Decoding Anne Lister

Caroline Gonda is College Associate Professor and Director of Studies in English at St Catharine's College, Cambridge. She was the first person appointed to the post of LGBTQ+ Fellow at a Cambridge College. With John Beynon, she co-edited the pioneering collection Lesbian Dames: Sapphism in the Long Eighteenth Century (2010). She writes and teaches on literature, gender and sexuality, particularly lesbian narrative and queer reception. Chris Roulston is Professor of Gender, Sexuality, and Women's Studies and French Studies at the University of Western Ontario. She has been a leading Lister scholar for the last decade. Her essays on Lister's relationship with Eliza Raine, classical literature, queer sexuality, marriage and Gentleman Jack have appeared in Eighteenth-Century Studies (2022), the Journal of Lesbian Studies (2013, 2022), and the Journal of the History of Sexuality (2021).

• 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.

'This is the smart, timely, interdisciplinary book that Anne Lister deserves. The range of topics and approaches by the authors is well-suited to their dynamic subject, who herself was never contained by the norms of her day. An essential volume of new essays about the most prolific diarist and chronicler of lesbian love of her time.' Jen Manion, Amherst College