This month I’m getting my fill of a particular sort of academic study that brings together parallel examinations of several related subjects (or persons) to build a layered case for the author’s conclusions. There is often a tendency to throw in a section of random leftover topics somewhere toward the end. This sounds a bit more negative than I mean it to feel -- academic writing has some rules and structures that are quite different from a more popular approach to historic topics. But it can make it hard to recommend books like this to a general reader. And yet, if you are planning to set a piece of historic fiction in western Europe in the 17-19th centuries, you can find a wealth of intellectual background and social understandings and expectations in works like DeJean, Andreadis, and Vanita. This applies in particular if you mean to set your fiction in intellectual or literary circles.
This book, in a way, continues on from Andreadis’ examination of English uses of Sappho in the 17-18th centuries, focusing on similar topics and treatments during the Romantic and Victorian eras, but with a slightly broader focus on how Sappho (and the Virgin Mary) inspired considerations and understandings of non-normative sexuality in general, not just female homoeroticism.
And with this entry, I conclude my Pride Month Special focusing on topics relating to Sappho. Maybe I should start planning now for another special topic for next year's Pride Month. (Though, to some extent, for the Lesbian Historic Motif Project, every month is Pride Month!) Do you have any suggestions for next year's focus?
I'd also like to add a teaser that the podcast sister-project (The Lesbian Historic Motif Podcast) will be expanding in format in August, with additional content beyond my historic essays. Stay tuned for more details!
Comments