amelia myself and i
Jul. 30th, 2011 03:31 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wytchcroft
I have mentioned elsewhere my burgeoning interest in Amelia Earhart (and, I should add now, many other early flyers all of them idiosyncratic and intriguing) –
in the intervening time I’ve been richly rewarded in the process of research as a very great amount of material has been published, archives are now available online, books and documentaries have proliferated and at least one biopic movie has been made.
As a scribbler, it’s hard not to respond creatively somehow, the desire to evoke a period, to celebrate the achievements of so charismatic a personality and, ultimately, to want to solve the enigma of her final flight and disappearance becomes stronger as more details and more mysteries are uncovered.
I am under no illusion of being able to really do justice to the reality of Earhart as a person (and associated figures such as the oft maligned navigator Noonan) or to the surreal exuberance of semi-crazed events such as the ‘powder-puff derby’ which pitted the few female pilots of the time against one another as they navigated across America with roadmaps or fell out of the sky due to the ungodly amount of sabotage, sand in the gas tanks for example, wacky races got nothing to compare!
But the pull of gravity is indeed strong – thus the few associatively linked ‘island pieces’ that I’ve posted here all have some connection to Earhart as a muse figure. I will cheerfully admit to a fairly low opinion of my (gawd) literary (!) efforts but perhaps that’s the root of my fascination with Amelia; she herself held modest views of her piloting skills – she just didn’t let that stop her. A genuine punk in that regard, she would flash a grin, screw up her eyes, hunch down her shoulders and nervously slam her beloved plane against the runway or against the sky. Everyone posting here on the web must feel a similar mix of exhilaration and fear.
As a woman, Amelia’s pre-feminist breakthroughs are well known and justly regarded. But she was not entirely alone. Indeed there was a strong rivalry (which could on occasion become bitter) between the Aviatrixes of the time – women, as ever, being encouraged to compete with one another for the attention of and possible recognition from men.
That there was not MORE of this, and that in fact the women were frequently strongly supportive of one another and genuinely friendly, is a testament to their characters and the shared hunger for advancement.
But all the same – what of the women who were NOT Amelia Earhart?
I want now to know of them, to know how it must have felt to be simultaneously inspired and frustrated by the flyers exploits and reputation.
Women from all walks of life not only pilots.
How would someone like Earhart impact on their personal sense of identity and achievement in life?
So... I have been working away at something, a project (finally! after a year of not really writing,) a drama piece...of which more later. The improvised fragments so far posted (and arising from different sessions, some with music and f/x) are just first approaches, aerial reconnaissance, testing the petrol, I want to get the ‘poetry’ out of my system before starting out because... well, just because - and I need to make certain that my eager little Vega** does not simply gad about the same path already gracefully flown by others.
There is another layer too – all this zooming back into the past has revealed it to me. Back in the 1980’s I cranked out a performance piece called ‘Flight’ about the connection between the mother and child during birth. That piece resulted in definite and significant changes in my life.
Just recently I have been amongst expectant and new mothers and been inspired by them (hello to my real life Muses out there) to write, or retrieve, pieces exploring notions and experiences of birthing and new life (both light and dark) – which has fed into the Amelia work, in effect becoming another ‘Flight’, and I am only now realising this, tracing a necessary circle before heading out for the horizon...
So, this is the process underway, attempting to find the points of navigation, to adjust the engine and order in the best fuel possible, to compare maps and markers before striking out. I don’t normally post the process work (I know, I know it’s ALL Process Work, ok, ok) but that in itself represents a new direction for me.
Maybe I’ll falter, maybe I’ll stop, and all this scribbling will result in nothing more than an embarrassing ground-loop...
we’ll see.
*i am an uncommitted believer in the Gardener Island scenario for those who know the topic. And there is a weird poetry in many of the radio signals picked up after the non-arrival at Howland, genuine or not.
** or Electra.
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Amelia was gay
Date: 2011-07-30 06:05 am (UTC)Hugz,
Justine
Re: Amelia was gay
Date: 2011-07-30 11:35 am (UTC)but the historical evidence is slender either way, excepting the fact that she was part of a newly daring 1920s exploratory culture; ‘bobbed hair, bathtub gin and wild, wild ways’ as Marion Meade puts it.
I certainly don’t discount the possibility and an actor might choose to bring that onboard in their performance and attitude to the role. But I am wary of being definitive with so opaque an icon. Icons are forever being claimed and reclaimed – that’s the function of myth after all to become a screen for our own projected information and desires.
If Jane Mendlesohn has written a classic piece of hetero Earhart/Noonan shippage fiction with her novel ‘I was Amelia Earhart’ then I have no doubt that Earhart femme-slash abounds elsewhere. And if it can happen to Sherlock Holmes in the movies then someone will seize the notion of a ‘gay’* Amelia in a similar way. If I was Angela Carter, Jeanette Winterson or Sarah Waters then I could do something maybe – and Ali Smith may yet! I can easily imagine Earhart as a female Captain Jack from Torchwood too.
But, ultimately, I’m not sure that Amelia’s sexuality is very important, indeed it was the sort of life baggage she could leave behind every time she got on a plane, along with her dysfunctional childhood, her cluster headaches and her husband.
Sorry for such a long reply – and thank you for pointing out a possible island to land on and find fuel, one I could all too easily have overlooked or foolishly discounted.
*I’m never comfortable with labels.
Re: Amelia was gay
Date: 2011-07-30 01:23 pm (UTC)i do believe that all *great* men and women are more open to love in all its glories and having said that, i believe that what makes them so great is the complete love they have for what makes them great, i.e., amelia and her love of adventure or whatever you may call it, because it is so much more than that... ;)
what a wonderful and intriguing project. you are quite the chap, my friend! i am always learning from you.
i do hope your process is fruitful and fulfilling.
i look forward to so much more...
:D
x
Irene's reply
Date: 2011-08-03 01:36 pm (UTC)Gay. Hmm? Did I hear you right? I know, I know, ok. Gay. Were we… gay. We were. All of us, all so very gay, you know, back then, so very gay, hell, weren’t we the bright young things, you read about I’m sure.
But that’s not what you what you want to know is it buster, let’s get this straight right now – we may have been... gay, but sure as apples mister, not all of us were queer.
What? Oh you heard me, you heard me just fine – back then it – there was no – gay… Jesus. Queer’s the word, and queer? Hell, what aint queer about women in pants taking to there air like that, women with the sound of engines and sky hollering through their pretty empty heads and the hair all in their eyes, played merry hell with a lady’s mascara let me tell you. Women with wings.
Gay… Damn it, when did people get so sensitive about it – what you’re asking… on a summers day, some Hicksville out of town poke hole, some country fair, we could set down among the burnt smell of thirsty grass, intoxicating kerosene and candyfloss, were we fucking the innocent gals of America right there in the back of our hot and sinful metal? Were we queer?
Some of us - maybe… free to be… You know, she was so brazen for a gap toothed queen bitch coming on so eager, huh, standing there, striking that well known pose, hands on hips or the back pockets, the back bent just ever so, looking up and down at the same time, so studied she must have practised it for hours… “Well, I want to fly – you gonna teach me?” And the hand extended. Such an eager little piece, such a – fan. You think all this is new? Huh? You think? She had our stance already and soon as tutored she got the haircut and the rest down pat.
Ah, bullshit. You think nobody smirked back then? No/one got vicious?
Poor Julia.
And here YOU are now, asking with such effrontery…
She always… the flyer…
oh sure, it’s easy to picture her, standing before her island, hand on hip or taking to the air with the slap of a hand, wild eyed and peter pan. I’m not wilting Wendy here Mister, you got that?
And what if I COULD bring her back huh? Conjure her up for you, hmm? That pretty girl like a boy who may have been a boy inside a girl, that vixen Ariel… That would be something, wouldn’t it? That would be… magic. Summon her – Ariel and her island. Had I that magic… wouldn’t that be just dandy, wouldn’t that make me a fine Prospero?
No, it would make me Sycorax, mister –
it would make me the witch.
I am, Sir, unwilling to undertake such a role.
Go home, the show’s over boys – and all the gals are gone.
...................................
see? i wasn't kidding about being prodded, thanks Justine, i can't judge the literary level yet but you got the propeller moving! :)
'best,
wytch
Re: Irene's reply
Date: 2011-08-03 02:00 pm (UTC)and she's up and away, i'd say!
:D
Re: Irene's reply
Date: 2011-08-03 05:56 pm (UTC)Re: Irene's reply
Date: 2011-08-03 06:28 pm (UTC)you're too kind and too modest! amelia would have approved, i'm sure! and irene! ;)
no subject
Date: 2011-07-31 05:42 pm (UTC)Hugz,
Justine
no subject
Date: 2011-08-01 01:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-01 05:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-01 10:44 am (UTC);p