goest") in their private ceremonials. She also seems to stretch conjecture some what by stating that the obscure events narrated in Henry James' TURN OF THE SCREW actually denote the corrupti on of an eight-year-old girl by a depraved Lesbian governess. Since no one has ever figured out precisely what TURN OF THE SCREW is really about, this may be a valid literary game...like trying to interpret Picasso's cubist studies, the interpretation is really in the eye and the mentality of the beholder.. ..but I doubt if she would find many professors of literature who would agree with her.

All the se minor faults aside, however, this book stands as a major milestone in the literature of homosexuality in general and female variance in particular. As far as I know, except for a few privately circulated le aflets in mimeograph, it is the first work of its kind, and an absolute necessity for those who are interested in the social aspe cts of Lesbianism.

Its worth goes far beyond this. The novelist, by definition, is one who observes humanity. As such, he also becomes an excellent, if pragmatic psychiatrist. The writer of any work of serious fiction tends to portray the Lesbian as she appears in society, not in the limited portraiture of the psychologist's casebook. This is just

as true of those novels which attack the Lesbian as it is of the Lesbian apologist, both viewpoints, limited as the y aro, say point-blank that the writer has seen the homosexual woman, and has this to say about her place in society. (And, although many Lesbians will rebel against this unassailable fact, even those novels which attack the Lesbian the most bitterly are of some worth, as reflecting a weak point, an exposed flank from which attack is possible).

Basically, I would say that the worth of Miss Foster's SEX VARIANT WOMEN IN LITERATURE goes far beyond the more bibliography. It surveys and studies an entire area of human thinking, which does not limit itself to the pathology of the too-well-known "psychological" book about homosexuals; it surveys how men and women have seen the Lesbian, how they have thought about her, how they have written about her. For anyone with even the most cursory interest in Lesbians or Lesbiani the book should be the corner stone of the library.

sm,

MARION ZIMMER BRADLEY