Literary Lesbians
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
JULY: The Well of Loneliness by Radclyffe Hall
First of all we have to recognise the dedication of one of our reading group members, Amy, who stayed up until 1.30am on the morning of our meeting to finish the book (unlike most of the others). Hard core.
We should also welcome our new members Rosie, Tina and Lisa, all of whom were enthusiastic contributors to the discussion.
Lynnie also put in an enormous effort researching all there is to know about Radclyffe Hall, the era in which she lived, and 'the bible of lesbianism'. Lynnie pointed out that the novel is now 80 years old, having been published for the first time in 1928. This was the same year that women in the UK got the vote, and was only one year after 80 men were arrested in the UK for homosexual solicitation. Sexual acts between women were not criminalised, largely because they were not recognised. Previously, only a few novels written by women had hinted at or contained lesbian themes. Interestingly, Orlando by Virginia Woolf, in which the lead character changes from a man to a woman, was published in the same year.
Radclyffe Hall published 8 novels and 5 volumes of poetry. Another of her novels, 'Adam's Breed', published in 1926 won the James Tait and Prix Femina prizes - the only other novel to have won both of these was EM Forster's 'A Passage to India'.
The Well of Loneliness was banned in the UK soon after publication, but was still available from France by mail order. A court case to ban the book in the USA was not successful. The book was republished in the UK in 1949 after Hall's death.
Lynnie almost didn't get to finish her presentation about Radclyffe Hall's life because the heated debate started almost immediately. The first hot topic of discussion was whether the lead character, Stephen, wanted to be a man or was in fact effectively a male trapped in a woman's body.
Someone suggested that the problem was that Stephen grew up not knowing that she was a lesbian, 'unlike us' who have grown up in a culture in which lesbians are more visible and more accepted. Quite a few of 'us' then piped up to say that we didn't know we were lesbians, or even what a lesbian was, until quite late. So the societal difference wasn't as great as it might have initially appeared. However, gender roles have changed and it may be that Stephen was just a product of her times. She may not actually have wanted to be man, but simply have the rights of a man at that time.
Rosie thought that Stephen wanted to be a man, pointing out that Stephen had in fact expressed this desire, and then behaved as if she was a boy by dressing as a boy, engaging in male activities such as riding astride and fencing, and wishing she could play with the other boys. Ange and Lisa pointed out that they always played sport and wrestled with the boys when they were younger, and Amy said that she felt uncomfortable in a dress, but none of them wanted to be a boy.
Then followed the old "nature versus nurture" debate. We talked about how Stephen's father had wanted a boy, gave Stephen a boy's name, and encouraged her to engage in typically male activities. Sal asked whether or not behaviour and characteristics such as those displayed by Stephen, are innate and different from sex. She noted that some behaviours seem to be gender identified, and referred to twin children (one boy and one girl) she knew who behaved differently. There was quite a lot of discussion about how much social expectations impacted on the behaviour of particular genders. Sal said that Stephen's feelings for Collins at such a young age were not created by nurture, and this supported her 'nature' argument.
The character Valerie Seymour was discussed, as she didn't seem to fit the author's apparent definition of an 'invert' - a person who displays the characteristics and behaviour of the opposite sex. However, we noted that the author appeared only to approve of those relationships between two women, one of whom was the typical 'invert' and the other of whom was more apparently 'straight' and feminine. The other couples referred to in the book, male and female, who did not fit this heterosexual paradigm, were somehow thought of as 'deviant' by Stephen.
Lynnie pointed out that within society at the time, the only way Stephen could see herself being accepted, was if she fell within a relationship that closely mimicked the heterosexual paradigm. This meant that she had to identify as a 'man'. Sam also pointed out that Stephen valued the fact that she had a woman's insight in writing her novels. Rosie was not 100% convinced, but conceded that she didn't have enough evidence to support her earlier claim that Stephen wanted to be a man.
There was some discussion about whether or not Radclyffe Hall had to support her argument for the recognition and acceptance of the invert by making Stephen very masculine.
Sam also pointed out that Radclyffe Hall tended to have martyr themes in quite a few of her novels. We discussed how when Stephen was trying to feel Collin's pain, she was searching for martyrdom from the beginning, and this created an expectation for her that love = pain which continued throughout her relationships.
Radclyffe Hall was herself a strict Catholic, and her way of reconciling her faith with her invert status was to believe that God created everyone for a reason, and the invert's lot was to suffer. Sal pointed out that with this logic, Stephen couldn't see any way around her suffering. She couldn't be true to herself without hurting others (e.g. Mary).
We discussed the almost maternal nature of the love between Stephen and Mary and why Radclyffe Hall portrayed it in this way. It was suggested that this was to 'normalise' or to make more acceptable their love. We noted that there was never any explicit physical contact described between them. In fact the most that was said to imply a sexual relation between them was "And that night they were not divided". Rosie's quote of the night "But let's face it, it's dirty!" (Rosie made some other hilarious comment about 'ham fisted boxes' but I can't remember for the life of me the context in which that comment was made!)
The general consensus was that everyone enjoyed the first part of the novel, particularly the part in which Stephen was growing up. However, everyone agreed that the last third of the book became "preachy" which "pissed Amy off" (but as she said, all books piss her off in some way). We agreed that we all felt rather alienated (that's a word that has to be used at least five times at every meeting) by the religious overtones. In particular we found that to be something likely to annoy people of our generation, although at the time the book was written religion was much more a part of everyday life.
Some people were disappointed at the inevitable tragic ending, but as Sally said, 'happy endings don't incite change'.
Lynnie noted that the fact that we still found so much to discuss about the book some 80 years later was something that would have made Radclyffe Hall feel as though she had achieved at least part of her goal.
Literary Lesbians Tagged
Daniela tagged us and asked us to tell her eight random facts/habits about ourselves. So here we go:
Amy used to hustle pool in high school instead of going to class. She also has slight OCD and requires the toilet paper to roll over the top - she even changes rolls at other peoples' houses. Oh, and she used to do archery.
Jude chose to have a baby on her own, although she wonders whether that's interesting or just mad.
Lynnie likes reading, loves Missy Higgins, likes long walks on the beach, and her nickname is 'Zilda'.
Sally has recently taken up stomping on towels for exercise (oh, and to mop up the water that she flooded her apartment with). Her random fact is 'don't forget the overhang on the washing machine'.
Laura started the first gay surf group in Melbourne in 2003, originally called Surfin' Gayfari, and now known as Bent Boards.
Ange can't brush her teeth standing up straight. She also once met Germaine Greer but accidently mistook her for Colleen McCullough, which didn't go down well!
Sam still hasn't lived down her fleeting moment of fame when, at the age of 10, her quote and her name was read out on The Kenny Everett Video Show. The quote was "You can pick your friends, you can pick your nose, but you can't pick your friend's nose". It was cool at the time, but not at the age of 15 when the show was repeated.
Amy used to hustle pool in high school instead of going to class. She also has slight OCD and requires the toilet paper to roll over the top - she even changes rolls at other peoples' houses. Oh, and she used to do archery.
Jude chose to have a baby on her own, although she wonders whether that's interesting or just mad.
Lynnie likes reading, loves Missy Higgins, likes long walks on the beach, and her nickname is 'Zilda'.
Sally has recently taken up stomping on towels for exercise (oh, and to mop up the water that she flooded her apartment with). Her random fact is 'don't forget the overhang on the washing machine'.
Laura started the first gay surf group in Melbourne in 2003, originally called Surfin' Gayfari, and now known as Bent Boards.
Ange can't brush her teeth standing up straight. She also once met Germaine Greer but accidently mistook her for Colleen McCullough, which didn't go down well!
Sam still hasn't lived down her fleeting moment of fame when, at the age of 10, her quote and her name was read out on The Kenny Everett Video Show. The quote was "You can pick your friends, you can pick your nose, but you can't pick your friend's nose". It was cool at the time, but not at the age of 15 when the show was repeated.