Wives and Other Stories by T. Kingfisher
Somehow I failed to review this when I finished it, quite possibly because that happened in the chaos leading up to my summer travel.
Jackalope Wives is a collection of short pieces by Ursula Vernon under her writing-for-adults name of T. Kingfisher. I say “short pieces” rather than short fiction because it also includes poetry and things that don’t really fit neatly into categories (like the totally hilarious and biting “This Vote is Legally Binding” which is basically a letter to the editor talking back to an article on how to try to pick up women who are wearing headphones in public). But for me the heart and spine of the collection are the stories that I think of as falling in the “Kingfisher mythos” -- a quintessentially American mythic otherworld peopled with jackalopes and sentient feral railroads and magical wild hogs and very very many snarky grumbling wise old women who sigh and glare and then go off to save the world. Stories like the titular “Jackalope Wives” in which male bullheaded entitlement causes a tragedy that must be redeemed, and “Razorback” (a reworking of an old folk tale) where a witch looks for justice for the death of her best friend, and “Bird Bones” which involves an avian intervention in neighborhood hostilities. And, of course, the fiercely delightful “The Tomato Thief” (which won a Hugo this year) in which the protagonist of “Jackalope Wives” returns to figure out just who is robbing her garden and encounters yet another injustice demanding her wise and cranky attention.
I’ve been spacing out my reading of Kingfisher’s short fiction a bit because it hits so solidly in my sweet spot that I’m not sure I could bear to run out of new stories to read. I’m not sure I can be coherent it saying how much I love her writing. Just give it a try; maybe you’ll feel that way too.
Major category: ReviewsTags: Reviews: Books
Story Review: Children of Thorns, Children of Water by Aliette de Bodard
This is a short piece within de Bodard’s “Dominion of the Fallen” world, falling hard on the heels of The House of Shattered Wings and I believe introducing us to a key character who will feature in The House of Binding Thorns. It goes beyond character study, giving us a tightly packaged perilous adventure (perilous from several directions) featuring not only the harsh cut-throat politics of the various Fallen houses, but the lingering hazards of the magical cataclysm that destroyed Paris--hazards that have no respect for house loyalty. It probably isn’t a story that would stand alone for someone who hasn’t read at least one of the novels--there’s far too much essential world-building to be able to summarize for a piece of short fiction. But it’s exactly right for a short bonus feature for those who are following the series.
Major category: ReviewsTags: Reviews: Books
