Return of the Mazo (5)

Sto-o-o-o-o-o-p. I am the arteest, and if you have not begun reading at #1, you must. It is my will.

Globe and Mail books guy James Adams got back from taking some time off, and responded to my was-Mazo-de-la-Roche-a-lesbo e-mail: "I'm not a de la Roche scholar by any means, nor deeply conversant with the latest contours of gender and sexual orientation theory.

"But it seems that de la Roche's lesbianism and her relationship to her cousin-sister has been much contested in the last quarter-century. I'd check the sundry debates that arose with the publication of Joan Givner's 1989 biography of de la Roche (Givner's book is subtitled 'The Hidden Life.' Givner seems to be fully into 'The Full Sappho' camp). Just this spring Heather Kirk wrote a piece for Canadian Literature magazine on Clement called 'The Hidden Life of Mazo de la Roche's Collaborator' in which she attacks Givner ("a dreadful biographer") and (her words) "demolishes" Givner's lesbian thesis. Kirk's own thesis (which I haven't read) seems to be that, yes, there was probably a homoerotic (as opposed to homosexual content) to their relationship but then the same could likely be said of most female-to-female relationships of a 'bosom-friend' or sisterly nature."

Your scribe could not stop herself from pondering the mystery of Mazo de la Roche's sex life. Images kept popping into her brain, images that slowly turned into... monstrous tendrils, swelling in size and swirling about her until they grabbed her legs and began to pull

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ahhhh
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