Hi Milli!
OK! So here I am, ready to catch up a bit with this cool thread. Thank you so much for posting all of that information about the Triangle tragedy. It's such a sad event, it's hard to even imagine or comprehend the horror and injustice of that situation. And, I think it was handled beautifully in
Beyond the Pale. Some of that writing was so chilling. The parts of the chapter "Melt the World" that were in either Rose's voice or the ghostly voices of the other victims were just haunting.
In my copy, starting at p. 368 the formatting of the text becomes unconventional and Dykewomon writes these little short sentences and phrases, such as [these are just some of the fragments... It's kind of hard to quote because the formatting is so unusual] "
Flame spikes up through the floorboards. Everyone is running... let me out of here... I have to get down stairs... don't you understand... let me through... how can this happen to me?... I was good... I was about to meet my lover... I was pregnant... I was bringing my paycheck to Mama..." And then the part that specifically from Rose's perspective "
Chava I worked sewing since I was fourteen... seven years in sweatshops... and still I had pride in my needle... Chava I went to the window but I saw what happened to the girls... who jumped... I tried to get back to the doors... the black stripes on my shirt... burn first."
I love this part. It's so unbelievably powerful to give voices to these victims. And, I really like how the text breaks down almost into poetry.
It is interesting to see how this book, or at least Chava's story, is bracketed by two events of horrendous violence and injustice. It's hard to imagine one individual enduring so much tragedy, so young and within such a short span of years. Poor Chava.
But, yes, I agree with you that I think she's meant to go on and do great things in Ohio and in the suffrage movement. She gets so excited by social and political causes that I'd expect she would really enjoy working in the suffrage movement. And, of course it seems that many suffragists would make good friends (and potential lovers for Chava) based on common interests and ambitions. Really, I'd love to read a sequel to this book... to see how things go for Chava and to see some happier times for her (hopefully).
Anyway, thanks again for recommending Beyond the Pale. I'm very happy to have discovered this book and author. I'd never heard of her prior to your recommendation.
In terms of what I'm going to read next... I don't know.
Not Lonesome Dove afterall...
I've decided to put that off some more (it seems like a good Brokie thing to do, but I don't have a huge sense of urgency). At the moment I don't have the willpower to tackle it. Or, if I do start it, I'll go ahead and read other books at the same time (I read multiple books at once quite frequently actually).
I've already read
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, and really liked it. I've also read
Written on the Body and
Powerbook... I really like Winterson a lot.
Some day I'd like to read more of Dykewomon's writing. So, that's a possiblity. Or, I might take your suggestion about the
No Margins anthology. It might be nice to read shorter works. I actually really love short stories as a form of writing.
But, essentially at the moment I'm open to any and all suggestions about what to read next. I'll have to buy my next lesbian read, I don't have anything in hand right now.
Thinking of anthologies, here's a good one edited by Lillian Faderman (I think she'll become a running theme in this thread).
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Chloe Plus Olivia: An Anthology of Lesbian Literature from the Seventeenth Century to the Present (1994)
The title comes from a famous passage in Virginia Woolf's
A Room of One's Own, 1929. I actually quoted this little passage in the Favorite Quotations thread in the Women Today forum. (
A Room... was first written/delivered as a lecture)- "
I turned the page and read... I am so sorry to break off so abruptly. Are there no men present? Do you promise me that behind that curtain over there the figure of Sir Chartres Biron is not concealed? We are all women, you assure me? Then I may tell you that the very next words I read were these - 'Chloe liked Olivia'... Do not start. Do not blush. Let us admit in the privacy of our own society that these things sometimes happen. Sometimes women do like women."
And, this is the blurb from the back of the book:
"
Chloe Plus Olivia is an anthology of four centuries of lesbian literature, with each piece set in historical and literary context. The most complete compilation of its kind, it offers an enlightening review of the shifting concept of lesbian literature itself, followed by examples of six different genres: Romantic Friendship, Sexual Inversion, Exotic and Evil Lesbians, Lesbian Encoding, Lesbian Feminism and Post-Lesbian Feminism. Authors included range from Katherine Philips in the seventeenth century and Emily Dickinson in the nineteenth century to Audre Lorde and Dorothy Allison in the twentieth century. With a historical scope enhanced by Faderman's personal search for a definition of lesbian literature, Chloe Plus Olivia is certain to become the reference point from which all subsequent studies of lesbian writing will begin."
