Description
Book SynopsisOffers an account of the historical emergence of "the lesbian" by looking at late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century women's writing. This title proposes that modern lesbian identity in the United States has its roots not just, or even primarily, in sexology and medical literature, but in white, middle-class women's culture.
Trade Review”In the pages of American women's literature, lesbians are made, not born. Kathryn R. Kent expertly surveys the many creative acts of instruction, imitation, and invention among women that ultimately make modern lesbian identity more than just a product of medical discourse. At the heart of all these narratives of self-fashioning lies a central paradox: girls can only freely invent themselves by imitating someone else. Kent brilliantly profiles both sides of these mimetic couples (mothers and daughters, teachers and students, lovers and friends), demonstrating in the end that imitation is inevitably a two-way street.”—Diana Fuss, author of
Identification PapersTable of ContentsAcknowledgments
Introduction
1. "Single White Female”: The Sexual Politics of Spinsterhood in Harriet Beecher Stowe’s
Oldtown Folks 2. "Trying All Kinds”: Louisa May Alcott’s Pedagogic Erotics
3. "Scouting for Girls”: Reading and Recruitment in the Early Twentieth Century
4. "Excreate a No Sense”: The Erotic Currency of Gertrude Stein’s
Tender Buttons 5. The
M Multiplying: Marianne Moore, Elizabeth Bishop, and the Pleasures of Influence, Part I
6. Influence and Invitation: Marianne Moore, Elizabeth Bishop, and the Pleasures of Influence, Part II
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index
