'Anne Lister was an aristocratic woman who embraced her masculinity, flirted and more with women in her orbit and kept coded diaries her whole life. These diaries are long overdue for sustained analysis. This collection of essays promises to remedy what has been an overlooked treasure trove of information about sex and intimacies between elite women in the late 18th and early 19th centuries and they decode the life, the loves, the genders and the social worlds of the inventive and marvelous Anne Lister.' Jack Halberstam, author of Female Masculinity, Duke University Press
Introduction Chris Roulston; 1. Caroline Gonda in conversation with Helena Whitbread; Part I. Nature was in an Odd Freak When She Made Me: Lister, Sexuality, Gender and Natural History: 2. A regular oddity: natural history and Anne Lister's Queer theory of tradition Laurie Shannon; 3. Anne Lister's search for the anatomy of sex Anna Clark; Part II. My Spirit's Oil: Lister Reading, Lister Writing: 4. My use of the word love: lister, language and the dictionary Stephen Turton; 5. Self-conscious closeting and paradoxical writing in Anne Lister's diaries Caroline Baylis-Green; Part III. Born at Halifax: Lister's Politics, Local and Global: 6. Anne Lister's politics Susan S. Lanser; 7. Building castles in the air: Anne Lister and associational life Cassandra Ulph; 8. Anne Lister's home Angela Clare; Part IV. Curious Scenes: Lister's Travels: 9. The art of travelling requires an apprenticeship: Anne Lister's diaries and travel Kirsty McHugh; 10. Traveling in the caucasus, traveling in time: decoding biography as genre Angela Steidele; Part V. I Beg to be Remembered: Lister, Public History and Popular Culture: 11. Labels, plaques and identity categories: finding the words for Anne Lister Caroline Gonda; 12. From Anne Lister to gentleman Jack: queer temporality, fandom and the gains and losses of adaptation Chris Roulston; 13. Emma Donoghue in Conversation with Sally Wainwright; Bibliography; Index.
