![]() First edition Gold Medal Books cover, 1952 | |
Author | Vin Packer |
---|---|
Cover artist | Barrye Phillips |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Genre | lesbian pulp fiction |
Publisher | Gold Medal Books |
Publication date | 1952 |
Media type | Print (Paperback) |
Spring Fire, is a 1952 paperback novel written by Marijane Meaker, under the pseudonym "Vin Packer". It is the first lesbian paperback novel, and the beginning of the lesbian pulp fiction genre; it also addresses issues of conformity in 1950s American society. The novel tells the story of Susan "Mitch" Mitchell, an awkward, lonely freshman at a Midwestern college who falls in love with Leda, her popular but troubled sorority sister. Published by Gold Medal Books, Spring Fire sold 1.5 million copies through at least three printings.
Cleis Press re-released the book in 2004 after extensive negotiations with Meaker, who had long denied permission over her feelings about the ending. Following the exposure of their relationship, Leda is committed to a mental institution and Mitch realizes she never loved Leda. Meaker later wrote, "I still cringe when I think about it. I never wanted it republished. It was too embarrassing." Meaker explained in the 2004 foreword that Dick Carroll, her editor at Gold Medal Books, told her that because the book would be sent through the mail, no references to homosexuality as an attractive life could be portrayed or postal inspectors would send it back to the publishing house. He said that one character must acknowledge that she is not a lesbian, and the other she's involved with "must be sick or crazy". [1]
The story is based on an affair Meaker had in boarding school as a teenager. She was awkward and shy in a new school and fell in love with a more experienced, older girl. They traded love letters, and the other girl's mother found them on the eve of a weekend trip they were to take together. When the girl's mother approached her, "She said she'd rather kill herself than be like me," Meaker remembered. [2]
She initially wished to title the book Sorority Girl, but her business-minded editor changed the title to Spring Fire in order to confuse potential readers with the James A Michener title The Fires of Spring .
Susan ("Mitch") Mitchell is pledging to the Tri Epsilon sorority at fictional Cranston University. She is seen as a boon to the sorority due to her father's significant wealth, and the sorority is promised a new silverware set from the alumni if she is accepted. Large, ungainly, and shy, she is drawn to older sorority member Leda Taylor who is direct and independent; they become roommates and have double dates—Leda with boyfriend Jake and Mitch with the sullen, boorish president of the "Sig Eps" who humiliates her during a fraternity party. Mitch flees the party after striking the fraternity president on the head and the sorority is blackballed. Much-more-experienced Leda trades her exasperation with Mitch's innocence with overt affection for her in rapid mood switches.
To avoid further exclusion, Mitch is persuaded by her sorority to invite the fraternity president to a dance at the sorority house, where he rapes her after getting her drunk. Afterwards Leda finds her stunned and calms her down by telling her how much she loves her. They begin a secret affair while Leda publicly continues dating Jake, whom she tells Mitch she rather despises, and Mitch going with relatively harmless "independents" (non-fraternity boys), which is frowned-on by the sorority leaders.
Mitch's only friend in the pledge class is kicked out of the sorority after getting home at 1 AM because her date had a flat tire. Leda tries to teach Mitch that they must put men first so they aren't disrespected, but they may love each other in private. Leda's promiscuous, alcoholic young mother visits, and Leda tries to test Mitch so she's able to answer her mother's questions about men, but Mitch is shy and reluctant to lie about her feelings. But after her mother leaves, Leda apologizes for ignoring Mitch, shows her affection again, and tries to reassure her that they aren't lesbians.
Mitch tries to sleep with her date to see if he makes her feel the way Leda does, but he is unable to perform. Convinced that she is abnormal and infectious and that Leda is a temptation, Mitch writes to Leda telling her she's leaving the sorority. Leda tries to stop her by seducing her again, but their sorority sisters enter the room and see what is happening. In an emergency meeting, Leda reads the sisters Mitch's heartfelt letter and explains that Mitch has had a crush on her and the sisters had seen Mitch attacking Leda.
While the Dean of Women interrogates Mitch, Leda gets drunk and wallows in her guilt for selling Mitch out to the sorority. When the Dean asks to see Leda, sorority members find her sobering up, but she is still not sober enough to drive and she crashes the car; in the aftermath, witnesses hear her calling out deliriously for Mitch. Her injuries are serious enough that she is hospitalized for 3 days, during which Mitch moves out of the sorority house and back into the dorm. They meet a final time when the Dean drives Mitch to visit Leda in the hospital; the tenuous confrontation leaves Leda laughing and crying simultaneously as Mitch departs. The day the sorority's new silverware set arrives, they learn that Leda has had a complete nervous breakdown and is to be institutionalized. Mitch begins new friendships as she realizes that she never really loved Leda after all.
A pulp fiction novel, Spring Fire was sold in train and bus station kiosks and drug stores with other sensationalist books about crime, drugs, gangsters, and cowboys. Although it was not reviewed by any renowned literary critics, Spring Fire sold more copies in 1952 than The Postman Always Rings Twice by James M. Cain and My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier, also released the same year. When the paper in pulp novels was not designed to last more than a year, Spring Fire went through three printings, eventually selling nearly 1.5 million copies. Its success earned Meaker an invitation to meet Roger Fawcett, the owner of Gold Medal Books' parent company, who wanted to, "shake the hand of the writer who outsold God's Little Acre (Erskine Caldwell)." [3]
Spring Fire inspired other serious writers in the lesbian pulp fiction genre such as Ann Bannon and Valerie Taylor, and indeed, proved so profitable that the genre attracted (usually male) writers whose books exploited the topic of lesbianism, launching an entire genre of fiction.
In 1989, Meaker spoke about realizing the impact the book had while she was working at Gold Medal Books: "Spring Fire was not aimed at any lesbian market, because there wasn’t any that we knew about. I was just out of college. We were amazed, floored, by the mail that poured in. That was the first time anyone was aware of the gay audience out there." [4]
In 2004 upon the re-release of the Cleis Press edition, a reviewer noted, "Spring Fire not only plays a vital pioneering role in lesbian writing, it’s also as a warning of how difficult things could be. It’s ironic that Spring Fire was released now, when we need it the most, to remind us of the incredible courage of those who came before, the enormity of what has been accomplished, and why we must remain vigil, and treasure and protect every step forward we’ve managed to take." [5]
Patricia Highsmith was an American novelist and short story writer widely known for her psychological thrillers, including her series of five novels featuring the character Tom Ripley. She wrote 22 novels and numerous short stories throughout her career spanning nearly five decades, and her work has led to more than two dozen film adaptations. Her writing derived influence from existentialist literature, and questioned notions of identity and popular morality. She was dubbed "the poet of apprehension" by novelist Graham Greene.
Lesbian pulp fiction is a genre of lesbian literature that refers to any mid-20th century paperback novel or pulp magazine with overtly lesbian themes and content. Lesbian pulp fiction was published in the 1950s and 1960s by many of the same paperback publishing houses as other genres of fiction, including westerns, romances, and detective fiction. Because very little other literature was available for and about lesbians at this time, quite often these books were the only reference the public had for modeling what lesbians were. English professor Stephanie Foote commented on the importance of lesbian pulp novels to the lesbian identity prior to the rise of organized feminism: "Pulps have been understood as signs of a secret history of readers, and they have been valued because they have been read. The more they are read, the more they are valued, and the more they are read, the closer the relationship between the very act of circulation and reading and the construction of a lesbian community becomes…. Characters use the reading of novels as a way to understand that they are not alone." Joan Nestle refers to lesbian pulp fiction as “survival literature.” Lesbian pulp fiction provided representation for lesbian identities, brought a surge of awareness to lesbians, and created space for lesbian organizing leading up to Stonewall.
Gold Medal Books, launched by Fawcett Publications in 1950, was an American book publisher known for introducing paperback originals, a publishing innovation at the time. Fawcett was also an independent newsstand distributor, and in 1949 the company negotiated a contract with New American Library to distribute their Mentor and Signet titles. This contract prohibited Fawcett from publishing their own paperback reprints.
The Price of Salt is a 1952 romance novel by Patricia Highsmith, first published under the pseudonym "Claire Morgan." Highsmith—known as a suspense writer based on her psychological thriller Strangers on a Train—used an alias as she did not want to be tagged as "a lesbian-book writer", and she also used her own life references for characters and occurrences in the story.
The Ladder was the first nationally distributed lesbian publication in the United States. Published from 1956 to 1972, The Ladder was the primary monthly publication and method of communication for the Daughters of Bilitis (DOB), the first lesbian organization in the US. It was supported by ONE, Inc. and the Mattachine Society, with whom the DOB retained friendly relations. The name of the magazine was derived from the artwork on its first cover, simple line drawings showing figures moving towards a ladder that disappeared into the clouds.
Ann Weldy, better known by her pen name Ann Bannon, is an American author who, from 1957 to 1962, wrote six lesbian pulp fiction novels known as The Beebo Brinker Chronicles. The books' enduring popularity and impact on lesbian identity has earned her the title "Queen of Lesbian Pulp Fiction". Bannon was a young housewife trying to address her own issues of sexuality when she was inspired to write her first novel. Her subsequent books featured four characters who reappeared throughout the series, including her eponymous heroine, Beebo Brinker, who came to embody the archetype of a butch lesbian. The majority of her characters mirrored people she knew, but their stories reflected a life she did not feel she was able to live. Despite her traditional upbringing and role in married life, her novels defied conventions for romance stories and depictions of lesbians by addressing complex homosexual relationships.
Valerie Taylor was an American author of books published in the lesbian pulp fiction genre, as well as poetry and novels after the "golden age" of lesbian pulp fiction. She also published as Nacella Young, Francine Davenport, and Velma Tate. Her publishers included Naiad Press, Banned Books, Universal, Gold Medal Books, Womanpress, Ace and Midwood-Tower.
Marijane Agnes Meaker was an American writer who, along with Tereska Torres, was credited with launching the lesbian pulp fiction genre, the only accessible novels on that theme in the 1950s.
Gay pulp fiction, or gay pulps, refers to printed works, primarily fiction, that include references to male homosexuality, specifically male gay sex, and that are cheaply produced, typically in paperback books made of wood pulp paper; lesbian pulp fiction is similar work about women. Michael Bronski, the editor of an anthology of gay pulp writing, notes in his introduction, "Gay pulp is not an exact term, and it is used somewhat loosely to refer to a variety of books that had very different origins and markets". People often use the term to refer to the "classic" gay pulps that were produced before about 1970, but it may also be used to refer to the gay erotica or pornography in paperback book or digest magazine form produced since that date.
Lesbian literature is a subgenre of literature addressing lesbian themes. It includes poetry, plays, fiction addressing lesbian characters, and non-fiction about lesbian-interest topics. A similar term is sapphic literature, encompassing works that feature love between women that are not necessarily lesbian.
Odd Girl Out is a lesbian pulp fiction novel written in 1957 by Ann Bannon, the first in a series of pulp fiction novels that eventually came to be known as The Beebo Brinker Chronicles. It was originally published in 1957 by Gold Medal Books, again in 1983 by Naiad Press, and again in 2001 by Cleis Press. Each edition was adorned with a different cover. Not until 1983 did author Bannon learn that her first novel was the second best-selling paperback of 1957.
I Am a Woman is a lesbian pulp fiction novel written in 1959 by Ann Bannon. It is the second in a series of pulp fiction novels that eventually came to be known as The Beebo Brinker Chronicles. It was originally published in 1959 by Gold Medal Books, again in 1983 by Naiad Press, and again in 2002 by Cleis Press.
Journey to a Woman is a lesbian pulp fiction novel written in 1960 by Ann Bannon. It is the fifth in a series of pulp fiction novels that eventually came to be known as The Beebo Brinker Chronicles. It was originally published in 1960 by Gold Medal Books, again in 1983 by Naiad Press, and again in 2003 by Cleis Press. Each edition was adorned with a different cover.
Beebo Brinker is a lesbian pulp fiction novel written in 1962 by Ann Bannon. It is the last in a series of pulp fiction novels that eventually came to be known as The Beebo Brinker Chronicles. It was originally published in 1962 by Gold Medal Books, again in 1983 by Naiad Press, and again in 2001 by Cleis Press. Each edition was adorned with a different cover. Although this is the last in the series, it is set first — a prequel to the others. In the order of the series, it follows Journey to a Woman. However, in the order of the events and characters in the series, Beebo Brinker takes place several years before Odd Girl Out does.
Forbidden Love: The Unashamed Stories of Lesbian Lives is a 1992 Canadian hybrid drama-documentary film about Canadian lesbians navigating their sexuality while homosexuality was still criminalized. Interviews with lesbian elders are juxtaposed with a fictional story, shot in fifties melodrama style, of a small-town girl's first night with another woman. It also inserts covers of lesbian pulp fiction. The film presents the stories of lesbians whose desire for community led them on a search for the few public beer parlours or bars that would tolerate openly queer women in the 1950s and 60s in Canada. It was written and directed by Lynne Fernie and Aerlyn Weissman and featured author Ann Bannon. It premiered at the 1992 Toronto Festival of Festivals and was released in the United States on 4 August 1993. It was produced by Studio D, the women's studio of the National Film Board of Canada.
Tereska Torrès was a French writer known for the 1950 book Women's Barracks, the first "original paperback bestseller." In 2008 historians credited the republished book as the first pulp fiction book published in America to candidly address lesbian relationships, although Torrès did not agree with this analysis.
Elaine Williams was an American lesbian pulp fiction author and editor of the late 1950s and early 1960s. She wrote under a pseudonym, largely either as Sloan Britton or Sloane Britain.
Yvonne Christine MacManus was an American novelist specializing in lesbian fiction and science fiction. Although she used her real name when writing in other genres, MacManus published lesbian fiction under the pseudonym Paula Christian.
Julie Ellis was an early lesbian pulp fiction author of the 1960s, writing pro-lesbian romance and erotica under varied pseudonyms for Midwood-Tower Publications. She changed her writing pseudonyms and legal name usage numerous times and later in life she wrote historical and romance fiction under the name Julie Ellis.
The Girls in 3-B is a classic work of lesbian pulp fiction by Valerie Taylor which was published in 1959 by Fawcett. Its happy ending for a lesbian character was unusual for the time period. It was one of the first three novels of any pulp fiction genre to be reprinted in 2003 by Feminist Press.