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Lesbian Peoples: Material for a Dictionary
With wit and verbal magic, these two amazing women present a fascinating fictional world where women are the sole inhabitants, weaving words and wonders of their own.
Their delightful dictionary redefines selected historical and mythical persons, places, countries, flowers and animals, and celebrates the primitive, cerebral, exotic and sexual capacities of women.
Interweaving ancient myths with new myths of their own invention, the authors create a special and exclusively female universe encompassing such diverse entries as Amazon, Blissful, Cadavers, Cat, Chariot, Delight, Dog, Ecstasy, Gomorrha, Harpies, History, Knee, Love, Mother, Truth, and many other definitions: all thought provoking, frequently outrageous, sensuous, beautiful, tantalizing - and very, very funny.
Their delightful dictionary redefines selected historical and mythical persons, places, countries, flowers and animals, and celebrates the primitive, cerebral, exotic and sexual capacities of women.
Interweaving ancient myths with new myths of their own invention, the authors create a special and exclusively female universe encompassing such diverse entries as Amazon, Blissful, Cadavers, Cat, Chariot, Delight, Dog, Ecstasy, Gomorrha, Harpies, History, Knee, Love, Mother, Truth, and many other definitions: all thought provoking, frequently outrageous, sensuous, beautiful, tantalizing - and very, very funny.
170 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1976
25 people are currently reading
1032 people want to read
About the author
Monique Wittig
37 books384 followersMonique Wittig was a French author and feminist theorist particularly interested in overcoming gender and the heterosexual contract. She published her first novel, L'opoponax, in 1964 . Her second novel, Les Guérillères (1969), was a landmark in lesbian feminism.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 36 reviews
August 18, 2019
Speculative utopian psychedelic lesbian fiction told through a dictionary? Love it.
May 22, 2019
Note: this review is especially harsh because I have high expectations for this author.
This book mostly takes the myths around the Amazons and adds a simple story of how lesbians came to be liberated from the current society to form their own community subdivided into tribes, with a bunch of magical elements. It's interesting how a dictionary (more like an encyclopedia really) can be read: from A to V (it doesn't go further), or at random and then by looking up recurring words. You discover the fictive world, called "the age of glory", and its story, piecemeal, as if you had a real document from this world in hand.
The definitions could be classified as such:
- a few definitions give the core of the story, like "powder", "mother", "history", "witch"
- others, a bit more numerous, give you the core of the culture and social organization of the "lesbian peoples", like "love", "orgasm", "bag", "animals", "hallucination"
- similar ones give you peripheral elements of said culture and social organization; they repeat the same traits as what is in the core, like "mushrooms", "clitore", "mouth"
- others, rather numerous but that don't contribute much besides giving the reader some familiarity with names and places from the myths around the Amazons, give names and vague details about the Amazons and its famous people, reinterpreted in the context of this book's world-building
- the few definitions left are about people and things from when the book was written — I noticed the obvious "Gouines Rouges" and a reference to Joanna Russ, but there probably are a few more
The definitions about Amazons are highly repetitive; okay, there's a justification for that given in the book itself about repetitive tales told by those from the Phoenix islands, but even when it's not textually repetitive, the content still is. At best, it gives you some familiarity with the Amazons, but not much more. The definitions about the core of the story are a bit more interesting, but it's still not the meat of the book as they mostly give is a justification for how the "age of glory" came to be and how it's related to the past. Politically it's not relevant either, as the solution to create the authors' utopia here is magical realism.
So the most interesting part is the world-building, which is like a small ethnography of the "lesbian peoples". But what's in it, what are its core categories? As much as I enjoyed the way the book works and how it follows the logic of myths, despite the small issues I noted previously, the underlying categories of the world of the "age of glory" show major issues at odds with one of the authors' previous essays in The Straight Mind and Other Essays.
The authors describe peoples who live close to nature, don't need and even reject science, have mysterious supernatural powers, organize their social lives mostly around love and sex (especially sex, as love seems to be mostly expressed through sexuality), relate themselves strongly to animals (or can be half animals in some tribes), and are eternal adolescents (contrarily to the "mothers" in the cities who give birth). Associating women with nature, lack of rationality, sex, animals, and childhood is at the core of the symbolic order of patriarchy; even more so for lesbians who are cast as never truly women. Maybe the authors should have ready Wittig's essay "Homo Sum", because this essay tackles exactly that issue... Wait, Wittig is one of the co-authors!
So, what happened here? Reading articles written after Wittig died by people who knew her, it surfaced that a few years after having co-founded the MLF (movement for the liberation of women), she became sort of disillusioned with the reception of her ideas and how lesbians were seen in the movement. She wrote about that with acrimonious literary devices in the untranslated short stories Paris-la-politique. Seemingly at that time she became more interested in lesbian separatism due to her pessimism. She also made contrary declarations later about how it wasn't for her. This dictionary seems to be an attempt to create an imaginary world for that — it's a thought experiment maybe, or a way to "universalize the point of view of the dominated". But as I argued earlier, the core categories are very much in line with that of sexism! This seems like a failed subversion to me. Or maybe it's supposed to be taken humorously throughout, but that would imply if you "lesbianize" our culture, suddenly it can't be serious anymore? Whichever it is, there's something wrong here.
All in all, the world-building and its exposition is very well done, though there are some unneeded repetitions in my opinion. As for the underlying discourse on our culture and society, and as a fiction for a magical utopia, the attempt was interesting, but I think it's a dead end: the subversion has failed, no counter-model to the "straight mind" has emerged from it, whereas this should have been the book that could have done it.
This book mostly takes the myths around the Amazons and adds a simple story of how lesbians came to be liberated from the current society to form their own community subdivided into tribes, with a bunch of magical elements. It's interesting how a dictionary (more like an encyclopedia really) can be read: from A to V (it doesn't go further), or at random and then by looking up recurring words. You discover the fictive world, called "the age of glory", and its story, piecemeal, as if you had a real document from this world in hand.
The definitions could be classified as such:
- a few definitions give the core of the story, like "powder", "mother", "history", "witch"
- others, a bit more numerous, give you the core of the culture and social organization of the "lesbian peoples", like "love", "orgasm", "bag", "animals", "hallucination"
- similar ones give you peripheral elements of said culture and social organization; they repeat the same traits as what is in the core, like "mushrooms", "clitore", "mouth"
- others, rather numerous but that don't contribute much besides giving the reader some familiarity with names and places from the myths around the Amazons, give names and vague details about the Amazons and its famous people, reinterpreted in the context of this book's world-building
- the few definitions left are about people and things from when the book was written — I noticed the obvious "Gouines Rouges" and a reference to Joanna Russ, but there probably are a few more
The definitions about Amazons are highly repetitive; okay, there's a justification for that given in the book itself about repetitive tales told by those from the Phoenix islands, but even when it's not textually repetitive, the content still is. At best, it gives you some familiarity with the Amazons, but not much more. The definitions about the core of the story are a bit more interesting, but it's still not the meat of the book as they mostly give is a justification for how the "age of glory" came to be and how it's related to the past. Politically it's not relevant either, as the solution to create the authors' utopia here is magical realism.
So the most interesting part is the world-building, which is like a small ethnography of the "lesbian peoples". But what's in it, what are its core categories? As much as I enjoyed the way the book works and how it follows the logic of myths, despite the small issues I noted previously, the underlying categories of the world of the "age of glory" show major issues at odds with one of the authors' previous essays in The Straight Mind and Other Essays.
The authors describe peoples who live close to nature, don't need and even reject science, have mysterious supernatural powers, organize their social lives mostly around love and sex (especially sex, as love seems to be mostly expressed through sexuality), relate themselves strongly to animals (or can be half animals in some tribes), and are eternal adolescents (contrarily to the "mothers" in the cities who give birth). Associating women with nature, lack of rationality, sex, animals, and childhood is at the core of the symbolic order of patriarchy; even more so for lesbians who are cast as never truly women. Maybe the authors should have ready Wittig's essay "Homo Sum", because this essay tackles exactly that issue... Wait, Wittig is one of the co-authors!
So, what happened here? Reading articles written after Wittig died by people who knew her, it surfaced that a few years after having co-founded the MLF (movement for the liberation of women), she became sort of disillusioned with the reception of her ideas and how lesbians were seen in the movement. She wrote about that with acrimonious literary devices in the untranslated short stories Paris-la-politique. Seemingly at that time she became more interested in lesbian separatism due to her pessimism. She also made contrary declarations later about how it wasn't for her. This dictionary seems to be an attempt to create an imaginary world for that — it's a thought experiment maybe, or a way to "universalize the point of view of the dominated". But as I argued earlier, the core categories are very much in line with that of sexism! This seems like a failed subversion to me. Or maybe it's supposed to be taken humorously throughout, but that would imply if you "lesbianize" our culture, suddenly it can't be serious anymore? Whichever it is, there's something wrong here.
All in all, the world-building and its exposition is very well done, though there are some unneeded repetitions in my opinion. As for the underlying discourse on our culture and society, and as a fiction for a magical utopia, the attempt was interesting, but I think it's a dead end: the subversion has failed, no counter-model to the "straight mind" has emerged from it, whereas this should have been the book that could have done it.
August 18, 2024
C'est le même univers que les guérillères développé cette fois ci sous forme de dictionnaire. Une poésie utopiste très belle
June 17, 2018
Plus qu'un simple dictionnaire, c'est presque une encyclopédie et répertoire d'intertexte lesbien. D'abord publié en 1976, ce brouillon pour un dictionnaire (avec tout l'inachèvement que ça présume ou plutôt le potentiel derrière) est un fantastique outil pour connaître les mythes, les symboles, etc. lesbien que ce soit à travers les figures d'amazones amplement référencées d'un bout à l'autre du dictionnaire qu'à travers la création de néologisme ou de termes réappropriés (goudou, âge de gloire, la Gaule, etc.) qui permettent aux amantes de s'approprier et de s'exprimer à travers un langage modulée pour elle (un gynolecte si on veut en opposition à l'androlecte).
On se cite entre lesbiennes, amazones, on réactualise des figures, on investit des symboles comme des animaux, mais surtout, on se réapproprie du langage pour exprimer sa propre réalité. Un vraiment beau brouillon de dictionnaire qui n'est finalement qu'un point d'entré vers d'autres textes et figures.
On se cite entre lesbiennes, amazones, on réactualise des figures, on investit des symboles comme des animaux, mais surtout, on se réapproprie du langage pour exprimer sa propre réalité. Un vraiment beau brouillon de dictionnaire qui n'est finalement qu'un point d'entré vers d'autres textes et figures.
Read
August 13, 2022from the “grandma sent me all of her lesbian theory and erotica when she moved” pile — I liked this a lot more than I thought I would!
November 24, 2024
3.75??
Tüm göndermeleri yakalayamadıysam da eğlenceli bi okumaydı. Sappho'ya koca bir sayfa ayırıp boş bırakmalarına bayıldım
"The lesbian peoples who appeared just about everywhere had no difficulty in speaking a single language. Each companion lover loved another who, loving her in turn, began to speak a language familiar to them all. This very ancient and rediscovered tongue is called the lesbian language."
"If you're poor / then you're a dyke / if you're rich / you're sapphic // if you're neither one nor the other / a lesbian, a lesbian is what you'll have to be" (wise words)
Ear - "Thus the little companion lovers are born today from ear to ear"
ALSO Eve and Lilith as companion lovers?? I wanna read more of this please 😭
Tüm göndermeleri yakalayamadıysam da eğlenceli bi okumaydı. Sappho'ya koca bir sayfa ayırıp boş bırakmalarına bayıldım
"The lesbian peoples who appeared just about everywhere had no difficulty in speaking a single language. Each companion lover loved another who, loving her in turn, began to speak a language familiar to them all. This very ancient and rediscovered tongue is called the lesbian language."
"If you're poor / then you're a dyke / if you're rich / you're sapphic // if you're neither one nor the other / a lesbian, a lesbian is what you'll have to be" (wise words)
Ear - "Thus the little companion lovers are born today from ear to ear"
ALSO Eve and Lilith as companion lovers?? I wanna read more of this please 😭
Read
May 17, 2024exactamente el libro que hubieran escrito heloïse y marianne de ‘retrato de una mujer en llamas’ en la escena en la que están drogadas
June 15, 2024
MOT. À cause de tous les déplacements de sens, glissements de sens, pertes de sens que les mots on tendance à subir, il arrive un moment où ils n’agissent plus sur la ou les réalités. Il faut alors les réactiver. Ce n’est pas une opération simple et elle peut prendre toute sorte de formes. La plus répandue est celle que pratique les porteuses de fables. Les porteuses de fables changent sans arrêt de place. Elles racontent, entre autres, d’une place à l’autre les métamorphoses des mots. Elles-mêmes changent les versions de ces métamorphoses, non pas pour rendre les choses plus confuses mais parce qu’elles ont enregistrer ces changements. Ils ont pour conséquence d’éviter pour les mots une fixation de sens. Il y a aussi le tribut que les amantes paient aux mots. Elles font des assemblées où elles lisent toutes ensemble des dictionnaires, elles se mettent d’accord sur les mots dont elles n’ont pas envie de se passer. Puis elles décident suivant les groupes, les communautés, les îles, les continents du tribut possible suivant les mots et elles le paient de leur personne (ou ne le paient pas). Celles qui le font appellent ça plaisamment ‘écrire sa vie avec son sang’, ce qui, disent-elles, est la moindre des choses.
Ser lesbiana _es_ la utopía.
Ser lesbiana _es_ la utopía.
April 20, 2024
ce court brouillon de dictionnaire est le fruit du désir d'écrire une histoire des amantes, en dehors de toute binarité de genre et, évidemment, d'hétérocentrisme.
wittig et zeig se réapproprient divers mythes et figures, et construisent un nouveau patrimoine pour ces amantes, que l'histoire a volontairement effacé.
on explore une variété de mythologies, on réapprend la définition de certains termes en approfondissant les autres.
j'aurais adoré que ce brouillon soit un peu plus long....mais bravo quand-même
wittig et zeig se réapproprient divers mythes et figures, et construisent un nouveau patrimoine pour ces amantes, que l'histoire a volontairement effacé.
on explore une variété de mythologies, on réapprend la définition de certains termes en approfondissant les autres.
j'aurais adoré que ce brouillon soit un peu plus long....mais bravo quand-même
June 3, 2018
this is a beautiful lesbian feminist utopian take. highly recommended.
November 11, 2022
Oui. Oui !!!! C'était trop bien. Quelle inspiration. J'ai trop d'excitation pour faire une revue intelligente et raisonnable
January 21, 2023
This is such a fun and unique book.
May 5, 2024
extremely interesting!
Read
July 22, 2025je reviens avec une review quand j'ai un cerveau mais 3.75 pour le moment, je pense
November 2, 2025
bueno totalment perfectes totes les entrades, tan de bo hi haguèssin més<3
April 21, 2025
Un libro muy especial, un regalo para toda mujer lesbiana, para toda amante. Una exploración y creación simultáneas de historia y mitología de las lesbianas. En modo diccionario, nos presentan con significados, personajes, momentos, e historias que nos permiten crear un imaginario colectivo por y para las lesbianas. En un mundo donde las historias se han contado por y para hombres, este diccionario propone algo irreverente, un ojo por ojo: una historia y mitología independiente de los hombres, sin mencionar siquiera su existencia.
Las autoras lo hacen a veces con un tono ominoso, a veces divertido y hasta travieso. Me imagino a las autoras, amantes empedernidas, tumbadas en algún escenario idílico e imaginando un mundo que fue de ellas; disfrutando del proceso, saboreando cada idea, riendo a carcajadas, llorando de rabia. No sé si ellas se dieron cuenta que en este proceso estaban creando algo que futuras amantes considerarían esencial: algo que es sólo para ellas, una pieza de cultura que nos pertenece y nos hace sentir parte de algo tangible. Todas necesitamos un mito original, cada nación, cada comunidad - y este es el libro que nos los da a las amantes.
Partes de esta mitología de las amantes que me han encantado: las amazonas como ejes principales, la pereza y la lentitud como ritual compartido, la unión y solidaridad de amantes de todo el mundo. Partes que no tanto: usar analogías de guerra en los rituales de amor de las amantes.
Y la parte más bonita de todas: esto es un primer borrador, lo que indica que es tan sólo el principio. Es un diccionario vivo, y todas las amantes del pasado, presente, y futuro formamos parte de él. Seguimos creando nuestra mitología e historia compartidas. Este texto es sólo el principio.
Las autoras lo hacen a veces con un tono ominoso, a veces divertido y hasta travieso. Me imagino a las autoras, amantes empedernidas, tumbadas en algún escenario idílico e imaginando un mundo que fue de ellas; disfrutando del proceso, saboreando cada idea, riendo a carcajadas, llorando de rabia. No sé si ellas se dieron cuenta que en este proceso estaban creando algo que futuras amantes considerarían esencial: algo que es sólo para ellas, una pieza de cultura que nos pertenece y nos hace sentir parte de algo tangible. Todas necesitamos un mito original, cada nación, cada comunidad - y este es el libro que nos los da a las amantes.
Partes de esta mitología de las amantes que me han encantado: las amazonas como ejes principales, la pereza y la lentitud como ritual compartido, la unión y solidaridad de amantes de todo el mundo. Partes que no tanto: usar analogías de guerra en los rituales de amor de las amantes.
Y la parte más bonita de todas: esto es un primer borrador, lo que indica que es tan sólo el principio. Es un diccionario vivo, y todas las amantes del pasado, presente, y futuro formamos parte de él. Seguimos creando nuestra mitología e historia compartidas. Este texto es sólo el principio.
February 15, 2024
una obra mestra de caire revolucionari que m'ha mostrat la ínfima, però efectiva possibilitat de crear una nova societat (o antiga, però oblidada) a partir d'un llenguatge. mitjançant la ressignificació dels símbols, metàfores i definicions als quals solem atribuir la veritat absoluta, Wittig i Zeig han canviat el món.
March 18, 2009
I CANNOT EXPLAIN THIS BOOK.
night of the vanishing powder? glorious age? companion lovers? clitore?
i love it. whatever. i love it.
night of the vanishing powder? glorious age? companion lovers? clitore?
i love it. whatever. i love it.
March 4, 2024
El projecte de Wittig era el de dotar d'una mitologia als cossos lesbians, sense importar-ne la ficcionalitat; o, tal vegada, submergint-se en la ficció, alliberada dels límits que imposen la història i els fets. La seva qüestió no és tant què és una dona o una lesbiana -temes que aborda, de totes maneres- sinó què ha fet, què fa un cos lesbià; és, doncs, més propera a l'ètica etològica spinozista que a l'eterna pregunta sobre l'essència, i per això molt més materialista que idealista.
Així, Wittig -i la seva amant, Zeig- creen una història lesbiana que es divideix en edats i en la qual les llacunes temporals són una eina generadora, una proposició, un espai-temps que s'ofereix a ser emplenat pels nostres propis desitjos. Resulta interessant no sols aquesta diferenciació primigènia entre dona i amazona, arrel de la minimització de la dona al seu paper de mare, sinó també les relacions que s'estableixen entre aquestes dues poblacions, condemnades a relacionar-se en una trajectòria força similar a la nomàdica/imperial que proposarien Deleuze i Guattari a Mil mesetas. D'altra banda, diria que el llibre conté pensaments preciosos, tendres i brutals, i també bestials.
De les amazones, Wittig en repeteix un i altre cop, en una cita ficcional:
«Mucho tiempo después de desaparecido su esplendor, algo de su naturaleza indestructible brilla todavía, continúa palpitando y de tiempo en tiempo surge violentamente de la oscuridad» (Helen Diner, Las madres y las amazonas, Germania, edad del acero rápido).
I en aquesta cita hi ha molt de Wittig i de la seva manera de percebre aquest personatge conceptual, però també real que és la dona; per a mi, ens diu que tot i la reducció històrica patriarcal de la dona a ésser-que-pareix, hi ha en la pròpia feminitat una escletxa d'alliberació, un paisatge diferent, viu, aquell de l'amazones com a constructe oposat a la dona-ésser-que-pareix, amazones com a alliberament d'aquestes cadenes.
Així, Wittig -i la seva amant, Zeig- creen una història lesbiana que es divideix en edats i en la qual les llacunes temporals són una eina generadora, una proposició, un espai-temps que s'ofereix a ser emplenat pels nostres propis desitjos. Resulta interessant no sols aquesta diferenciació primigènia entre dona i amazona, arrel de la minimització de la dona al seu paper de mare, sinó també les relacions que s'estableixen entre aquestes dues poblacions, condemnades a relacionar-se en una trajectòria força similar a la nomàdica/imperial que proposarien Deleuze i Guattari a Mil mesetas. D'altra banda, diria que el llibre conté pensaments preciosos, tendres i brutals, i també bestials.
De les amazones, Wittig en repeteix un i altre cop, en una cita ficcional:
«Mucho tiempo después de desaparecido su esplendor, algo de su naturaleza indestructible brilla todavía, continúa palpitando y de tiempo en tiempo surge violentamente de la oscuridad» (Helen Diner, Las madres y las amazonas, Germania, edad del acero rápido).
I en aquesta cita hi ha molt de Wittig i de la seva manera de percebre aquest personatge conceptual, però també real que és la dona; per a mi, ens diu que tot i la reducció històrica patriarcal de la dona a ésser-que-pareix, hi ha en la pròpia feminitat una escletxa d'alliberació, un paisatge diferent, viu, aquell de l'amazones com a constructe oposat a la dona-ésser-que-pareix, amazones com a alliberament d'aquestes cadenes.
June 7, 2023
Las barreras del lenguaje cayeron el mismo día en que desaparecieron las fronteras, el día, suele decirse, de la gran desbandada. Los pueblos de amantes que se crearon entonces no tuvieron a mal hablar una lengua única. Aquellas que amaban a otras que las amaban a su vez, se pusieron a hablar una lengua común a todas. Esta lengua muy antigua y reencontrada se llama la lengua lesbiana. Gloria.
Libro precioso que recomiendo a todas mis amigas sáficas!! 💗
Libro precioso que recomiendo a todas mis amigas sáficas!! 💗
August 13, 2025
ahora solo leo sáfico, me parece top lo de crear un universo puramente lesbiano al estilo mitológico tradicional y hay alguna entrada muy graciosa y muy top, pero el formato se hace un poco pesado creo
December 26, 2020
Este libro es pura fantasía y no hay mucho más que añadir por mi parte.
July 4, 2021
I often tell people to read this book (dictionary). It's a dictionary from a world with no men.
December 17, 2021
Sci-fi altro che appunti.
March 12, 2023
génie lesbien.
August 14, 2023
Menuda maravilla
April 19, 2024
Incroyable même si quelques aspects semblent dépassés
June 27, 2024
Reminiscent of “The Book of the City of Ladies” in form/historical intention. Reminiscent of “The Female Man” culturally.
October 17, 2024
no era lo que me esperaba pero ha sido interesante
Displaying 1 - 30 of 36 reviews