Rita Mae Brown

Time Magazine has an interview with Rita Mae Brown which is worth a read. I have enjoyed a number of her books – including High Hearts which is set during the Civil War with much of the action taking place within a 70 to 80 mile radius of Charlottesville- and also books involving fox hunting since my brother and his wife are part of that set in Charlottesville. Moreover, one of my brother’s sisters-in-law had an affair with Rita Mae some years back (my brother and his wife are “in society” (http://avenue.org/party/year2001.html - see Vienna Waltz and http://www.timeslice.ca/hss/Keswick/KeswickSpring2008.pdf) so it caused a bit of a scandal. Unfortunately, my brother finds having an openly gay brother an embarrassment and avoids me while my sister-in-law is wonderful). But I digress. Overall, I have always enjoyed Rita Mae’s spirit and sense of being her own person. Here are a few highlights:

Tell me about your experience in the early days of NOW (the National Organization for Women). Did you resign in protest?
Hell no. They threw me out. Here I am, a southern country girl, so I was easy to write off as a stupid kid. I still had my accent — I have it when I go home, but I hadn't learned how to disguise it. I raised the issue of class differences between women and racial differences. At this point this was really quite an important band of women in America, but not necessarily representative of all women's concerns. Then, of course, I raised the issue of gay women. That was all it took. [Betty Friedan] got rid of me in a hurry.

You didn't go quietly at the time though, did you?
Hell no. I fought. I wrote in the newsletter and I fought. It didn't do any good because everybody was scared sh--less of her. But I'll give Betty credit. I don't know if you ever met her. Bombastic, rude, self-centered. Brilliant. And you know what? Fundamentally a moral person and about 20 years later she apologized to me in public. It took a lot. She said, I was wrong.

Do you feel as though things have changed a lot for lesbians and for gays?
Yes, I think so. I think you can judge the level of success for any group of people by the reaction against it. And given the reaction of the so-called Christian Right — I would put that in quotes because I don't believe they're Christians at all — I would have to say that people have been wildly successful.