The Edinburgh Book Festival events reclaiming female sexuality
Female sexuality and the role of sex in women’s stories come under the microscope at this year’s Book Festival. Rachel Morrell goes under the covers to find the events exploring an
often-misrepresented subject
Starting our journey of sexual exploration with Hollie McNish, the bestselling poet behind Lobster and Slug, feels appropriate, as she explores a simple word which comes loaded with meaning: virgin. McNish will traverse the murky depths of purity culture between musings on her own journey in poetry collection Virgin. Across three events, she’ll bring her modern voice to a subject that has rendered many a story untold: her own late-night discussion (22 August, 8.30pm) and joining the panels for ʻPoorna Bell: She Wanted Moreʼ (23 August, 2pm) and ʻThe Compassion Salonʼ (23 August, 11.45am).
Kate Lister will join the ʻLadies Of Pleasureʼ line-up (15 August, 5.15pm) as the panel discusses the control and liberation of female sexuality. Sharing the history of prostitution in her blog Whores Of Yore and as host of the award-winning podcast Betwixt The Sheets, Lister is a perfect addition to the festival’s sex-positive panel, especially as her new non-fiction novel, Flick: The Story Of Female Pleasure seeks to transform the image of women’s sex lives. Charting examples throughout history which reveal the overlooked idea that women in the past enjoyed rather than endured their sexuality, Lister rejects the common perspective and instead discovers humour and empowerment in the bedrooms and brothels of yesteryear.
Joining Lister on the panel is Jean Menzies, ancient historian and author of Aphrodisia, who takes a look at the boudoirs of classical antiquity, finding everything from seduction tips to civil rights in the annals of ancient Greece and Rome in order to provoke an understanding of women’s desire and sexual wellbeing today. With a prolific backlist that includes everything from a sapphic reimagining of Arthurian legend to the significance of Greek mythology in LGBTQ+ literature, Menzies is a well of knowledge who will be appearing in ʻLadies Of Pleasureʼ and chairing a range of mythology-centred events throughout the festival.
Thanks to her new book With My Own Hand, Ashley Douglas adds to our understanding of Scotland’s saucier side via 16th-century Marie Maitland, a scribe and secret lesbian poet, whose sonnets in The Maitland Quarto are finally finding the light. Combining the manuscript’s hidden clues with her own research into this queer woman’s life in 1586 amid the rigorous moral code of Scotland’s Reformation society, Douglas discovers one of the earliest instances of lesbian poetry since Sappho. Having worked with the National Library Of Scotland and specialising in LGBTQ+ history and the Scots language, it will be fascinating to hear about her exploration of this topic in person at the ʻLadies Of Pleasureʼ panel, adding even more depth to a series of seductive events at this year’s Book Festival.
All events at Edinburgh Futures Institute; main picture: Maxime Hugeux.