[Our heroine Alithea -- in male disguise to go adventuring, as you may recall -- has run up a temporary Debt of Honor while gambling and is maneuvered into taking a temporary loan to pay it off from a beautiful and lovely young widow, Arabella. Arabella has withdrawn to her country house before Alithea is aware of the strategem. Arabella -- in the persona of the Chevalier de Radpont -- writes to her offering to come visit in order to settle the debt, Arabella tells the Chevalier to wait on her return as she has a rule never to allow male visitors at her country home. She notes:]
sexual/romantic desire
This tag is used broadly when there is discussion of erotic or romantic desire between women, whether or not specific activities are mentioned.
LHMP entry
It is clear from Marianne's letters and descriptions of her activities that she has been making new friends, taking up new hobbies, and generally becoming less emotionally dependent on Anne. In the early part of the year, Anne is much concerned with managing the property she shares with her aunt and uncle, taking over more of the control. Tib comes to visit in mid January and is in poor health. In a month Anne is wishing the visit were over already and is tired of Tib's drinking and snuff-taking.
In February, Anne strikes up a new friendship with a Miss Pickford whom she begins to suspect shares her inclinations with regard to her close friend Miss Threlfall. Like Anne, the neighbors comment on Miss Pickford for being an intellectual and somewhat masculine in effect. They nickname her Frank. In conversation, Anne makes coded references to subjects and authors to sound her out on sexual topics.
At the beginning of the year, Anne is once more being annoyed by strangers accosting her on the road and by impertinent letters. After yet another comment about an advertisement taken out in her name seeking a “sweetheart”, she consults a lawyer about the letters, but he advises her to take no notice of them.
In February she goes off to spend time in York with the Belcombes and Marianne. In March they are joined by Isabella (Tib) Norcliffe and it’s clear having all three women in one place is a bit uncomfortable.
While staying with the Belcombes in York, Anne gives Miss Vallance a copy of her secret cypher while at the same time saying she is “getting lukewarm about her.” Anne returns to Halifax in mid-January. In February she writes a very loving letter to Marianne and refers to her as “my wife”. In May she records a sexual fantasy about a local woman Caroline Greenwood, whom she admires, and there are regular notes through the summer about her attraction to various women, though none of these seem to go beyond admiration.
It turns out that Miss Browne seems to be in love with a man that she's known for several years and is unhappy that her parents are set against him. It is becoming clear (even to the oblivious Anne) that Miss Browne has never seen Anne's interest as romantic. And after much internal conflict recorded in February and March, Anne's interest in her fades significantly.
The first part of the year was very quiet, but in April Miss Browne returned and Anne becomes quite attentive to her, despite considering her family vulgar. This resulted in comment as the friendship was between the two women alone and not between their families. Anne finds many excuses to encounter her casually but there are no formal visits. Halifax society begins teasing Anne about the peculiar relationship. Anne also records encounters with more lower class persons who mock her for her masculine appearance and habits.
This volume covers 1817 to 1824: Anne Lister lived from 1791 to 1840 at Halifax in West Yorkshire, England. Born one of six children, to an upper class family, the deaths of her four brothers enabled her to inherit Shibden Hall where she then lived with her Uncle James and Aunt Anne (unmarried siblings) from age 24 on, leaving her parental home. Finances were difficult at first but she seems to have had a talent far careful management and eventually had sufficient funds to travel.
At the time of the earliest journal entries, Marianne has already married and her husband has intercepted their correspondence, which included speculations on Anne and Marianne forming a household together after the (much older) husband's death. At this point Anne begins using her cipher in the correspondence for key passages, as well as in her journals, But relations with Marianne were becoming strained from the separation and Anne's thoughts turned once more to an earlier lover, Tib (Isabrlla Norcliffe), who was part of the York social circles of her youth.
The article begins by defending the use of the term "lesbian" by citing Brooten's evidence for a medieval sense of a woman who "behaves like a man" and "is oriented toward female companionship for sex" while raising several issues with that usage. But the author is examining a similar apparent contradiction in medieval texts to the one found by Brooten in early Christian texts: an acceptance (to some degree) of female same-sex unions combined with hostility toward female appropriation of male roles.
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