I encounter the lesbian strain in domestic thrillers

Stranger on Lesbos
By Valerie Taylor

Valerie Taylor started out in a conventional marriage with two kids, divorced, came out, and became an early advocate for gay women in the Midwest. Her novel, "Stranger on Lesbos," is part of a series, so even though this novel, written in the 1950s, ends on a rather conventional note, it behooves the reader to keep in mind that the story isn't over.

As the novel opens, Frances seems happily married to Bill. They have a son, Bob, who is almost grown. Born to poor and working class parents, Frances and Bill have come up in the world. He's an executive, and their home in the suburbs has all the modern conveniences. Bill worries about Frances's sense of fulfillment and encourages her to return to college to pursue her advanced degree in literature.

But there are signs of strain in this happy picture early on. Bill is often entertaining clients. His encouragement of Frances's studies seems as much motivated to distract her from the late nights he keeps as from any concern for her happiness. Bob is becoming independent, and Frances is beginning to question his need for her as a parent: "Good old mom, a standard piece of household equipment," she thinks as she tidies Bob's closet. It's also clear that Bill and Frances's love life has not been particularly satisfying--12 orgasms in 16 years.

If Bill and Bob have been indifferent, flashbacks to Frances's life with her father show a history of abuse and neglect. Pa is a drunk who thinks nothing of hacking up the doors in the house to burn in the cookstove and using a page from Frances's books as tinder: "Then he ripped pages out of Frankie's geography book, and her heart tore across like paper." Frances has had difficult relationships with men throughout her life, and it might have allowed readers in the 1950s to find a "reason" for Frances's attraction to women. This may be a nod to conventional wisdom at the time on Taylor's part, but it clearly is not wisdom that she herself buys into.

At college, Frances meets Mary Baker. She is drawn into an intense friendship with "Bake," as she is known, and, eventually, a love affair. But Bake is disturbingly like the men in Frances's life. She is insensitive, urging Frances not to bother to go home to make dinner for her son, and asking rudely why Frances married Bill: "You get pregnant or something?" She also pressures Frances to leave her husband and move in with her, and while Frances is deeply in love--or at least deeply gratified sexually--she resists Bake's plan. While she doesn't articulate, it, Frances seems to know at some level that Bake is has the same alcoholic and faithless tendencies as her Bill.

After starting a fight with another woman in a gay bar, the place is raided. Frances expects to see Bake in the paddy wagon, but she has somehow ducked the police, leaving Frances on her own. Worse, when Frances uses her phone call to contact Bake, she apologizes for running out, and urges Frances to get Bill to bail her out.

The novel covers the span of a few years, in which Frances graduates, gets a job, and continues to stay with Bill and manage her affair with Bake. And pretty miserable years they are, too; Frances is abused by both men and women, is betrayed by just about everybody, and becomes deeply confused about where she belongs. In a frank talk with Kay, a lesbian in Bake's circle who has been married and understands Frances's confusion, she acknowledges the realities of being a lesbian at a time when most homosexuals had to remain closeted and long-term relationships were difficult to sustain:

Maybe that's why so many of us drink too much. That's a kind of running away.... Look, it's none of my business, but if I had a husband and he was halfway decent to me ... I think I'd stick with him. Maybe it isn't all moonlight and roses. Okay, so it's very romantic watching your girl get soused and make a public fool of herself. Not to mention the nights when you wake up and wonder how long you've got before she gets interested in someone else.

When her son Bob, who is planning to get married, demands that she stop seeing "a lot of queers" to mollify fiancee Mari's conventional notions about family decency, Frances agrees, then falls apart. She does pick up the pieces in an ending that is somewhat ambiguous. The reader senses that Frances has rejected a good part of what is abusive, dangerous, and unhealthy about "the life," but she has also rejected who she is as well. She has learned something ... but not everything.

***SPOILERS FOLLOW*** In leaving Frances at Bob's wedding, reconciled to restarting her life with Bill, Taylor ends the story where many gay people ended their lives 60 years ago, making the best of it in conventional marriages and repressing their sexuality. Frances clearly hopes, as the book ends, that she can find contentment. She has a history with Bill. In the early days, he was kind. And he clearly wants to take her back, not just for appearances, but because she is the girl he fell in love with.

Taylor is generous enough to acknowledge that Frances is not the only victim in this domestic situation. Bill's happiness, too, has been (and the reader senses, will be) tied Frances's sexual identity and his demand that she follow accepted conventions.

Also, hovering at the edges of Bill and Frances's return to domesticity is Kay, who has crashed the wedding (though very discreetly and looking very chic). "With only a minimal qualm, [Frances] renounced Kay's friendship and whatever possibilities it might hold of emotional involvement. I'll leave the receiver off the hook, she decided firmly."

One senses that phone will not stay off the hook indefinitely.