Artemis Smith

Speaks

for Herself

Artemis Smith, author of ODD GIRL and THE THIRD SEX gave a short dissertation on the problems involved in the writing and publishing of Lesbian novels. She told how one of her novels was turned into a Lesbian novel, against her wishes, by the publisher. She mentioned that, while this was probably one of the best times to get a Lesbian novel published, she had some truly good ones in her closet that her publisher wouldn't take. seems that a stereotype must be followed in order to make the publisher interested.

It

Artemis is now more interested in making Lesbians and homosexuals background characters in heterosexual novels, She feels that more good can be done this way than with the purely Lesbian novels she has written and that sho could do a higher class of novel and get less blue pencil editi 8. She is writing a new book about a young man î: armed services who neither is a homosexual nor 1 the a Comunist, but who gets branded both by "association."

Miss Smith made an offer to writers. She asked writers of Lesbian novels who could not get their books published to send them to the Daughters of Bilitis, Inc. to be read by them. The ones they felt to have real merit would be sent on to Artemis Smith who would scan them. The ones she felt had a good chance to be published, she would pass on to her literary agent to try

15