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Tuesday, December 6, 2016 - 07:45
As a reader, it can be easy to forget just how much power readers have to make or break the success of a book--particularly of a book that doesn't have the resources of a major publisher's promotion department. I always feel hesitant about asking my readers to serve as my publicists, but the simple fact is that when an author tells people about how wonderful her books are, it gets discounted as meaningless. When a third-party reader tells people how wonderful a book is, they're more inclined to believe it. So while I never expect my readers to promote my books, I will occasionally point out that the success of my current books has a major influence on whether you'll be given the opportunity to enjoy future ones. If that matters to you as a reader, it's important not to treat my work as some sort of guilty pleasure--to be admitted to only when pressed--but to shout out to the rest of the world what a wonderful experience they'll miss out on if they don't read these books. With that in mind, here are a few observations on the process.
There is no such thing as "over the top" when promoting a book. No one has ever been convinced to read a new author by being told, "The writing is kind of interesting," or "She's never going to be the next Ursula K. LeGuin or Brandon Sanderson, but the books are ok, I guess." People expect book recommendations to be full of intensity and passion. A luke-warm recommendation is heard as a polite way of warning readers away.
When you recommend a book, don't hand people reasons to decide to avoid it. Reviews need to include critical assessment, but when you're being an advocate for a book, focus on the things you like, on what you consider the book's strengths. Honestly, I cringe when fans of my books write things like, "Even though it's a lesbian romance, other readers might enjoy this," or "I don't usually like historic settings but this one worked for me," or "it isn't really much of a romance but I didn't mind that," or "I enjoyed this book but I wouldn't recommend it to most people because they wouldn't appreciate it properly." Talk about the specific aspects that you honestly and genuinely loved. "The worldbuilding is intricate and immersive," or "the characters are all richly individual," or "the plot went in delightfully unexpected places."
Don't pre-reject the book when people are asking for recommendations. The most important part of recommending a book is remembering to actually recommend it. I'm not saying you should act like a rec-bot and insert the recommendation randomly into every conversation. But look for connections where it matches part of what people are looking for, even if it isn't a "central case". Books like mine aren't ever going to be a "central case." They intersect too many themes for that. But most of all, I beg you, simply remember that my books exist and that you liked them. Once upon a time, there was a recommendation thread in a lesbian fiction group where a reader was specifically looking for historic/fantasy stories. After I waited patiently for a day to see if anyone would recommend the Alpennia books, I finally suggested them myself. Several posters who had previously made suggestion comments jumped in and said, "Oh yeah, I really liked Heather's books." But not one of them had thought to recommend the series themselves. Don't make Alpennia the Colonel Brandon [*] of the book world, the books everyone thinks well of but nobody remembers to talk about.
[*] Sense and Sensibility reference
At the very least, post a review-like-object somewhere online. Not everyone does Amazon reviews; not everyone does Goodreads reviews; not everyone has a review blog. But pretty much everyone who is reading this has some context online where they can say, "Hey, I just read this great book [title] by [author]. Here's what I liked about it." Make sure the title and author's name will show up correctly on searches. That sort of thing matters.
That's probably enough of a pep talk for one day. Let's have another excerpt from Mother of Souls. It's the first term of Margerit's new college for women and Serafina has been tapped to help out with the thaumaturgy lectures...
* * *
Chapter 22 - Serafina
“Mais— Serafina, I don’t understand.” The question came hesitantly from Valeir Perneld.
The hesitation in her voice was not from what they studied, for Valeir was one of Margerit’s most promising thaumaturgical finds: an auditor who heard the fluctus as choirs of angels. No, they all still stumbled over how to address each other. Margerit had declared that there would be no distinction of rank among the students. No constant reminder from mesnera to mefro of the distance between them outside these walls. And there, too, she held an awkward place. Not a teacher to be given the respect of a surname, and yet one who stood on familiar grounds with most of those who were. If the other students stumbled over addressing her as Serafina, she too stumbled to remember to address Akezze as Maisetra Mainus in their hearing.
“Yes, Valeir?” she said. “What is it?”
“How will it work to try to…to describe fluctus in pictures when I don’t see it?”
Serafina paused in laying out the drawings to answer. “Visio is the most common way of perceiving phasmata, if the word ‘common’ can be used at all. But even for visions it isn’t a simple question.”
From the corner of her eye, Serafina saw two figures slip quietly into the room. Not tardy students, but Margerit herself and a stranger in the dark clothing of a priest. It wasn’t at all uncommon for guests to observe the classes: parents who wanted to see what their daughters would be studying or simply the curious. And not surprising, perhaps, that a priest might be sent to examine what was being taught in the way of thaumaturgy. Margerit made a silent gesture to continue, so Serafina turned back to her topic.
“The depictio isn’t a true image. None of these are, any more than letters written on a page are the sound of a word.” She caught the eye of a plump, dark-haired girl at the far side of the table. “Helen, write your name on the board.” She nodded encouragingly to indicate that this was not intended as punishment.
The girl traced the letters crisply and precisely.
“Now in Greek,” she instructed.
With only the slightest hesitation, Helen wrote Ἑλένη.
“Now in Latin.”
Back to the more familiar letters: Helena.
“Now,” Serafina asked, “are those the same name?”
The students looked confused and uncertain.
“They’re not the same…” Valeir began.
Serafina returned to the dark-haired girl. “Who is your name-saint?”
“Sain-Helen,” she replied promptly.
“And if you read her life and miracles in Bartholomeus, what do you read on the page?”
Her eyes brightened in understanding and she said, “Sancta Helena.”
“Is that two saints or one?” Serafina asked. This time she directed the question to the whole cluster of girls.
“One,” they chorused.
Serafina nodded to indicate they’d done well. “So here you have a depictio that Maisetra Sovitre made during the Mystery of Saint Mauriz.” She returned to the images they’d been studying. “If I had represented that same moment of the ceremony—” She cast her mind back, though it hardly mattered in detail. “—I would have called the currents here more of a reddish-pink where she has green. I would have said it pulsed slightly, which she hasn’t indicated. And these lines here at the side are meant to indicate the aural part, but I rarely hear things during mysteries. Someone else who is a tactile sensitive might describe the same thing as a breath of warm air followed by a prickling as if an insect were walking on their skin.”
Two of the girls shuddered at that description.
“And yet the mystery is the same. The grace of God through Saint Mauriz is the same.” Serafina chose those words for the unknown priestly observer. Margerit was usually the one who insisted on the language of charis and miracles.
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Mother of Souls View comments (0)
Monday, December 5, 2016 - 08:29
We've come to the largest and most diverse set of LHMP tags: "People/Works/Events." It's taken me a while just to start organizing how I'm going to present these, and I've only barely started writing up the brief descriptions to accompany each one. So today's post is just a high-level overview. (I.e., I don't have anything else to post on LHMP day, so this is what you get.)
Overall, there are three major types of information in these tags: historic individuals who had some sort of lesbian-like characteristic (remember that this doesn't necessarily mean anything about their specific desires or orientation); authors who wrote non-fictional (at least, purportedly non-fictional) works addressing some sort of lesbian-like characteristic or who wrote relevant literature falling into a variety of specific sub-groups; and works of literature that include lesbian-like themes or characters.
When I went through to assign sub-groupings based on emergent themes, here's what I came up with. Some of these are going to get merged with other sub-groupings as I work through them. My analysis style always goes through this sort of evaluation as I start categorizing and grouping data. In order to make the number of tags more manageable, I've taken a few different approaches. For example, if an author wrote a large number of relevant works, I may tag those discussions with the author's name alone, whereas if they only wrote one or a few, each work may have a tag that includes the title.
Historic Individuals
- Communities - Intended to identify specific institutions that have relevance to the project, e.g., specific women's communities. With only one item currently, I'll find a different way to categorize this.
- Court Case - In most cases, trials that concerned lesbian activity include a personal name that can be used as a tag. But this sub-group also includes more anonymous descriptions. As I have a "court case" tag in the Topics tag-set, this has been something of a fall-back grouping and many examples are located elsewhere.
- Crossdressing
- General - Examples of crossdressing (including partial or overt use of gendered clothing without the intent to pass as the other gender) that don't fall in a more specific category.
- Female Husband - Examples of either passing women or trans men who married (or attempted to marry) women.
- Military Crossdressing - Examples of women who crossdressed as men specifically in order to enter the military. Includes some examples where the clothing was simply functional and there was no attempt to conceal gender.
- Passing/Trans - Non-military, non-marital examples of crossdressing where the intent was to live as the presented gender. Includes some cases that are best interpreted as transgender identity.
- Passionate Friendship - Women whose lives are relevant due to their participation in, or opinions about passionate/romantic friendships between women. In general, if there is a specific identifiable partnership involved that is presented to the world as a romantic couple, the sub-group "Romantic Pair" is used instead. The dividing line is fuzzy.
- Romantic Pair - Women involved in a committed long-term partnership with each other, or a relationship that is presented as marriage-like or is clearly a sexual relationship. While examples in this group overlap with a number of other sub-groups, the emphasis here is on identifying specific known "couples".
- Reputed Lesbian - Women who were accused of, rumored to be, or provide tangential evidence of having been involved in lesbian sexual relationships. In general, this sub-group is used when no specific partnership is identifiable (or when there are multiple), or when the accusation may not have been true.
- Sex Between Women - I may merge these few examples into other categories, but it was set up as covering women where there is clear evidence of sexual activity but where there isn't a specific relationship and/or there's good reason not to interpret it as deriving from sexual orientation.
Authors
- Descriptive Work - Covers non-fiction texts that intend to describe aspects of the world and society, e.g., medical texts, descriptions of cultural practices, records of specific events if I don't have a personal name associated with the event. The concept of "non-fiction" here is from the point of view of the author and intended readership, so it includes things like astrology.
- Gender/Feminism - Authors (of literature or non-fiction) whose work addresses broad general themes of feminism or gender issues. I see that I've used this mostly for a separate author tag when that author's specific works are numerous and may also be listed individually.
- Philosophy - Works addressing theoretical issues of gender and sexuality that don't really fall in the "description of the world as it is" category. Includes religious commentary on issues of sexuality.
- Sex Between Women - Literary authors (usually when listed apart from specific works) whose work centers around depictions of lesbian sexual activity.
- *Gender Transgression - I only have a couple of items tagged with this and will probably find a different grouping they fit into. It was intended to identify works concerning perceptions of gender categories that don't necessarily directly address sexuality.
Works of Literature
- Crossdressing - A large body of works involving women disguised (to some degree of success) as men. See also "Gender Confusion" for a more specific subset.
- Military Crossdressing - I may merge this small category with the general crossdressing group. In general, literary women who enter the military in disguise also fall in a more salient group (e.g., Gender Confusion).
- Gender Confusion - This covers works where gender disguise (either by women as men or by men as women) creates the appearance or (temporary) understanding of romantic or erotic attraction between women. Note that this isn't meant to indicate that the characters are confused about their gender.
- Erotic Flirtation - Works where women engage in erotic interactions or banter that are not presented in context as actual sexual encounters.
- Communities - The sole example of a fictional community organized around lesbian sexual activity will probably be merged into some other relevant grouping.
- Passionate/Romantic Friendship - Literary themes of passionate friendship between women. This sub-group covers a wide range of context and degrees of intensity, from devoted platonic friendship through erotic desire. In general, if a specific established couple is involved or if a sexual relationship is indicated, the characters will fall under "Same-sex Love" instead.
- Predatory Erotics - Literary themes of erotic desire where it is portrayed as predatory, disfunctional, or pathological.
- Same-Sex Love - Literary depictions of romantic/sexual couples covering a broad range of expressions but where the relationship is clearly distinct from platonic friendship.
- Sexual Education - Depictions (generally pornographic) of women engaging in sex together where the activity is presented as sexual initiation in preparation for heterosex, rather than as being driven by lesbian erotic desire.
- Sexual Innuendo - Literary depictions of an understanding of the potential for sexual activity between women, but where no specific characters are engaging in it.
- Poetry: Love Between Women - Poems in the voice of a woman expressing love for another woman, or that make reference to romantic love between women. In general, I have only included examples where the language of romantic attraction is unmistakable, rather than all expressions of admiration or affection.
- Poetry: Sex Between Women - Poems that reference or describe sexual activity between women.
Other - These are sub-groups that don't fit clearly into the above three categories. They're scheduled for re-analysis and merging with other sub-groups.
- Transvestite Saints - This sub-group awkwardly straddles the historical and literary categories as many of the relevant biographies are almost certainly fictional. I'll probably move them under the historical group anyway.
- Visual Art - While I have a "visual arts" tag in the Topics group, this is meant to tag specific artists who created lesbian-relevant work. Although I currently have only one tag here, in part that's because I haven't focused much on this topic.
So stay tuned for the actual tag-lists in this set as I write the up!
Saturday, December 3, 2016 - 09:53
Thank you all for entering! The lucky winner is Zara. Please contact me through the website contact form for infomation on how to claim your book.
Publications:
Mother of SoulsFriday, December 2, 2016 - 06:45
As has become custom, while in NYC for Thanksgiving, I took in the show playing at the theater where Lauri is house manager. This time it was "The Encounter" created, directed, and solo-performed by Simon McBurney. This work clearly falls in the general category of "experimental theater" so I'm going to come at this review from several different angles. The synopsis from Playbill gives the most basic background of the work: "In 1969, Loren McIntyre, a National Geographic photographer, found himself lost among the people of the remote Javari Valley in Brazil. It was an encounter that was to change his life: bringing the limits of human consciousness into startling focus. Conceived as a theatrically aural experience, the audience is drawn directly into the middle of the action."
Starting with the technical angle: the aural environment is a major element of the performance--one might say the most important element aside from the script. Each audience member is given a set of headphones and--after a brief introduction--all sound, both live and recorded, is channeled through the sound system. The 360-degree stereo aspect is regularly played with, not merely to position sound effects behind the listener and provide the illusion of movement and location from imagined characters, but sometimes to deliberately contradict McBurney's physical position to reinforce the subjectivity of perception that is a major theme of the play. The physical staging is spare: a desk, a mannequin head on a post that stands in for the viewer/listener (as part of the sound pick-up system) and also stands in for various characters being interacted with. A handful of other props, such as water bottles and a mass of video tape, that are repurposed at various times.
The story itself is told in constantly shifting layers: McBurney the playwright interacting with the bedtime rituals of his daughter, McBurney the playwright collecting anecdotes others tell him about the photographer McIntyre, McBurney the narrator telling McIntyre's framing story, and McBurney the actor as McIntyre in the midst of his adventure. Shifts between the layers not only serve to comment on the act of storytelling and the ways in which narrative is bent to differing purposes, but also serve to break up some of the more intense scenes and "reset" the audience's emotional baseline.
All this fictionalization and subjectivity created (for me) a cloud of confusion over what messages the performance was meaning to communicate. For me the deepest story--that of the photographer McIntyre--kept feeling like it boiled down to, "white dude disrupts the lives of indigenous tribe and makes the whole thing about his own personal spiritual transformation, including attributing Mystical Powers and Spiritual Wisdom to the Magical Natives." But at the same time, the version of the story being presented on stage had gone through several transmissions and interpretations, so it was difficult to tell what aspects reflected McIntyre's view on his experience, versus how he presented that experience to others, versus how those others interpreted that story, versus what McBurney felt would make a compelling stage performance.
The various layers of narrative framing kept bringing my attention back to the play's commentary on the act of storytelling. From one angle, McIntyre's experience is set up almost as a portal fantasy or hallucinatory vision. The portal framing begins when he is dropped by plane in the middle of the Amazon jungle, encounters two members of the Mayoruna tribe, and follows them through the trackless vegetation until he loses his way and has no choice but to keep following them. The portal is exited later, after a climactic ecstatic ritual, when a sudden violent storm and flood leaves McIntyre floating downriver, separated from his Mayoruna companions and returning to western civilization.
But conversely, these distancing techniques that move the events of the story farther and farther into fictional territory are contradicted by the play's conclusion, which presents the playwright as having traveled to meet with the Mayoruna and discuss the performance with them. The problem is: by the time we get to this part of the performance, I've settled into an assumption that no specific element of the script can be taken as factual. So even this purported touch-back to the real people being depicted on stage (well, for a value of "depicted" that doesn't involve actors or physical presence) feels just as fictional as everything else.
So. What did I think? The work is technically impressive and memorable, but it feels exploitative. I keep coming back to "white dude makes encounter with indigenous people all about his own subjective spiritual transformation in which they are primarily stage props." In this light, the staging as a one-man show that seems designed to center McBurney's stage-chewing abilities is a perfect mirror.
Thursday, December 1, 2016 - 07:15
When you read Stephanie Burgis's guest-post below, I think my regular readers will understand immediately why I'm delighted to have her as a guest, and why I think anyone who enjoys my writing will probably love hers as well. I haven't read her newest book Congress of Secrets yet, but I thoroughly enjoyed her previous work Masks and Shadows (see review) and gave it one of my highest accolades: passing the "treadmill test" with flying colors! (Since I read fiction mostly at the gym, the "treadmill test" is, "Did I blow right past my workout target because I was so engrossed in the book?") Although the new book has similar themes and setting to Masks and Shadows, they are independent of each other.
--Heather
Finding the Fantasy in History – Guest Blog by Stephanie Burgis
The best thing I ever did for my writing career was to go to grad school. I didn’t get an MFA in Creative Writing, though. Instead, I studied opera history and politics, and the way those two things intertwined.
There are lots of obvious reasons why it’s good for any fiction writer to study history. You get to see the way the world really works (sometimes over and over and over again, in distressing repetition). You get to see the (sometimes unimaginable) ways real people have schemed and fought for power, as well as breathtaking acts of real heroism, generosity and self-sacrifice, too.
But sometimes, you get another bonus, as a fantasy writer. Sometimes, you get magical ideas handed to you.
As I got ready to write this guest blog, I kept thinking back to the first line in the Acknowledgements of Lois McMaster Bujold’s wonderful book The Curse of Chalion (which is set in a fantasy world based on Renaissance Spain): “The author would like to thank Professor William D. Phillips, Jr., for History 3714, the most useful four hundred dollars and ten weeks I ever spent in school.”
In Bujold’s case (if I’m remembering this story right, from an interview I read many years ago!) she took a course on Spanish history just for fun, in mid life, and it sparked a whole new setting for her next few books and also a basic historical setup that she could turn into something astonishingly unique and powerful. (I am a huge Bujold fan in general, but I love her Chalion books best of all!)
Her kingdom of Chalion bears a number of resemblances to Renaissance Spain, just as her fiery young heroine has a lot of overlap with Spain’s own historical Queen Isabella – but Bujold made that world her own with the addition of an all-new, original and convincing religious system that includes five gods taking an active part in history and directly affecting all the characters and their struggles.
…So it started with history, and became something new. That’s a fabulous way of doing it!
But sometimes, it’s just a matter of finding what was already there.
In my own case, I spent my years as a PhD student studying opera and politics in late eighteenth-century Vienna and Eszterháza…which meant, inevitably, that I read a lot about the many different secret societies that were rife in Vienna in that time period. Most famously, Mozart’s The Magic Flute is full of Masonic symbolism – and the provocative chapter title of one academic book I read, when studying Mozart’s operas, was: “Why did the Freemasons Visit Hell?”
Of course, that visit never literally happened. The author of that book was only discussing a rite in which they symbolically visited the underworld.
But as a fantasy reader and writer, of course I immediately thought: What if it wasn’t just symbolic? What would that have been like?
Vienna also happened to have a number of active alchemists working in the late eighteenth century. Some of them, of course, were proto-scientists…but others were fabulously successful showmen who held audiences rapt with their astonishing “supernatural” summonings.
As a lifelong fantasy reader, it didn’t take long for me to wonder: what if those weren’t just fraudulent performances? What if that kind of mysterious, supernatural alchemy actually worked?
And I was at an academic conference at Oxford University (run by the Society for Eighteenth Century Studies) when, just for fun, I attended a talk about Sir Isaac Newton, who had nothing whatsoever to do with my own work. I had attended a lot of talks that day, and I’d listened with more or less interest to lectures on dozens of different aspects of the eighteenth-century world, trying to pick out any details that might be relevant to my PhD thesis, and also daydreaming a little about where I might head out for dinner afterward, until…
…Halfway through that particular talk, I suddenly perked up, stopped daydreaming, and started frantically scribbling notes on my program book, as the speaker discussed Newton’s theories of the aether, the material and the immaterial worlds, and the ethereal medium that (according to that model) hovered in-between the two worlds, just beyond the limits of our vision.
Those theories went on to become the direct basis for the work done by one of my alchemists in Masks and Shadows, when he summons very real and dangerous elementals from the immaterial world into the luxuriant palace of Eszterháza, with bloody results.
My latest novel, Congress of Secrets, is set 35 years later, at the Congress of Vienna in 1814, and it’s a standalone novel without any recurring characters– but the same kinds of alchemy have been going on behind the scenes in Vienna ever since the events of Masks and Shadows. Unfortunately, the head of secret police has figured out his own methods...as my powerful, driven heroine knows only too well.
But she’ll risk anything to get her father back – even resorting to the same dark alchemy that devoured her childhood.
...The same kind that came to me from that one Oxford conference.
It wasn’t what I’d expected to get out of that academic gathering – but when you start studying history, you never know what you’ll find!
In my case, I found two novels full of dark, alchemical magic – and it all came out of looking at dry historical facts and wondering… What if???
Stephanie Burgis grew up in East Lansing, Michigan, spent 2 years in Vienna, and now lives in Wales, surrounded by castles and coffee shops. She is the author of two historical fantasy novels for adults (Masks and Shadows and Congress of Secrets), a trilogy of MG Regency fantasy novels (the Kat, Incorrigible trilogy), and over 30 short stories in various magazines and anthologies. You can find out more and read excerpts of all of her books at: www.stephanieburgis.com
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Guest PostsWednesday, November 30, 2016 - 07:03
Give-away!
Bella Books has authorized me to do a few e-book give-aways to celebrate the release of Mother of Souls--and entice, new readers, of course! I'll be spreading them out around various online venues, so keep your eyes peeled for chances. In fact, let's do a giveaway right here and now! Comment on this post (must be on the alpennia.com website, not any place this is reposted or RSS-fed) and I'll select a random winner on Saturday. (Note: winner must set up a Bella Books account to redeem, but this only involves giving them an e-mail address, no financial information.) And if you already have a copy, you can transfer your win to someone else as a gift! (As long as they're willing to follow the redemption requirement.)
Comments are still going through manual moderation, so don't worry if it doesn't appear immediately. Check back on Saturday for the winner!
* * *
Margerit Sovitre knew that setting up a women's college would be a complex, intense, and difficult project. But she didn't expect the opening of the first term to be accompanied by an avalanche of other disasters.
Chapter Twenty-One: Margerit
On returning home to Tiporsel House, there was barely a moment for Margerit to sense something was amiss. It was in the way the footman at the door glanced sideways with an ostentatious air of not telling her something important. But there, just beyond him, was Barbara, pacing the floor with a scowl and clearly waiting for her arrival.
Barbara jerked her head in the direction of the corridor to the back of the house and led the way, saying, “I’ve already sent a messenger to your aunt and uncle.”
Margerit’s stomach clenched. “To Aunt Bertrut?”
“To Chalanz, to the Fulpis. Best to reassure them with no delay. I took the liberty of suggesting that if the matter hasn’t gone beyond all hope of repair, it might make sense to put it about that the visit was planned.” Barbara paused at the closed door to the office. “I’ve left the scolding for you.”
The confusion resolved itself. Margerit slipped through the door and shut it behind her.
The figure that stood nervously before the small hearth might have been taken for a boy except that the cap that had hidden her tumbling riot of chestnut curls was now clutched and twisted in her hands. Margerit could guess the rest of the story from the ill-fitting brown wool coat and trousers—respectable enough not to provoke questions about a young man traveling alone on a public coach—and the small valise at her feet, barely large enough for the most basic necessities. Knowing her cousin, the first of those necessities were her journals. The stricken look on the girl’s face suggested either that Barbara had not been honest about the scolding or that her cousin had grown mindful of the enormity of her situation.
“Iulien Fulpi, what are you doing here?” Margerit demanded, seizing her cousin by the shoulders and shaking her violently. She wanted desperately to embrace her instead, relieved at safe passage through hazards only imagined now that they were past. “You’re too old to be running wild! What were you thinking?”
Iuli’s mouth quivered. “You promised.”
Publications:
Mother of SoulsTuesday, November 29, 2016 - 11:00
I'm swapping around the Tuesday and Wednesday blogs this week due to the disruptions of vacation travel. In March 1864, Abiel is spending much of his time escorting troops and prisoners from place to place. Arrangements for his promotion continue as well as plans to rejoin his original regiment. (As we will see next month, those plans fell through for reasons beyond his control.) And in this midst of all this, there is time to enjoy and comment on some more theatrical performances in Washington. Abiel's army career won't be all plays and fine dining by any means, but it's an interesting window on the contradictions. One of the more intriguing escort excursions is noted on the 15th, involving a prisoner whose behavior Abiel is so confident of that he not only removes the man's leg-irons, but allows him a "visit to his cousin," which appears to be a euphemism for a visit to a house of ill repute.
* * *
[PUNCTUATION AND SPELLING ARE COPIED FROM THE ORIGINALS. EDITORIAL COMMENTS ARE IN BOLD TYPE.]
Diary: March 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 20, 21, 22, 23
Letter: March 23, 1864 - Theatrical reviews, dealing with a drunken soldier
Diary: March 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 30, 31
March 1st
Day cold, snowed.
March 2nd
Day clear & warm, snow nearly all gone. Very mudy. Answered Uncle John's letter tonight.
March 4th
Day clear & warm. There is 12 men in camp to go to North Carolina or Virginia as soon as there is enough to make a good squad. I shall be sent with them to Fortress Monroe.
March 5th
Day clear & warm. Dr Hunt wrote to George O. Jones Esq of Albany, New York for me, recommending a promotion to Lieutenant or Captain. He wrote a splendid letter. I took a copy to retain, so if it should come to nothing, I can retain it for a reccommendation of another kind.
Sunday March 6th 1864
Day cold & cloudy. Dr Hunt left for Columbus, Ohio last evening. He is a very fine officer and I hated to see him go. Looks like snowing to night.
Tuesday 8th
Rained nearly all day.
I wrote a letter to Miss A. M. Porter. Colonel started last night for home on leave.
Wednesday 9th
Clear and warm.
This evening a note came up from Major Woods, saying that a boat would leave the Coal Wharf at 7 A.M. tomorrow and would take any men we had for Fort Monroe. Captain Crawford was in town and I could not find Major Johnson, Invalid Corps who is commanding during the Colonel's absence. So I ordered the men to be got ready with four days rations and to be reported at the office at 5 A.M. [on] the 10th. There is 65 duty men and 25 deserters. I then went over to the Captain's quarters and wrote on Major Woods' note what I had done, and that if he wanted to see me about getting them off in the morning to send his orderly to wake me up when he returned, which he will about midnight.
Thursday March 10th
Commenced to rain about 9 A.M. and has continued to do so all day. Henry Kulp came into the barrack this morning about 2 A.M. Said the Captain was back and wanted to see me. I went over and he made out an order for me to take charge of them [i.e., the men to be sent] to Fortress Monroe and then return. I came over to the office, built a fire, washed, and when I got warm made a copy of the order for the clerk to copy in the book. I opened the "Special Order Book" so as to put [the] order where it would have to be copied and what should I see but an order by Major Johnson for Lieutenant Burrill to do the same thing, viz take charge of the men. Oh how glad I felt! I did not want to go. It appears after I got through looking for the Major he came into the office and made arrangements to send the Lieutenant. When I came back to the office, he was gone, so I did not see him at all. General U.S. Grant has been appointed Lieutenant General and is now at Washington. We heard a great deal of firing arround & sent to Department Head Quarters to see what it was about. It was to celebrate the passage of the Emancipation Act by the Virginia legislature.
March 11th 1864
Rained nearly all day. I received a letter from Samuel [i.e., Abiel's father]. He is well but his wife is very sick. He says he will buy a yoke of cattle this spring and go to work on his farm. He wants to get money enough to buy a plough. Warns me against lending money to John. Says he is a snake in the grass.
March 12th
Day clear and warm. I expect the Colonel back tomorrow. Had the office all scrubed out. It looks as neat as can be. Nothing of importance occured.
March 13th Sunday
Clear and warm A.M. Showery P.M.
I went out to Munson's Hill, Bailey's Crossroad & Ball's Farm of which we used to read so much in the papers when the Army of the Potomac was laying here. From Munson's Hill--which is nearly ten miles from the capitol but still it can be plainly seen (so can about a half of the city and the country for miles arround)--the view is beautiful. In future years a monument will probably be erected on this hill and our children will visit it and, while gazing on the surrounding landscape, remember how their fathers collected on these hills to protect Liberty and sweep slavery from the country. [This may refer to when Union troops were routed at Ball's Bluff 1861.] On our return, we passed Clouds Mills, quite a romantic spot in a deep glen surrounded by woods and rocks. I had no idea there was so romantic a spot any where near here. Had a regular system of April showers this afternoon. Since dark, it has grown quite cold. Wind N.W.
March 14th
Day clear and cool. I have my orders made out to take charge of a prisoner and conduct him to Ft Monroe then return.
March 15th
Day clear and cold. I received my man and started for Washington with ironed. [sic - "with leg irons?"] I got my transportation and when I went to the depot to procure a ticket found that it only called for one man. I had to go way back and go through the whole business again. I saw Orville Clark at the office. On our return, my prisoner wanted to stop and see his cousin at North 28 Street. [Note: "see his cousin" appears to be a euphemism for "visit a whorehouse."] It is a very clean neat place and the girls belonging to it look finely. He kissed them all around and seemed very sorry to part with them, which I have no doubt he was. Some of then commenced to pull me arround a little--set on my lap etc. I just quietly resisted them and as soon as my man was through his adieus, started. At Baltimore, found I was too late for the Old Point boat [and] would have to wait until tomorrow at 5 P.M. So went to Gilmours, got our supper, then went to Holliday Street Theatre. Saw Mrs D. P. Bowers play “Leah the forsaken" or "The Jewish maiden" played splendidly. Miss Lucille Western is playing the same thing at Front Street, so giving the public a chance to judge which is the best. I then came here (Fountain Hotel), took a room and shall stay all night.
[Note: It isn't clear what Abiel is doing with his prisoner during all this, although "our supper" suggests they were together at that point. Did the prisoner accompany him to the theater and in "walking through the town" the next day? He notes later that he didn't require the man to wear leg irons after leaving Washington, so there was some level of trust.]
March 16th
Day clear and cold. Froze last night. Got up this morning about 8, had breakfast at Gilmours, and spent the rest of the day in walking through the town. At the appointed hour, took the Adelade for the Forts, towards which we are now steering as fast as possible.
March 17th
Clear & cold. Got to Old Point at 7 A.M. Took my prisoner up and turned him over to the Provost Marshall. Made him put the irons on before I took him in the office. I did not require him to wear them after leaving Washington; he was such a good fellow. Went to a saloon to get my breakfast, saw a tipsy citizen who refused to let me pay for it but did it himself. Want[ed] me to drink with him, but I would not, but gave him my hand. Bored myself to death waiting for the boat to return to Baltimore, which it did at 5 P.M. Got aboard and am now seated in her saloon feeling very comfortable, which is more than many of the rest of the passengers can say, for the bay is very rough and they have some accounts with Neptune to settle.
March 18th At Camp
Not so cold as yesterday. Clear. Got to Baltimore at 6 A.M. Went to the [Soldier's] Rest [and] got breakfast. Visited the Quarter Master to get transportation to Washington. Started on the 8.40 train. When I arrived there, went to see if the camp had been paid. Found it had not. Walked out. Boys glad to see me back. Captain Crawford home on leave. A billiard table up in camp. Had a game this noon and this evening. Played again. Feel very tired. Found a letter from John. People all well. Also one from my sister. All sick but her. She does not want me to go back to the regiment.
March 20th
Cold. The above notice (newspaper clipping) came out in the papers today. Corporal Fraynor and three others were captured by guerillas, taken into the woods, and two guards placed over them. The boys watched their chance and sprung on their guards. Took their arms from them and shot them and also wounded a Lieutenant and brought him in with two other prisoners. This was certainly brave, for men without arms and outnumbered to kill two of their guards, capture two and a Lieutenant. This took place last Monday. The next day after, the Sergeant and myself were out on Munson's Hill. We came back through a thick wood and very gloomy kind of place. I had no idea guerillas were laying arround loose so near to us or I should not have felt so comfortable. It was so cold I did not go walking to day.
Monday 21th
Cold. Received a letter from Miss Porter. She writes very pleasantly.
March 22th Parole Camp
Day very cold. I got orders to take charge of 11 men and bring them to this place. It commenced snowing at sundown and is now the worst night of the season. One of the men was so drunk when I got here he could not stir. I took him by the collar and draged him through the aisle and threw him off into a snowbank, just as they were starting. I turned my men over to the Officer of the day and got a receipt for them. The officer then took me down to the sutlers and we had an oyster supper and then went up to his quarters. We have had two or three games of seven up and a smoke. He has just showed me where to go to bed. He has gone out to see the lights are all out.
Wednesday 23rd
Day cold A.M. Warm P.M. The officer of the guard woke me up, according to promise, in time to take the 6.30 A.M. train. Still snowing and blowing and very cold. A Negro regiment was camped near Parole Camp and, cold as it was last night, they only had sheter tents without stoves or fire. [Note: not sure if "sheter" should be "shelter" or "sheeter"?] I bet there was more than one frozen limb this morning. I came on the Washington. Washed myself and took breakfast at the "Rest," then walked out to camp. The Colonel told me that Colonel North, the New York state agent, was over here and wanted to see me. He says he will give me a letter to him tomorrow and let me go over to town. Wrote to my sister tonight.
LETTER
Head Quarters Rendezvous of Distribution Va
March 23" 1864
Dear Susan
When I headed this letter, I expected to send it to father but have changed my mind and also the destination of this letter. I received yours of the 12th inst[ant] just as I was starting for Fort Monroe with some men. Just as I received one last summer from you when I was starting on the same trip.
I had a very strong notion of going to the regiment when I started, but Colonel McKelvy did not want me to go yet, so I came back. I went and returned by the way of Baltimore. While there, went to the Holiday Street theatre to see Mrs D.P. Bowers play "The Jewish maiden" or "Leah the forsaken." She is a splendid actress and acquitted herself admirably. Still I like Miss Lucille Western much better in that play, for her voice is so much more pleasant. Mrs. Bowers has been on the stage so long that her voice is rather too harsh. Sounds almost like that of a man. Both of these ladies are playing in Baltimore now, Miss W. at Front Street and Mrs B. at Holiday. They are both playing the same piece ("Leah the forsaken") and are to play it every night for a week so as to give the Theatre-going public a chance to judge which of them is the best, by going to see first one then the other. I have seen Miss Western in "East Lyme" and one or two other pieces. [Note: This is a transcription error for "East Lynne".] I believe her the best actress in America. Edwin Forrest, the great tragedian, has an engagement at one of Washington theatres for six weeks for which he is to receive ($9000.00) nine thousand dollars. I must see him once or perhaps more than once while he is here. I can get a pass and the countersign whenever I want to stay all night.
I came from Annapolis today. I was down there yesterday with some papers and men. I did not get there until dark. Oh! how bitter cold it was. We have had some very cold weather this winter but I have not felt so chilled since I have been in the service. The wind was blowing from the north and it was snowing very fast. One of my men got some whiskey on the cars and was so drunk he would not obey my orders. while I was taking [talking?] to him, the cars started from the station where my men were getting off. I caught the bell rope and gave it a pull for them to stop, which they did. The conducter came running to the rear to see what was the matter, saying he would give five dollars to know who pulled the rope. One of the men told him it was me. He started for me, but my men closed up behind me and he backed out. I took the fellow who was drunk by the shoulders, gently laid him on his back in the aisle. Then took him by the collar and drew him from one end of the car to the other and threw him off into a snow bank. Then jumped off myself and let the cars go on. The fellow began to think I was not a person to be fooled with a great deal, so he allowed himself to be led up to Parole Camp, which was only a few rods from where we left the cars. When we got there, I ordered him to be put in the Guard House.
I turned the rest of the men over to the proper officer, and the accepted the invitation of the Officer of the day to go down with him and some officers of the 94th New York Volunteers to an oyster supper. We had a good time. Then I went with the Officer of the day to his quarters and slept with him. I wanted to come away on the first train in the morning, so the Officer of the Guard who has to set up all night said he would wake me in time to take it. I was afraid he would forget it, but he did not. When I got up, I found the snow six inches deep on the level and the wind still blowing great guns. Some of the guard were almost frozen. I got to camp about 10 a.m. Since noon it has been very warm. The snow finds the sun rather too much for it, so it is turning into water as fast as possible.
I had not heard the news which your letter brought me, but was expecting to. You need not fear about losing your first place in my affections by the recent addition to our circle of relations, but of this matter the least said the better. Whose name did you send for the little stranger?
Father must live on his land, or have some of his family on it, or his claim to the ownership is forfeited. He could live on it and work some other land on shares if he so pleased, but I cant see what object he would have in that, unless it was that he, by this means, gets a team and tools furnished to work it with. These, you know, would cost him deal of money, which he probably has not got to spare this season.
Tell Janey that Oscar says he does not feel his loss very much, but he thinks McClara will not say the same. I am sorry you are all so unfortunate about colds when I am so lucky. I dont know why it is, but I have not had but one cold this winter and that did not last long. Usualy I have one all winter. It must come hard on mother she is so old and feeble. I hope she is better now.
My kind regards to all. Your loving brother,
Bijou
(written along edge of first page)
Dear sister, I have just read my letter over and find that in my desire to get a good deal on one sheet I have made it sound cold, which I do not like. It needs warmth, so I will put it in. I love you all a big heap: mother, Josey, Janey all, and you. Maybe - I will have a good kiss all arround when I get home - even to the little lap dog. Yours ever,
Bijou
(written along edge of last page)
Have you got so you can read my running hand yet? Please tell me in your next if you know how old mother was when she died.
Yours, B.
DIARY
Thursday 24th
Day clear and cold. I went over to see Colonel North today. He took my name, company, regiment, and place of residence. He is somewhat acquainted at Andover with the Bundeys, and Crusen spoke to me very kindly and said he would tend to my case. Frank Basset I rather think is trying to get a commish, for the colonel spoke to me of him. The 39th Veteran Volunteers of Illinois came to our camp today and are going to camp near us.
Friday 25th
Rained all day. The 25th Ohio Veteran Volunteers came today and have temporary quarters with us. Several regiments are to be sent here shortly.
Sat 26th
Cold and rainy. The 24th Massachussetts Veteran Volunteers came in and were quartered in the barracks temporarily.
Sun 27th
Day warm and clear. I took an idea into my head that I could sketch of the forts and hills beyond the camp. I never had tried such a thing before, but I took my book pencil and piece of paper and went up near for Barnard. And looking off across the plain to the hills beyond, took the picture. Sergeant says, "bully for the first time."
[There is a reproduction of the drawing. I don't have an electronic file at the moment and need to go back to the paper copy and see how good an image I can pull.]
Monday 28th
Warm and clear, consequently pleasant. I wrote to father. The Divisions are now at work making out new rolls, for the old ones are wrong and we cannot get our pay on them. We have to make a lot of rolls for every regiment mustered. It will take about seven hundred. There is only three hundred men mustered for pay, but in that some 200 regiments are represented, and for each regiment we have to make triplicate rolls.
Tuesday 29th
Cloudy A.M. Rained P.M. I am at work recording the receipts of Parole Prisoners that were here last summer. I find in comparing the book kept at the Receiving Office with the books of the Camp that a good many men were received that are not accounted for by the latter. I am now trying to get some account of them. It is raining tonight. Wind east.
Wednesdav 30th
Rained and snowed all day. The latter melted as fast as it fell. The Pay Rolls of the 2nd Division are done. Over three hundred and sixty separate rolls. It was a big job. I received a letter from O.L. Barney today. He will attend college next winter again. Say[s] Joseph Potter is dangerously sick. It makes me feel very anxious, so I have written to my sister to inform me of his present health at once. I also have a letter from Barton, the prisoner I took to Fort Monroe a short time ago. He says he is all right with the regiment. I hope he is, for he appeared to be a bully fellow. I have been very busy all day. The Colonel reposes a great deal of confidence in me, and so I find plenty to do.
March 31st
Rainly all day. Colonel went over to Washington and when he came back this evening he was prety tight. He knows enough not to transact any business while in that state. He came in the office and signed one paper, but when he went out he told me not to send it out. But as it was important that it should be tended to tonight, I did send it.
Major category:
LaForge Civil War DiariesMonday, November 28, 2016 - 06:34
Today’s tag-list essay finishes up the “Miscellaneous Tags” group, covering the topics of medical/physiological topics and tags for specific genres of source material. Entries include things like:
- essentialism - The debate between understanding homosexuality as an inborn orientation versus a chosen or socially-conditioned behavior exists as far back as the records go. In general, the default is to view it as chosen (e.g., as “sin”) or as a context-specific social role (e.g., “romantic friendship”), therefore I have only tagged sources when they give evidence for understanding it as an “essential” inborn aspect of personality.
- artistic representation - This tag is used for discussing visual art depicting sex between women or lesbian characters from literature.
- court case - This tag identifies court records of legal cases involving either the suspicion or reality of lesbian sex.
The remained category of tags is the largest one: people, publications, and events. This will include specific historic or literary figures, including both women associated with lesbian-like motifs and authors (of any gender) who wrote on relevant topics. It includes specific publications of relevance, and also more rarely institutions or specific historic events that are of interest to the Project. Many of the tags in this last group are used rarely (some only once) and new items are added regularly. So once I set up the person/publication/event tag essays according to broad themes, I’ll probably update them silently in the future.
Saturday, November 26, 2016 - 18:00
Lesbian Historic Motif Podcast - Episode 4 - Bosom Sex
(Originally aired 2016/11/26 - listen here)
[Note: Spelling follows the original in all direct quotations from the correspondence.]
It’s rare to have access to the internal emotional lives of women in history. Personal correspondence can give us a glimpse of the complex and often contradictory thoughts of women whose lives diverged from expected paths. But it’s not uncommon for such correspondence to be lost after their deaths. Letters may simply be discarded as trash. Or family members may destroy them in order to protect the reputations of the dead. In American history, there is a similar difficulty in finding the self-told stories of the African-American community in its early years. So the correspondence of Addie Brown and Rebecca Primus is doubly valuable for the story it tells.
Addie and Rebecca were black women, both born in the mid 19th century as free women in Connecticut. Their correspondence comes from a time shortly after the end of the Civil War when Rebecca often spent time away. It was Rebecca’s family who preserved the letters, so the collection includes Addie’s letters to her and Rebecca’s letters to her family, but the content of what Rebecca wrote back to Addie needs to be interpolated.
Rebecca's family was solidly middle class and had lived in Connecticut for several generations. She trained as a schoolteacher. And because of that and her missionary enthusiasm, she traveled to the South after the Civil War was over to help establish a school for ex-slaves. She experienced (and wrote home about) serious racial hostility, both because of her vocation and in response to her personal behavior because she saw no reason to automatically defer to white people if they didn’t respect her back.
Addie was an orphan without Rebecca's extensive network of family ties and support. Her correspondence is less literate but full of enthusiasm, passion, and sensuality. She was an avid reader, had a forceful personality, and tended to be judgmental of others. She, too, lived in Connecticut, which was probably where the two met. She made a living in a number of different jobs: as a seamstress, as a domestic worker, in various factory jobs. Shortly before her early death at age 29, she worked as a teamster driving wagons. She was intolerant of racism and segregation and was unafraid to speak her mind to her white employers. This might possibly have something to do with the number of times she changed jobs during the course of the correspondence.
The romantic relationship between Addie and Rebecca appears in their letters in a number of ways. There were regular protestations of love and devotion, but they also spoke of passionate kisses and caressing each other’s breasts. The letters also give clear indications that their relationship was felt to be in competition with potential heterosexual relationships.
The mid 19th century is typically thought of as a time of “romantic friendships” and Boston Marriages. And much of the language that Addie and Rebecca use is similar in flavor. In fact, they discuss the white literary depiction of romantic friendship in their letters, comparing their devotion to that described in Grace Aguilar’s novel Women’s Friendships. Some historians such as Lillian Faderman take the position that these relationships were romantic but not physically erotic. Women might kiss, they might embrace, they might even share a bed without it being considered sexually improper or incompatible with heterosexuality.
Addie and Rebecca give us a closer look--one that may have been a more silent part of other romantic friendships. After all, if we didn’t have these letters, we wouldn’t know it was a part of theirs. In one letter, when Addie mentions that she shares a bed with another woman, she reassures Rebecca, “If you think that is my bosom that captivated the girl that made her want to sleep with me, she got sadly disapointed injoying it, for I had my back towards all night and my night dress was butten up so she could not get to my bosom." And she continues with a protestation that her bosom is reserved for Rebecca.
Rebecca must have regularly expressed jealousy of women that Addie shared living space with. Addie writes that she has no desire to be kissed by anyone else, saying, "No kisses is like youres." She also says, "I imprint several kisses upon your lips and give you a fond imbrace." And later: "I wish that I was going to sleep in your fond arms to night."
Interestingly, Rebecca’s family and their community appear to have recognized and supported the special nature of their relationship, although sometimes with ambivalence. On one occasion, when Addie visited Rebecca’s family while Rebecca was away in the south, she reports that Rebecca’s mother told another visitor that “if either one of us was a gent, we would marry.” Addie was quite happy to hear that. Addie felt comfortable talking about her physical longing for Rebecca to friends and family and that she wished for her embrace and her return.
Both women were also courted by men, and that provides a chance to see how they thought of the parallels with their own relationship. Addie writes, "O Rebecca, it seems I can see you now, casting those loving eyes at me. If you was a man, what would things come to? They would after come to something very quick." and later "What a pleasure it would be to me to address you My Husband." When Addie mentions a male suitor, she notes that although she loves him, it’s not passionately. On other occasions, when she mentions attractions to men, she always compares her feelings to those she has for Rebecca. At times, these mentions seem intended to provoke jealousy. Addie seems to have had fewer occasions to experience jealousy of Rebecca’s other connections, though she once writes, that she dreamed of seeing Rebecca caress another woman, and spoke of how bad it made her feel not to be the object of those caresses.
When Addie wrote more seriously about contemplating marriage to a man, it was in the context of economic security. On one occasion when asking Rebecca how she would feel about marriage for that reasons, she says, "Rebecca, if I could live with you or even be with you some parts of the day, I would never marry." But this was at a time when Rebecca was living elsewhere and the two were unlikely to be able to set up a household together.
Over the course of their correspondence, the language gradually shifted to calling themselves sisters, but even this is ambiguous. Addie sometimes signed her name using Rebecca’s surname. Addie did marry a man eventually, after flip-flopping several times, but died of tuberculoses two years later at the age of 29. At some point after that, Rebecca married. She married one of her co-workers at the school where she was teaching in Maryland. She survived to the age of 95.
Show Notes
The lives and loves of two African-American women in the post Civil War era, as discovered in their correspondence.
In this episode we talk about:
Links to the Lesbian Historic Motif Project Online
Links to Heather Online
- Who were Addie Brown ad Rebecca Primus?
- What did their families and communities think about their relationship?
- The ways in which individual histories can surprise us.
- This topic is discussed in one or more entries of the Lesbian Historic Motif Project here: Addie Brown & Rebecca Primus
- Website: http://alpennia.com
- Email: Heather Rose Jones
- Twitter: @heatherosejones
- Facebook: Heather Rose Jones (author page)
-
- Website: http://alpennia.com/lhmp
- Blog: http://alpennia.com/blog
- RSS: http://alpennia.com/blog/feed/
- Twitter: @LesbianMotif
- Discord: Contact Heather for an invitation to the Alpennia/LHMP Discord server
- The Lesbian Historic Motif Project Patreon
Major category:
LHMPSaturday, November 26, 2016 - 07:37
There's a new Lesbian Historic Motif Project podcast up on The Lesbian Talk Show. Check it out!
The correspondece of Addie Brown and Rebecca Primus reveals love between women in the African American community in post Civil War America.
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