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The Lucky Star Page 73

by William T. Vollmann


  Epigraph: “What we’re really scared of . . .”—Judy Garland on Judy Garland: Interviews and Encounters, ed. Randy L. Schmidt (Chicago: Chicago Review Press / An A Cappella Book, 2014), p. 216 (Judy Garland, Coronet, February 1955).

  What she needed to do would happen even of itself . . .—This and several other such word-strings have been stolen from the testimony of Joan of Arc, then mutilated to fit my purposes.

  NEVA

  Epigraph: “She still takes her Teddy Bear to bed . . .”—Judy Garland on Judy Garland: Interviews and Encounters, ed. Randy L. Schmidt (Chicago: Chicago Review Press / An A Cappella Book, 2014), p. 20 (Gladys Hall, Motion Picture, January 1938).

  Epigraph: “I never played with dolls . . .”—Schmidt, p. 84 (Judy Garland as told to Gladys Hall, Screenland, December 1940).

  Epigraph: “Mom wants me to be safe . . .”—Kathryn Springer, The Dandelion Field (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2014), p. 96.

  Judy Garland: “I think women get themselves mixed up . . .”—Schmidt, p. 164 (Judy Garland, Screenland, October 1946).

  WHO WE WERE

  Epigraph: “And in my case there is no question of performance . . .”—Jean Stein, West of Eden: An American Place (New York: Random House, 2016), p. 191 (chapter on Jennifer Jones). The letter is undated, but the answering telegram is from 1953.

  Epigraph: “It is natural that when one thinks of sex . . .”—Michele Eliot, ed., Female Sexual Abuse of Children (New York: Guilford Press, 1994 repr. of orig. 1993 British ed.), p. 85 (Hilary Eldridge, “Barbara’s Story—A Mother Who Sexually Abused”).

  “She looks healthy and happy . . .”—Judy Garland on Judy Garland: Interviews and Encounters, ed. Randy L. Schmidt (Chicago: Chicago Review Press / An A Cappella Book, 2014), p. 84 (Judy Garland as told to Gladys Hill, Screenland, December 1940).

  Judy Garland: “If she loses her sense of perspective . . .”—Schmidt, p. 162 (Judy Garland, Screenland, October 1946).

  I remember that she stood just within our darkness as if she were waiting for her pupils to enlarge so that she could see us in . . . our various lonely self-tortures.—Cf. Serge A. Zhenkovsky, ed. and comp., Medieval Russia’s Epics, Chronicles and Tales, rev. ed. (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1974; orig. ed. 1973), p. 154 (Anonymous, “The Visitation to the Torments by the Mother of God” [or, “The Descent of the Virgin into Hell”], 12th cent.): “And the Holy Virgin said: ‘Let the darkness be dispersed that I may see the torment.’”

  “Show yourself so submissive and humble . . .”—Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, trans. Leo Sherley-Price (New York: Penguin, 1987 repr. of 1952 ed.; orig. Latin version wr. ca. 1413), pp. 110–11.

  WHAT SHE DID TO US

  Epigraph: “God, the magnificent, has said: ‘Women are your field . . .’”—The Perfumed Garden of the Shaykh Nefzawi, trans. Sir Richard F. Burton, ed. Alan Hull Walton (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1964; orig. trans. 1886; orig. wr. betw. 1394 and 1433), p. 129.

  Epigraph: “Unhindered by any ambiguity . . .”—Colette, The Pure and the Impure, trans. Herma Briffault (New York: New York Review Books, 2000 rev. repr. of 1996 ed.; orig. French ed. 1941), p. 97.

  “I was born in Murfreesboro, Tennessee . . .”—Judy Garland on Judy Garland: Interviews and Encounters, ed. Randy L. Schmidt (Chicago: Chicago Review Press / An A Cappella Book, 2014), p. 22.

  This page: the gospel of truth is joy.—James M. Robinson, gen. ed., The Nag Hammadi Library in English, p. 40 (“The Gospel of Truth,” 2nd cent.?).

  THE STREAM OF PLEASURE

  Epigraph: “And first, upon thee lovely shall she smile . . .”—Emrys Jones, comp. and ed., The New Oxford Book of Sixteenth Century Verse (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), p. 60 (“Certain metres written by master Thomas More in his youth for ‘The Book of Fortune,’ and caused them to be printed in the beginning of that book”).

  Epigraph: “Authorities and investigators are not in complete agreement . . .”—Margaret Sanger, Happiness in Marriage (New York: Blue Ribon Books, 1926), p. 155.

  This page: What Judy Garland’s ghostwriter saw—Schmidt, p. xv.

  “UNSERE LÄCHERLICHE HUNDEFRAU KOMMT WIEDER!”—“OUR LAUGHABLE DOG-WOMAN RETURNS!”

  This page: Information on the Wicked Witch re: Judy Garland’s amphetamines—Joan Beck Coulson, Always for Judy: Witness to the Joy and Genius of Judy Garland (Elmira, California: Yarnscombe Books, 2014), p. 55.

  I felt as if everything were burning! . . . my thoughts glowed red and yellow with lust.—Cf. Paul Carus, comp. [and trans.?], The Gospel of Buddha (Guernsey, U.K.: Studio Press Ltd. / The Guernsey Press Co. Ltd., 1995; orig. ed. 1915; n.d. given for original texts), p. 64 (the famous Fire Sermon): “Everything, O Jatilas, is burning. The eye is burning, all the senses are burning, thoughts are burning. They are burning with the fire of lust.” (The Jatilas were a group of ascetic Brahmins.)

  This page: A Japanese asked Francine how he could buy a used pair of the lesbian’s panties for fifty dollars.—Price information from an item on “Kokunbuncho, the largest sex industry area in Tohoku,” in the Asahi Shinbun, n.d., trans. for WTV by Ms. Kawai Takako, ca. 2014. Called “Buncho,” in Aoba ward of Sendai City, this “red-light zone where 60,000 people [including many decontamination workers] come and go on the weekends” employs a certain hostess. “To earn pocket money, she sold her underwear at 5000 yen [= about U.S. $50] and 20 nude photos at 10,000 yen. ‘I didn’t feel guilty. I felt secure to know that someone needs me’ . . . After graduating from senior high school, she became a bus guide in Kyoto. ‘I wanted attention from others.’ But due to her health condition, she quit after 2 years.” In Sendai a high school friend hooked her up with a “sex trade shop.” “Soon she got used to be kissed by a middle-aged man who is a stranger to her and her breasts touched . . . ‘From time to time I have a customer who I would hate but this is my job.’ In half a year she became the No. 1 of the shop.”

  This page: Judy Garland’s lies to her psychiatrist—David Shipman, Judy Garland: The Secret Life of An American Legend (New York: Hyperion, 1992), pp. 142–43.

  “Hostility is an emotion common to lesbians . . .”—Frank S. Caprio, M.D., Female Homosexuality: A Psychodynamic Study of Lesbianism (New York: The Citadel Press, 1954), p. 61.

  This page: a dangerous case of lesbian-thespian complex.—This is not Dr. Caprio’s, but my own absurdity.

  “The young aspirant to a career in the world of the theatre . . .”—Caprio, p. 132.

  “Most of all, on a date I think a girl should be herself . . .”—Schmidt, p. 86 (Judy Garland as told to Gladys Hall, Screenland, January 1941).

  “stream of pleasure rising up her arm . . .”—Gabriele d’Annunzio, Pleasure, trans. Lara Gochin Raffaelli (New York: Penguin Books, 2013; orig. Italian ed. 1889), p. 78.

  “We called Neva the bodhisattva . . .”—Because we were religious. That religion can be practical has been proven long ago, by the Egyptian altar which is also a grindstone. We now re-illustrated that point: Worshipping Neva infallibly brought us five-star orgasms. I tried to remember her predecessor, the beautiful star called Letitia; compared to Neva she was nothing but a female mummy-mask with glass eyes.

  “Near Jericho in Israel . . .”—World Pastor Tony Alamo, “World Newsletter: The Alamo Christian Nation,” vol. 21200, April 2015, pp. 1 and (continuation) 7 (Tony Alamo, “Sodom and Gomorrah”).

  This page: Marlene Dietrich’s outfit in Shanghai Express—Information from Karin Wieland, Dietrich & Riefenstahl: Hollywood, Berlin, and a Century in Two Lives, trans. Shelley Frisch (New York: Liveright, 2011; orig. German ed. 2011), p. 197.

  This page: Alcman knew the tunes of all the birds—David A. Campbell, ed. and trans., Greek Lyric II: Anacreon, Anacreontea, Choral Lyric from Olympus to Alcman (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Loeb Classical Library LCL143, 1988), p. 425 (40, Athenaeus, Scholars at Dinner).

  HER NAME IN
LIGHTS

  Epigraph: “Let me fly like a hawk . . .”—The Egyptian Book of the Dead: The Hieroglyphic Transcript and Translation into English of the Ancient Egyptian Papyrus of Ani, [trans.,] intro. and commentary by E. A. Wallis Budge (New York: Gramercy Books, 1999; orig. pub. 1895), p. 394 (“The Devourer and the Block of Slaughter”).

  Epigraph: “If I’m such a legend . . .”—Judy Garland on Judy Garland: Interviews and Encounters, ed. Randy L. Schmidt (Chicago: Chicago Review Press / An A Cappella Book, 2014), p. 394 (John Gruen, New York / World Journal Tribune Magazine, April 2, 1967).

  “a natural born poison woman”—Christine L. Marran, Poison Woman: Figuring Female Transgression in Modern Japanese Culture (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2007), p. 115.

  This page: Natalie Wood’s mother on “the importance of cataloging her career . . .”—Manoah Bowman, Natalie Wood: Reflections on a Legendary Life (Philadelphia: Running Press, 2016), p. 14.

  This page: The Chu Era—Chinese, 4th through 3rd centuries.

  This page: Details on Tonya Harding, Kristi Yamaguchi and Nancy Kerrigan in competition, Minneapolis to Detroit—Keith Davidson, Nancy Kerrigan (New York: Scholastic Inc. / Sports Shots: Collector’s Book 26, 1994), pp. 21, 30–32.

  I GUESS I JUST LIKE NICE PEOPLE

  Epigraph: “It does you no harm . . .”—Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, trans. Leo Sherley-Price (New York: Penguin, 1987 repr. of 1952 ed.; orig. Latin version wr. ca. 1413), p. 35.

  Epigraph: “Don’t yield your leadership . . .”—Judy Garland on Judy Garland: Interviews and Encounters, ed. Randy L. Schmidt (Chicago: Chicago Review Press / An A Cappella Book, 2014), p. 215 (Coronet, February 1955).

  This page: Judy Garland’s white party dress at the Academy dinner—Schmidt, p. 129 (Movieland, December 1943).

  This page: Garland’s marriage to Minnelli so that “she could continue to have romantic flings with other men . . .”—David Shipman, Judy Garland: The Secret Life of An American Legend (New York: Hyperion, 1992), p. 169.

  This page: Four-paragraph dialogue beginning with “lesbian idolification”—Some phrases stolen from Louise Allen, The Lesbian Idol: Martina, KD and the Consumption of Lesbian Masculinity (London: Cassell, 1997), various pp.

  “I guess I just like nice people and when someone has a lot of nice friends I’m sure to get along with them.”—Schmidt, p. 34 (Robert McIlwaine, Modern Screen, August 1939).

  CHAIN OF COMMAND

  Epigraph: “What is known as ‘G’ . . .”—Courtney Ryley Cooper, Ten Thousand Public Enemies (Boston: Little, Brown, 1935), p. 231.

  Epigraph: “How then ought ye to guard yourselves? . . .”—Paul Carus, comp. [and trans.?], The Gospel of Buddha (Guernsey, U.K.: Studio Press Ltd. / The Guernsey Press Co. Ltd., 1995; orig. ed. 1915; n.d. given for original texts), p. 94.

  This page: Nancy Kerrigan versus Oksana Baiul—Information from Davidson, Nancy Kerrigan (New York: Scholastic Inc. / Sports Shots: Collector’s Book 26, 1994), p. 38.

  Logic . . . can best be described as the orderly and sensible review of facts . . .—Verbatim from Charles P. Nemeth, J.D., LL.M., Private Security and the Investigative Process (Cincinnati, Ohio: Anderson Publishing Co., 1992), p. 15.

  JUDY AT SCHOOL

  Epigraph: “Without love, the outward work is of no value . . .”—Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, trans. Leo Sherley-Price (New York: Penguin, 1987 repr. of 1952 ed.; orig. Latin version wr. ca. 1413), p. 43.

  Epigraph: “Those whom nature has sacrificed . . .”—Radclyffe Hall, The Well of Loneliness (New York: Doubleday / Anchor, 1990; orig. pub. 1928), p. 146.

  Shantelle: “Neva, Neva, can’t you please help me? I wanna be less angry . . . And less proud . . . Because everything’s empty”—Saint Basil [the Great]: “O our Lady, Mother of God, take away the pride and violence from my poor heart, lest I be exalted in the empty life by the vanity of this world,” as quoted in Serge A. Zhenkovsky, ed. and comp., Medieval Russia’s Epics, Chronicles and Tales, rev. ed. (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1974; orig. ed. 1973), p. 96 (Vladimir Monomakh, “Instruction to His Children,” bef. 1126).

  “In the movies, your face is magnified . . .”—Judy Garland on Judy Garland: Interviews and Encounters, ed. Randy L. Schmidt (Chicago: Chicago Review Press / An A Cappella Book, 2014), p. 161 (Judy Garland, Screenland, October 1946).

  SOME NAMES ARE TRUE

  Epigraph: “Self is an error . . .”—Paul Carus, comp. [and trans.?], The Gospel of Buddha (Guernsey, U.K.: Studio Press Ltd. / The Guernsey Press Co. Ltd., 1995; orig. ed. 1915; n.d. given for original texts), p. 67.

  Epigraph: “Crime is intimately associated with female sexual inversion.”—Frank S. Caprio, M.D., Female Homosexuality: A Psychodynamic Study of Lesbianism (New York: The Citadel Press, 1954), p. 302.

  “A lesbian woman was assaulted by five people . . .”—Much abridged and somewhat altered [for privacy] from Ebony, November 13, 2017, Zahara Hill, “Lesbian Woman Brutally Assaulted in Los Angeles Hate Crime.” Downloaded for WTV by Jordan Rothacker on February 20, 2018, from http://www.ebony.com/news-views/los-angeles-lesbian-couple-assaulted-hate-crime.

  HUMILIATED IN SKIRTS

  Epigraph: “I don’t associate Frances Gumm with me . . .”—Judy Garland on Judy Garland: Interviews and Encounters, ed. Randy L. Schmidt (Chicago: Chicago Review Press / An A Cappella Book, 2014), p. 191 (Michael Drury, Cosmopolitan, 1951).

  Epigraph: “This thing that you are is a sin . . .”—Radclyffe Hall, The Well of Loneliness (New York: Doubleday / Anchor, 1990; orig. pub. 1928), p. 202.

  This page: Judy’s birthname Frank Masters—As mentioned on p. 75 of this book, Judy Garland’s parents wanted a boy and at first called her Frank.

  This page: The transwoman’s life story—A few incidents are stolen and variously modified from: GLBT Historical Society. Francine Logandice Collection (#2002-04). Carton 1. Folder containing Angela Douglas, “Triple Jeopardy” (78-pp. typescript), 1983.

  Judy Garland: “I think I’m interesting . . .”—Schmidt, p. xvii.

  This page: Extracts from Dr. Morrow’s circular: “To the typical female . . .” + “Don’t be satisfied . . .”—GLBT Historical Society. Francine Logandice Collection (#2002-04). Carton 1. Folder with Angela Douglas autobiography. John Brown, M.D., “Sex Change” [typescript], February 17, 1977. According to another item in the Logandice Collection, until 1973 all the transsexuals got was a hole, not even labia.—Angela Douglas [born Douglas Carl Czinkski in 1943; named after General McArthur], “Triple Jeopardy” (78-pp. typescript, wr. 1983), p. 49. I have stolen from this source a few details of Judy’s biography on the road and in prison, including Danielle’s story of the vaginal dilator (p. 55) and Angela’s happy night in jail (p. 40).

  “a woman whose heart had been hurt”—David Shipman, Judy Garland: The Secret Life of an American Legend (New York: Hyperion, 1992), p. 40 (citing George Jessel).

  This page: Time magazine on Judy Garland: “one of the more reliable song-pluggers in the business”—Shipman, p. 130 (hyphen added by WTV).

  This page: Fated for Femininity and the other period titles here and in other Judy chapters of The Lucky Star are all genuine, taken from catalogues or from the items themselves, in various folders of: GLBT Historical Society. Francine Logandice Collection (#2002-04). Carton 1.

  This page: How Nancy Kerrigan’s family financed her skating lessons—Information from Keith Davidson, Nancy Kerrigan (New York: Scholastic Inc. / Sports Shots: Collector’s Book 26, 1994), p. 9.

  This page: Judy Garland’s abortions—Shipman, pp. 128, 142, 139.

  This page: Judy gets her testicles punished by the Goddess—Logandice Collection. Folder: “Stories of Female Domination, 1997.” The mistress was named Goddess Natasha.

  “I would like to see women realize that the punishment we feel . . .”—Arden Eversmeyer and Margaret Purcell
, Without Apology: Old Lesbian Life Stories (Houston, Texas: Old Lesbian Oral History Project, 2012), p. 176 (statement of Arden Eversmeyer).

  This page: Judy’s exclusion from women-only spaces—About this matter the activist Erika Castro, whom I interviewed in Las Vegas in 2018, assured me: “I think there has been a change. With the new wave, being more inclusive to women of color, and the different obstacles that women of color have faced, have helped us to see that trans women are women. I think there’s still more work to be done. I still hear from some people that as a trans woman is transitioning from male to female, you still hear these derogatory terms, but a woman is a woman whether she is born that way or not.” I asked how the gatekeepers of a women-only space would deal with an evidently male-bodied claimant to femininity. Ms. Castro replied: “Most of the spaces that I am a part of, we say our names and our preferred gender pronouns and that’s how we identify ourselves to each other. Do some of us have a penis? We can’t ask those kinds of questions.” And again: “If I were to be in a space like that, and a person like that identifies as a woman, I have to respect them. At the end of the day it goes back to how they identify themselves. It goes back to the conversation we have now about trans folks being able to use the bathroom they prefer.”

  “Don’t you know that lesbians make love using their hands?”—After “lesbians make love with their hands.”—Louise Allen, The Lesbian Idol: Martina, KD and the Consumption of Lesbian Masculinity (London: Cassell, 1997), p. 151.

  “That’s what I’m supposed to be, a legend.”—Schmidt, p. xvii.

  This page: Description of the “Garland” ensemble—Information from Joan Beck Coulson, Always for Judy: Witness to the Joy and Genius of Judy Garland (Elmira, California: Yarnscombe Books, 2014), p. 220.

 

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