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A review by eemms
The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister by Anne Lister
4.0
I'm done!! Finally!! That felt like it took forever. Not sure how to rate this. 3? 4? my rating scale is only calibrated for fiction.
Definitely recommend if you're interested in first person accounts of wlw life in the early 1800s. Anne herself I found mostly unlikable. She's unsatisfied with her place in life (which is a pretty good place!), dislikes most of the other families in town, snubs them and then is upset when they don't keep up the friendship. Anytime anyone gets something wrong, she writes in her diary that she feels /she/ would've done it much better. Anyone she doesn't like is vulgar, and she'll write things down like "I assured so-and-so of us always being great friends, but I intend to never visit her again if I can help it".
The first hand account of 1800s lesbianism is unparalleled. She thinks (and at least per her diary she seems to be right) that she can have pretty much any woman she wants, and has several flings in among some long term lovers. She writes frequently of her need for a female companion to live out her life with. She did have plans for this, but the woman in question married, and though they are still in correspondence and planning to eventually be their own household, the husband is a problem. Once she gets a venereal disease things slow down a bit, but not before she's passed it on!
The parts I really enjoyed were the little bits of life in such a different time. There's a leech-woman, who Anne requests for bleeding separate from the local doctor. She descales her teeth with a pen-knife but also mentions buying tooth brushes several times. Clock time wasn't standardized, so she will sometimes mention by what clock she's noting the time and how it differs compared to say, the church tower. She walks SO MUCH, and seems to only eat two meals a day, plus sometimes tea.
I do recommend it if you're interested in LGBTQ history of the time period. The footnotes are in the back (ugh!! I know it's standard but I hate it) and seemed targeted at an academic reader interested specifically in 1830s Halifax, not a lay person such as myself - I didn't find them very useful. I also could've used a quick-reference character guide, as the recurring Halifax families started to get confusing. But the editor includes occasional summations of changes in Anne's life, her travel plans, etc, that help keep things easy to follow.
Definitely recommend if you're interested in first person accounts of wlw life in the early 1800s. Anne herself I found mostly unlikable. She's unsatisfied with her place in life (which is a pretty good place!), dislikes most of the other families in town, snubs them and then is upset when they don't keep up the friendship. Anytime anyone gets something wrong, she writes in her diary that she feels /she/ would've done it much better. Anyone she doesn't like is vulgar, and she'll write things down like "I assured so-and-so of us always being great friends, but I intend to never visit her again if I can help it".
The first hand account of 1800s lesbianism is unparalleled. She thinks (and at least per her diary she seems to be right) that she can have pretty much any woman she wants, and has several flings in among some long term lovers. She writes frequently of her need for a female companion to live out her life with. She did have plans for this, but the woman in question married, and though they are still in correspondence and planning to eventually be their own household, the husband is a problem. Once she gets a venereal disease things slow down a bit, but not before she's passed it on!
The parts I really enjoyed were the little bits of life in such a different time. There's a leech-woman, who Anne requests for bleeding separate from the local doctor. She descales her teeth with a pen-knife but also mentions buying tooth brushes several times. Clock time wasn't standardized, so she will sometimes mention by what clock she's noting the time and how it differs compared to say, the church tower. She walks SO MUCH, and seems to only eat two meals a day, plus sometimes tea.
I do recommend it if you're interested in LGBTQ history of the time period. The footnotes are in the back (ugh!! I know it's standard but I hate it) and seemed targeted at an academic reader interested specifically in 1830s Halifax, not a lay person such as myself - I didn't find them very useful. I also could've used a quick-reference character guide, as the recurring Halifax families started to get confusing. But the editor includes occasional summations of changes in Anne's life, her travel plans, etc, that help keep things easy to follow.