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Taking My Life by Jane Rule (Talonbooks $19.95)
Jane rule begins her memoir of her formative years, Tak-ing My Life by expressing "moral and aesthetic"; misgivings about the project. Poor health has ended her career as a novelist and left her feeling "not just directionless but unconvinced that there is one."; Rule states that she is turning to autobiography because there is "nothing else to do.";
The misgivings are understandable, for this is not only the most self-revelatory of her works, but one that exposes vulnerable friends and family to public scrutiny. In doing so, she goes against her expressed concern for maintaining the privacy of her acquaintances and correspondents.
No doubt her reservations explain her decision not to offer the document for publication. At the same time, she has clearly affirmed her belief in its importance by placing it in her archival collection at UBC-from which editor Linda M. Morra has retrieved it for publication with or without Rule's permission (that matter is not clarified in the introduction).
Jane Rule came from an affluent family whose many headstrong and colourful characters contribute to the lively account of her early years. But it is generally the painful and conflicted relationships that define us.
Accordingly, it is two "troubled and troubling"; relationships that form the over-arching theme of this narrative.
The first is with the older brother Arthur Rule, who was the cherished companion of Rule's early years. The bond between them was so close that she thought of them as an inseparable unit-Jane-and-Arthur-like the parents they were named for. Sadly, the bond was broken when Rule was five, and the peripatetic family left the eastern United States for California. From that moment, Arthur changed into a disturbed youth, whose erratic behaviour destroyed family harmony and made his sister miserable. He became hostile to the family, was expelled from schools, charged with vandalism, and often in trouble with the police.
There are hints that a crippling rivalry with his sister, aggravated by the father's invidious comparisons, exacerbated his problems. Whatever the cause, his sister yearned for the rest of her life to regain the affection of those early years.
Rule acknowledges that her relationships with teachers had a strong erotic charge. "I couldn't have known that first year in high school how much I presented myself to my teachers as a potential lover,"; she writes. She notes of one Miss Espinosa, a principal, "...we wooed each other as stupidly and negatively as children pulling each other's braids.";
Espinosa's influence was partly responsible for her failure to be accepted at Stanford, and a letter to Mills College (fortunately unheeded) said that Rule's moral character made her unfit for the college.
The teacher, however, who exerted the most influence during Rule's adolescence, was Ann Smith, a graduate of Wellesley College and The Art Institute of Chicago (two of her three portraits of Rule grace the book), eleven years Rule's senior. When they met, Smith lived alone, waiting for the return of her soldier husband. Her own childhood had been unsettling, involving frequent moves, an alcoholic father, and a sexual relationship with an older brother.
Smith's attitude to her fourteen-year-old student moved from professional to personal to intimate, and drew Rule into the vortex of her teacher's own emotional turmoil. The intensity of the friendship was such that fifty years later, Rule recalls fragments of their conversation:
"Nancy says you have a crush on me,"; Ann said one day.
"That's stupid,"; I answered hotly.
"What's stupid about it?";
"Crushes are stupid. I love you, but I don't have a crush on you.";
Later Smith tells Rule that she and her husband have sex at least twice a day, and Rule responds that she doesn't love anyone "that way.";
The first time I said it, I didn't add that I probably never would. Later I didn't add, "except you.";
It was in my head, but I had no idea what it meant.
Smith urges Rule to find relief in solo sex, and assures her that women do fall in love with each other, but insists that she have her first sexual experience with a man, lest she become a lesbian. When the two finally have sex, it is Smith's guilt that Rule finds most disturbing. Their relationship endures throughout Rule's college years, even as Rule loves other women, and after Smith moves to the east coast, where she and her husband (with whom Rule has a brief sexual encounter) have three daughters.
Although the book covers only Rule's first two decades, it ends with a strong sense of resolution. The emotional confusions of the previous years have receded. She is in a mutually satisfying relationship with an English woman, living in London, working on a novel, and her future looks promising.
Arthur Rule marries a college friend of his sister, in a ceremony she describes as "blackly humorous."; Before the ceremony his words to his sister, "Remember, kiddo...you can run your heart out, but I can beat you standing still,"; suggest that he sees even his marriage as a way of triumphing over his sister.
Ann Smith's life is falling apart. Although her neighbours see her as a model of serenity, she has been hospitalized for "melancholia,"; and her husband says he will commit her to a mental institution again if necessary. Rule leaves for England fearful for the physical safety of Smith's three children.
All biographers, editors and
literary executors, face ethical questions, as they weigh privacy issues and authorial wishes against the claims of cultural and literary history. Given Jane Rule's iconic stature, and the fact that every prominent writer is a contested site, the decision to publish this manuscript in its entirety and with the names of key figures unchanged, is sure to be debated.
The prudent course might have been, as Rule probably intended, to wait for a future biographer to place its contents within the context of the fiction. But biographies are long in the making, their successful completion never assured, and without them literary reputations quickly fade.
Scholars and devotees of Rule's work can, therefore, be grateful for this valuable resource. 978-0-88922-673-9
Joan Givner is the author of two biographies and an autobiography, The Self-Portrait of a Literary Biography.
[BCBW 2011]
The misgivings are understandable, for this is not only the most self-revelatory of her works, but one that exposes vulnerable friends and family to public scrutiny. In doing so, she goes against her expressed concern for maintaining the privacy of her acquaintances and correspondents.
No doubt her reservations explain her decision not to offer the document for publication. At the same time, she has clearly affirmed her belief in its importance by placing it in her archival collection at UBC-from which editor Linda M. Morra has retrieved it for publication with or without Rule's permission (that matter is not clarified in the introduction).
Jane Rule came from an affluent family whose many headstrong and colourful characters contribute to the lively account of her early years. But it is generally the painful and conflicted relationships that define us.
Accordingly, it is two "troubled and troubling"; relationships that form the over-arching theme of this narrative.
The first is with the older brother Arthur Rule, who was the cherished companion of Rule's early years. The bond between them was so close that she thought of them as an inseparable unit-Jane-and-Arthur-like the parents they were named for. Sadly, the bond was broken when Rule was five, and the peripatetic family left the eastern United States for California. From that moment, Arthur changed into a disturbed youth, whose erratic behaviour destroyed family harmony and made his sister miserable. He became hostile to the family, was expelled from schools, charged with vandalism, and often in trouble with the police.
There are hints that a crippling rivalry with his sister, aggravated by the father's invidious comparisons, exacerbated his problems. Whatever the cause, his sister yearned for the rest of her life to regain the affection of those early years.
Rule acknowledges that her relationships with teachers had a strong erotic charge. "I couldn't have known that first year in high school how much I presented myself to my teachers as a potential lover,"; she writes. She notes of one Miss Espinosa, a principal, "...we wooed each other as stupidly and negatively as children pulling each other's braids.";
Espinosa's influence was partly responsible for her failure to be accepted at Stanford, and a letter to Mills College (fortunately unheeded) said that Rule's moral character made her unfit for the college.
The teacher, however, who exerted the most influence during Rule's adolescence, was Ann Smith, a graduate of Wellesley College and The Art Institute of Chicago (two of her three portraits of Rule grace the book), eleven years Rule's senior. When they met, Smith lived alone, waiting for the return of her soldier husband. Her own childhood had been unsettling, involving frequent moves, an alcoholic father, and a sexual relationship with an older brother.
Smith's attitude to her fourteen-year-old student moved from professional to personal to intimate, and drew Rule into the vortex of her teacher's own emotional turmoil. The intensity of the friendship was such that fifty years later, Rule recalls fragments of their conversation:
"Nancy says you have a crush on me,"; Ann said one day.
"That's stupid,"; I answered hotly.
"What's stupid about it?";
"Crushes are stupid. I love you, but I don't have a crush on you.";
Later Smith tells Rule that she and her husband have sex at least twice a day, and Rule responds that she doesn't love anyone "that way.";
The first time I said it, I didn't add that I probably never would. Later I didn't add, "except you.";
It was in my head, but I had no idea what it meant.
Smith urges Rule to find relief in solo sex, and assures her that women do fall in love with each other, but insists that she have her first sexual experience with a man, lest she become a lesbian. When the two finally have sex, it is Smith's guilt that Rule finds most disturbing. Their relationship endures throughout Rule's college years, even as Rule loves other women, and after Smith moves to the east coast, where she and her husband (with whom Rule has a brief sexual encounter) have three daughters.
Although the book covers only Rule's first two decades, it ends with a strong sense of resolution. The emotional confusions of the previous years have receded. She is in a mutually satisfying relationship with an English woman, living in London, working on a novel, and her future looks promising.
Arthur Rule marries a college friend of his sister, in a ceremony she describes as "blackly humorous."; Before the ceremony his words to his sister, "Remember, kiddo...you can run your heart out, but I can beat you standing still,"; suggest that he sees even his marriage as a way of triumphing over his sister.
Ann Smith's life is falling apart. Although her neighbours see her as a model of serenity, she has been hospitalized for "melancholia,"; and her husband says he will commit her to a mental institution again if necessary. Rule leaves for England fearful for the physical safety of Smith's three children.
All biographers, editors and
literary executors, face ethical questions, as they weigh privacy issues and authorial wishes against the claims of cultural and literary history. Given Jane Rule's iconic stature, and the fact that every prominent writer is a contested site, the decision to publish this manuscript in its entirety and with the names of key figures unchanged, is sure to be debated.
The prudent course might have been, as Rule probably intended, to wait for a future biographer to place its contents within the context of the fiction. But biographies are long in the making, their successful completion never assured, and without them literary reputations quickly fade.
Scholars and devotees of Rule's work can, therefore, be grateful for this valuable resource. 978-0-88922-673-9
Joan Givner is the author of two biographies and an autobiography, The Self-Portrait of a Literary Biography.
[BCBW 2011]
Submitted on November 10, 2011 in By David.
