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Beebo Brinker

By Ann Bannon

(3)

| Paperback | 9781573441254

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Book Description

Ann Bannon was designated the “Queen of Lesbian Pulp” for authoring several landmark novels in the '50s. Unlike many writers of the period, however, Bannon broke through the shame and isolation typically portrayed in lesbian pulps, offering instead characters who embraced their sexuality. Continue

1 Review

I can't believe I've not found these books earlier. I was so excited when I heard about this book a week ago I had to buy a copy immediately. Lesbian pulp fiction set in the 50s beat New York scene, could a more perfect book have been written for me? I ordered my copy from Amazon and did a bit of re ... (continue)

I can't believe I've not found these books earlier. I was so excited when I heard about this book a week ago I had to buy a copy immediately. Lesbian pulp fiction set in the 50s beat New York scene, could a more perfect book have been written for me? I ordered my copy from Amazon and did a bit of research on the author. Apparently she was a sorority girl who got married after college and then realised, a little too late, that perhaps she wanted something else, and started to write pulp stories about lesbians while she was waiting for her kids to grow up so she could leave her husband. She used to go and hang out in Greenwich village but failed to find the butch of her dreams so she made up Beebo and wrote about her instead.
The novel was definitely a pulp, some of the characterisation was rather flimsy, and the situations definitely lacked the realism of the official beat novels but I loved it anyway. There was just so much honesty and humour in here. The characters, even while having to deal with the difficulty of 50's america's view of homosexuality they were always very adamant that there was nothing Wrong with what they were doing and it didn't doom you to unhappiness just cause you were gay. There were some really heartbreakingly honest conversations, such as Venus when she said she didn't think she should be judged as less gay simply because she'd gotten married and had children. There were also some brilliantly hilarious moments with Venus such as when she said she looked in the fridge every day when she put the champagne in there to cool. Venus and her son totally reminded me of Eddie and Saphy from Ab-fab.
Beebo was great, from turning up in the big city and getting sick from peppermint schnapps, to dressing up as a boy and fainting in her hick town. It definitely raised some interesting questions about gender issues for me. Here in the early 60s Bannon seemed to be asking a lot of questions about gender norms, the whole butch and femme thing. How it's obvious for transgendered lesbians that they're not straight, but how is it for women that don't look any different. I also really liked her soft hearted gay friend who took her in. He did seem a bit of a door mat, but also like someone you'd want to know who knew where all the fun places to go and hang out were.
This was actually the last book that Bannon wrote, even though it's the first chronologically. I'm a bit trepidations about the first one she wrote about a sorority girl falling for one of her sisters, but I am curious to read the rest. (And because I'm so obsessive about completeness will probably read them all!) And now I can't help but wonder what OTHER lesbian classics I've been missing out on...

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Robot-mel said on Oct 3, 2009 | Add your feedback