Interview with Janet Todd - The Lesbian Historic Motif Podcast Episode 157

2020-10-17

Interview with Janet Todd The Lesbian Historic Motif Podcast - Episode 157 with Heather Rose Jones A series of interviews with authors of historically-based fiction featuring queer women. In this episode we talk about: Why I jumped at the chance to interview Janet Todd Dynamics of mothers and daughters in mid-20th century England Post-WWII social and political changes in England all the way up to Brexit Themes of ignorance, claustrophobia, and class aspirations The subtle underlayer of queer sexuality in the book Mid-century experiences of...

Interview with Janet Todd The Lesbian Historic Motif Podcast - Episode 157 with Heather Rose Jones

A series of interviews with authors of historically-based fiction featuring queer women.

In this episode we talk about:

Why I jumped at the chance to interview Janet Todd
Dynamics of mothers and daughters in mid-20th century England
Post-WWII social and political changes in England all the way up to Brexit
Themes of ignorance, claustrophobia, and class aspirations
The subtle underlayer of queer sexuality in the book
Mid-century experiences of same-sex identification
Joan’s narrative voice and the life experience it represents
Writing an unlikeable character, not for sympathy, but for understanding
The “social refusenik” and national character
Why does a historian write a relatively modern novel?
How Janet’s own post-war childhood informed the setting
Changes in childrearing philosophy and how they shaped generations
Books mentioned
- Don’t You Know There’s a War On? by Janet Todd
- Lady Susan Plays the Game by Janet Todd (an expansion of Jane Austen’s Lady Susan)
- A Man of Genius by Janet Todd (a Gothic novel set in 19th century Venice, no queer content)
- Radiation Diaries: Cancer, Memory and Fragments of a Life in Words by Janet Todd (memoir of her cancer treatment)