Literary Lesbians

Book group this month was a pretty quiet affair.  Sam, Ange, Sonya, Marg and Jude had dinner at The Tenth Muse in Fitzroy.  We tried to talk about the book, but conversation soon turned to more interesting topics!

First important discovery was that not all editions of the book had the extracts from the ancient text in red print.  Some of the book group members’ copies were all black print, which made it quite confusing to distinguish between the ancient text and the modern story.

Sonya thought the lesbian content was negligible and not very good.  She was hoping for some sex scenes, but although the book gave quite detailed descriptions of the heterosexual sex scenes, the lesbian sex was brushed over.

Ange was picturing Han as a gorgeous Lucy Liu type character.  Sonya thought that she was an unlikable character.  She thought that she could have been developed more like Estella in Great Expectations, who was beautiful and mean but still attractive.  Han was cold, hard, and out for herself, messed up, a tease.  Sonya was not convinced by her transition at the end.

Sonya didn’t like the moral of the story: that they had to fall in love for the purpose of parting.  Ange agreed, “I got all the way through the book, for this?!”  Marg admitted to not even finishing the book, although she did like the fact that it was a bit different to usual.

We didn’t agree that the book read like a thriller (as it said on the cover).

Sam wondered whether Boy Meets Girl (an earlier book group book) would have been improved by writing the story in the style of this book.

We hoped that future books were going to be a bit better.

Conversation drifted off to AfterEllen, Biggest Loser, MadMen, dogs, etc. etc.

Sam, Sonya, Lisa, Kat, Marg, Nicole, Ange and Bridget came along to this month’s reading group dinner.

The book was “The Danish Girl” by David Ebershoff.  The book is going to be made into a film next year and apparently Nicole Kidman will play Einar/Lili and Charleze Theron will play Greta.  (Kat pictured Greta more as Christina Ricci.)

Lisa and Marg hated the book.  The others liked it, particularly because it was a bit different from all the trashy lesbian romances that we read last year.

Marg had a problem with the book’s politics, particularly how it represented femaleness and femininity.  She thought that Einar’s transition from man to woman was not just a physical change – he was also lobotomised!  Marg described this as “no phallus, no brain” and noted that when Einar became Lili it was like he became retarded.  He gave up work and became completely dependent.  Nicole thought that he didn’t actually give up his creative work, but he transferred it from painting on canvas to creating Lili – the make up was his paint.

Marg was also disappointed with the book’s subtext about fertility being the pinnacle of femininity (represented by Lili’s fixation with being able to bear children).  Sonya noted that the title of the book was appropriate in that Einar never actually became a woman, he became a little girl.  Greta emphasizes this when she says “You’re a grown woman Lili”!

Marg also thought that that the characters were all ‘empty vessels’ and that it was difficult to connect with any of them as they had no internal life.  We agreed that this was a pity, as it would have been much more interesting if we had some insight into how Einar felt as a man, and how Lili felt in the process of becoming a woman.  For example, how did Einar feel when he was having sex with his wife after he had decided that he wanted to become a woman?  Nicole pointed out that it wouldn’t have mattered if Einar had been portrayed as an empty vessel if he had then developed an inner life upon becoming Lili.  Marg thought that all new writers’ first characters tend to be empty vessels. 

It would have been good to know more about Greta’s inner life as well, although Nicole points out that it was part of Greta’s personality not to be expressive.  She doesn’t overtly ask for help.  She writes to her brother ‘about’ Lili, but doesn’t actually engage with her feelings.  Sam was relieved when Greta finally stood up for herself and drew the line.  Marg agreed that Einar was completely self-centred and that Greta was a rescuer.  Greta was more like his parent than his wife.  Lisa thought it was convenient (Marg said unnecessary) that Teddy died.  Lisa thought that this was just to show the kind of man that Greta was interested in.  Ange thought that Greta killed off Einar for her own career.

We felt that the author was intellectually but not emotionally interested in the topics of marriage and transgender/intersexness.  Nicole was bored with all the description.  Kat thought that things were overdescribed and juxtaposed.  She kept wondering what different descriptions were supposed to be.

Lisa thought the book could have been so good, it was a great subject, but the author didn’t do it justice.  And, the font was too small!!!

Discussion then drifted off about better books:

• “The Price of Salt” (republished as “Carol”) by Patricia Highsmith
  
• “All that False Instruction” by Kerryn Higgs
  
• “Working Hot” by Mary Fallon
  
• “Pages for You” by Sylvia Brownrigg
  
• “The Hotel” by Elizabeth Bowen
  
• “Suck my Toes” by Fiona Mc Gregor (Kat asks whether this is the sequel to “Kiss my Butt”!)
  
• “Skin” by Kate Holden
  

Attendees: Sally, Ange, Lynnie, Sonya, Shelley, Jude, Lisa and Marg (author of this month’s book). We welcomed Sonya and Lisa, newbies to the Literary Lesbians.

This month we reviewed The Catch, written by our very own Literary Lesbian member Marg Vandeleur! We were in for a treat to be able to have Marg there to tell us about the writing and publishing process and character development etc. We got to ask her all sorts of nitty gritty questions and thoroughly enjoyed the evening.

Marg started out by telling us about “the process”. She started writing the book in about 1998. It took her about 3-4 years to complete and about 2 years to get published. It landed on the shelves in about 2005. Marg was very open and relaxed when talking about her book although she said during the writing phase she felt like she went over every sentence 100 times to get it perfect (as you do when you’re writing your first novel). She eventually got it published by Penguin by sending it via Hares and Hyenas*.

Marg had involvement in choosing the cover, the colours etc. The publisher came up with the image and they photo shopped it a bit. Marg argued with them about the by-line on the cover and she eventually had her way with “Letty is fishing for a baby, but does she have to hook a man?” Originally the publisher had suggested something like… “Letty wants a baby but first she’ll have to hook a man."

Ten years ago, donor insemination was much less mainstream than it is becoming today. Marg had a political agenda to try and “normalise” lesbian relationships by writing a comic romp through gay Melbourne. She tried to write it from a naïve person’s point of view (Letty) – an outsider’s view of the gay scene or the “innocent abroad”. Marg thought there were enough layers in this topic to write a fairly decent book (and we all agreed that she achieved that).

Marg was worried about LL reviewing her book as she knows how much we all love to read out the sex scenes at book group and even do a bit of amateur acting (you know who you are) and The Catch has no lesbian sex scenes in it. We forgave her for that minor flaw.

Sal loved the book and thought it became stronger in the tone and really took off after the first 60-70 pages. Marg admitted the first 70 pages were a bit slow but after Letty makes the decision to try to have a baby the book really gets going. Sal found the humour in the book once Letty started Weekly Weighers.

The fabulous chapter titles were from a real book called the Anglers Omnibus. Marg managed to track down the author who is now 94 years old to ask permission to use the chapter titles which really connected the fishing theme nicely.

Marg really took time to map out the characters and had planned the basis of the story line before commencing to write. Shelley commented that some people write like they are driving at night with headlights on, never knowing where they are headed.

Ange asked Marg if she had ever been at the birth of a baby before because she really felt the descriptions were very real and believable and Marg explained that she had.

So what were the main themes? Shelley pondered if it was desire? Marg simply stated that she was hoping to convey that “it’s better to act than not act”. She wanted to show that Letty did actually have some control on her destiny and that all Letty really wanted was love.

Marg was asked to re-write the ending, which was initially not a happy ending. Sonya said she still found the end of the book sad in a way. The insemination hadn’t worked (the ‘normalising’ hadn’t happened) and Robert was unhappy. Sal was secretly hoping that Letty would get pregnant to Robert but stay with Hayden.

Another emerging theme was that sexuality is a very fluid thing as demonstrated by Chrissie’s character. There is a hint of Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night Dream: there is a case of comedic mistaken identity (when Hayden believes Letty is a lesbian).

Other bits of inside goss from the night:
- the Leatherettes were entirely fictional
- Marg based Hayden on her first boyfriend
- Lynnie gets 60% off books through her work
- Shelley used to get 33% off vibrators through her work! (take that Lynnie!)
- Jude commented that we’d only met once in the West for book group (hint hint)
- Nicole Kidman is a hermaphrodite?
- Sally secretly loved Elle McPherson in “It’s a Girl Thing” and recommends that everyone see this movie!

The talk then moved on to the L Word, Beneath the Willow(!) and breasts, as it normally does and then we all headed home.

Thank you Marg for opening up and sharing your book with us. We are truly grateful to hear an author’s perspective and congratulations on a fine novel.

*Literary Lesbian book group members are entitled to a 10% discount at Hares and Hyenas