I am a Woman. pbo, Gold Medal, 1959.
Women in the Shadows. pbo, Gold Medal, 1959.
These three form a single, connected narrative, although any of the three novels can be read as a self-contained story. The first volume introduces the heroine of the series, Laura Landon, at college; where, in undergoing an affair with her room-mate, lovely but frigid Beth, she discovers her homosexuality. Softened by the affair, Beth marries, and Laura runs away. In the second book, Laura, in Greenwich Village, is sharing an apartment, with Marcie, a divorcee, entirely “straight” who plays Laura along strictly for kicks; Laura suffers under this treatment for a long time, then runs away again to shack up with a butch-type Village character, Beebo. In the third book, Laura and Beebo have been living together for two years; Laura is tiring of this lengthy affair and cheats on Beebo with a colored dancer named Tris, while Beebo, to win Laura back, resorts to such trickery as staging a phony “rape” ... inflicting wounds on herself in search of sympathy. Tiring of this life, Laura runs away again, this, time to marry a male homosexual friend, Jack, in a search for stability and permanence. The whole story invites comparison with Weiraugh’s THE SCORPION: homosexuality per se is not attacked, but the drawbacks of the life, and the dangers and difficulties to anyone trying to adjust him-or-herself to that life, are frankly and brutally delineated; there is a pervasive air of dissatisfaction, or resignation, and gradual withdrawal; and the ending of the third book is unsatisfactory and hardly complete. Nevertheless, the impact of these books, particularly when read all together, is considerable; Miss Bannon’s grasp of character, technique and construction improve with each novel. Despite wild improbabilities and gimmicky, contrived situations, these are perhaps the major contribution to lesbian literature in the paperback field anywhere.
+ BARNES, DJUNA. “Dusie”, ss in American Esoterica, NY, Macy-Masius, 1927. This collection also contains short stories of (m) interest.
Nightwood. N. Y., Harcourt 1937, her New Directions n. d. A well-known and excellent lesbian novel laid in Paris.
+ BARR, JAMES. Derricks. NY, Greenberg 1951, (m) hcr Pan, 1957. Although those short stories all deal with male homosexuality, their coherent, fresh and constructive philosophy make this a book of primary importance for every reader.
Quatrefoil. N. Y., Greenberg, 1950, (m).
Game of Fools. ONE, 1954, 1955.
BARRY, JEROME. Malignant Stars. N. Y., Doubleday, 1960. Signe, a handsome Valkyrie-type girl, is found dead, and the note beside her body is apparently a love letter from her roommate Lyn; the suspicion that Lyn is her lover and murderer forms the main theme of the plot. Well done.