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Conflicts in Appraising Lesbian Pulp Novels Julie Botnick IS 438A

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Conflicts in Appraising Lesbian Pulp Novels Julie Botnick IS 438A Pulp Frictions: Conflicts in Appraising Lesbian Pulp Novels Julie Botnick IS 438A: Seminar in Archival Appraisal June 14, 2018 Abstract The years between 1950 and 1965 were the “golden age” of lesbian pulp novels, which provided some of the only representations of lesbians in the mid-20th century. Thousands of these novels sit in plastic sleeves on shelves in special collections around the United States, val- ued for their evocative covers and campy marketing language. Devoid of accompanying docu- mentation which elaborates on the affective relationships lesbians had with these novels in their own time, the pulps are appraised for their value as visual objects rather than their role in peo- ple’s lives. The appraisal decisions made around these pulps are interdependent with irreversible decisions around access, exhibition, and preservation. I propose introducing affect as an appraisal criterion to build equitable collections which reflect full, holistic life experiences. This would do better justice to the women of the past who relied on these books for survival. !1 “Deep within me the joy spread… As my whole being convulsed in ecstasy I could feel Marilyn sharing my miracle.” From These Curious Pleasures by Sloan Britain, 1961 Lesbian pulp novels provided some of the only representations of lesbians in the mid-20th century. Cheaper than a pack of gum, these ephemeral novels were enjoyed in private and passed discreetly around, stuffed under mattresses, or tossed out with the trash. Today, thou- sands of these novels sit in plastic sleeves on shelves in special collections around the United States, valued for their evocative covers and campy marketing language. Devoid of accompany- ing documentation which elaborates on the affective relationships lesbians had with these novels in their own time, the pulps are appraised for their value as visual objects rather than their role in people’s lives. The appraisal decisions made around these pulps are interdependent with irre- versible decisions around access, exhibition, and preservation. Rather than build vast, standalone pulp collections, archivists can introduce affect as an appraisal criterion to build equitable collec- tions which reflect lesbians’ full, holistic life experiences. The years between 1950 and 1965 were the “golden age” of lesbian pulp novels. Begin- ning with the publication of Tereska Torres’s Women’s Barracks and Marijane Meaker’s Spring Fire, published under the pseudonym Vin Packer, lesbian pulp fiction emerged as a distinct commercial and literary genre, with thousands of men and women publishing in the space. Writ- ten in the context of the shifting gender and social roles of the post-World War II era and reflect- ing Cold War anxieties, these novels are today generally discounted as campy, low-brow, and homophobic, by readership numbers alone likely appealing more to the “prurient interests”1 of straight men as much, if not more, than to lesbians, but in their own time, they “mattered intense- ly” to lesbians, “suppl[ying] a nourishment” that they “found necessary to their survival — les- bian representation.”2 Especially outside of coastal urban centers, these novels were often isolat- 1 Wooten, Kelly. n.d. “LibGuides: Lesbian & Gay Pulp Fiction: Lesbian Pulp Fiction.” Duke University. https://guides.library.duke.edu/queerpulps/lesbianpulps. 2 As quoted in Keller, Yvonne. 2005. “‘Was It Right to Love Her Brother’s Wife So Passionately?’: Les- bian Pulp Novels and U.S. Lesbian Identity, 1950-1965.” American Quarterly 57 (2): 385. !2 ed lesbians’ “only source of affirmation of sexual identity”3 even if these narrow, fictional repre- sentations of their lives were distorted and cruel.4 As Donna Allegra recalls, “No matter how em- barrassed and ashamed I felt when I went to the cash register to buy [pulps], it was absolutely necessary for me to have them. I needed them the way I needed food and shelter for survival.”5 The pulps all fulfill similar expectations in their readers through parallel structures of form and characters. The “requisite tragic ending”6 is a defining feature, not just a pattern, of the genre. Because of censorship laws, a legal defense was needed to justify the books’ circulation and differentiate the genre from and elevate it above mere pornography, which overwhelmingly manifested in “moral” conclusions “to balance out the licentiousness of her actions”7 — punish- ments, accidents, suicides, murders, or redemption by marriage to a man — or as one young, queer-identified student put it, “the ‘go straight or die’ ending.”8 The genre reified lesbians’ low place in society by portraying “the general misery of a lesbian existence” even while offering some comfort or inclusion to lesbians around the country.9 Even more than the content, though, the genre is defined by scholars today by the books’ covers.10 Michael Denning, writing about dime novels, gives a “commercial definition” for these books within genre studies, in which a genre is defined by its status as a product within the mar- ketplace. Scholars, then, can look at what publishers signify in their marketing decisions rather 3 “Lesbian Pulp Fiction Collection,” Mount Saint Vincent University, http://www.msvu.ca/en/ home/library/aboutthelibrary/policiesprocedures/collectionpolicy/ lesbianpulpfictioncollection.aspx. 4 Wooten, “LibGuides: Lesbian & Gay Pulp Fiction: Lesbian Pulp Fiction,” https://guides.library.duke.e- du/queerpulps/lesbianpulps 5 Donna Allegra, as quoted in Keller, “‘Was it Right’,” 385. 6 “Passions Uncovered: Gay, Lesbian and Transgender Pulps,” n.d., University of Saskatchewan Library, https://library2.usask.ca/srsd/pulps/contact.php. 7 Wooten, “LibGuides: Lesbian & Gay Pulp Fiction: Lesbian Pulp Fiction,” https://guides.library.duke.e- du/queerpulps/lesbianpulps 8 Cheryl Cordingley, Interview with Julie Botnick, Los Angeles, CA, June 12, 2018. 9 Wooten, “LibGuides: Lesbian & Gay Pulp Fiction: Lesbian Pulp Fiction,” https://guides.library.duke.e- du/queerpulps/lesbianpulps 10 Keller, “‘Was it Right’,” 393. !3 than the words books contain.11 By this definition, the covers were “the most important” aspect of these books; “certainly it was to lesbians at the time.”12 The cover illustrations, sordid and sul- try tableaus of “‘butches’ and cowering negligee-clad femmes, of Greenwich Village street cor- ners and meaningful glances, and paranoid and lustful blurbs,”13 rarely even matched the plots of the novels. They were not-so-subtly coded with soapy images and words like “strange,” “odd,” and “shadows” in the titles or teasers.14 On a drugstore wall or a newsstand rack, the covers, not the content, drew in readers. As Lee Lynch writes, “their ludicrous and blatantly sensational cover copy were both my signals and my shame.”15 Pulps, by design and by function, were ephemeral. Published outside of mainstream channels, they were so cheaply made that they could be hidden, burned, left on a bus seat, or thrown in the trash with hardly a dent in one’s change purse. The stories are tame or even hilari- ously campy by today’s standards, but they were so threatening in their own time, they were rarely kept on a bookshelf. Once just a dime a pop, because of their ephemerality, pulps are high- ly valuable, collectible materials for private collectors and repositories today. There are collections of lesbian pulp novels at repositories around the country. The major collections are within academic special collections and lesbian community archives, with the two types of archives having often contrasting appraisal, acquisition, and access criteria, policies, and implications. Some of the more prominent collections will be discussed here as case studies to highlight specific appraisal issues, though this is by no means an exhaustive survey of all the ma- jor lesbian pulp collections. Most university repositories with lesbian pulp collections appraise and acquire these nov- els within broader collections of either human sexuality or Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Trans- 11 Keller, “‘Was it Right’,” 396. 12 Keller, “‘Was it Right’,” 396. 13 “Lesbian Pulp Novels, 1935-1965,” n.d., Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, http://beineck- e.library.yale.edu/about/blogs/room-26-cabinet-curiosities/2009/02/23/lesbian-pulp-novels-1935-1965. 14 Wooten, “LibGuides: Lesbian & Gay Pulp Fiction: Lesbian Pulp Fiction,” https://guides.library.duke.e- du/queerpulps/lesbianpulps 15 Lee Lynch as quoted in Keller, “‘Was it Right’,” 396. !4 gender (LGBT) Studies. At Cornell University, the Lesbian Popular Fiction Collection of around 100 novels is nested within their Human Sexuality Collection, which “seeks to preserve and make accessible primary sources that document historical shifts in the social construction of sex- uality, with a focus on U.S. lesbian and gay history and the politics of pornography.”16 The Uni- versity of Saskatchewan’s collection is part of Saskatchewan Resources for Sexual Diversity, a project “to improve access to information on gender and sexual diversity available in the prov- ince’s libraries and archives.”17 Duke University’s collection is housed within the Sallie Bingham Center for Women's History and Culture in the Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, and includes not just the original pulps but “several literary antecedents” and later reissues of pulps which offered “critical reappropriation and recontextualization of these works.”18 Mount Saint Vincent University’s collection is functionally restricted to scholars within the areas of Cultural Studies, Women's Studies, History, English, Sociology, and Psychology.19 At the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, the collecting area of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies focuses on pre-Stonewall documents of LGBT life and culture and local LGBT history, but with a “particular emphasis” on pulps.20 Community archives are eager to collect pulps as well. The Lesbian Herstory Archives in Brooklyn holds a large collection of pulps — “These days every variety of sexual activity, de- scribed in great detail, is available from lesbian writers. Lesbian pulp was one of the starting points for these publishing movements and influenced many lesbian writers and publishers.
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