If you live anywhere near London (or if you travel to London often), allow me to strongly recommend to you the British Film Institute’s new Mediatheque. Well — new is a relative term. The service was first launched in March of 2007. But I hadn’t heard of it until recently, so there’s a possibility that you may not have, either. Anyway, the point is that it’s awesome.

Basically, the Mediatheque is a room with about 20 viewing stations in it. You stroll in, you register for a two-hour viewing session at the reception desk, and then you sit down and watch something from their archives of films, TV dramas, and documentaries — many of them lesbian-themed — at your own individual screen. It’s possible to book in advance, but based on my own experience this past weekend, your chances are quite good of getting a screen even if you just turn up on the day. You don’t have to be a member; you don’t have to be anything. It’s just there, and it’s free of charge. Nice, huh?

Take a look at the complete list of of archived films available to view. They’re not all lesbian-themed, of course (and I’ll admit I don’t quite understand the process by which they’ve been selected). But if you scan down the list, it won’t take you long to find a range of British lesbian favourites. There are classic dramas, like Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, A Village Affair and Fingersmith.

And there are short films — including the fantastically titled Came Out, It Rained, Went Back in Again, which I watched this weekend. Made in 1991, it features Absolutely Fabulous actress Jane Horrocks as a young “learner lesbian” who travels down to London for the first time and goes through a range of dilemmas that will be utterly familiar to anyone who’s gone through the coming-out process. … continue reading

Forget bad haircuts. Forget spinster aunts with too many cats. Forget even the tired, "Behind every great man ... " According to a new collection of mini-biographies by Maureen B. Adams, behind every great woman is a great dog.

No, Virginia Woolf's spaniel probably didn't dress like Wonder Dog here, nor did any of those profiled in Shaggy Muses: The Dogs Who Inspired Virginia Woolf, Emily Dickinson, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Edith Wharton, and Emily Brontë (Seal Press, July 31, 2007).

Adams theorizes that the pups were nonetheless heroic, deeply bonding with their human counterparts and enabling the authors to achieve in spite of physical illness, depression, and social and familial constraints. Who knew that without her pooch Flush, Barrett Browning may never have counted the ways, or that Dickinson's Newfoundland Carlo was the one audience she truly valued? I do always think that Leonard Woolf gets too much credit, so I'm happy to see Pinka — a gift from his wife's sometimes-lover Vita Sackville-West — receive his due. … continue reading

  I just found this little gem buried on the last page of the June/July issue of Geek Monthly: the Gender Genie. Just paste in something by your favorite novelist — or an excerpt from a newspaper article or your own blog — and the Gender Genie will guess the gender of the author. (For best results, the text should be more than 500 words.) The Gender Genie is based on an Illinois Institute of Technology study that explored the "lexical and syntactic features" of fiction and nonfiction.

I had to try to confuse the Genie, of course. Maybe it can predict the easy ones like Hemingway and Austen, but what about queer authors? I tried Henry James, and the Genie said "female" — aha! Then I tried Virginia Woolf and the Genie said "male" — fooled again!

Admittedly, both of those were close (the Genie gives you the female score and male score for each excerpt, and the numbers on James and Woolf weren't far apart). So then I tried Jeanette Winterson and the Genie was way off base, even though I used a column excerpt that seemed to include traditionally "female" words like sunburst, flower and cat and was generally quite personal and introspective. … continue reading

Helen Mirren has sent her regrets to Queen Elizabeth II, who invited Mirren to dine at Buckingham Palace. According to the Daily Mail, the RSVP spelled s-n-u-b:

"It is unheard of for Her Majesty to extend a personal invitation to dinner to someone who has portrayed her in a film. We did not expect to be told that the date is unacceptable."

And why was the date unacceptable to Mirren? Well, because she's busy filming National Treasure: Book of Secrets in South Dakota, of course. … continue reading

Last week, a BBC news article told the tale of a lost manuscript. It seems that Jeanette Winterson's latest (unpublished) novel, The Stone Gods, was found on a bench in a London Underground station.

At first I imagined Winterson herself leaving the manuscript behind. If you've been to one of her readings, you know that she's rather intense and also somewhat easily distracted. I can just see her scrawling on a page in disgust and throwing a sheaf of A4 paper down on a bench -- only to then leave it behind in order to chase down some food or a passing blonde.

I'm kidding, Jeanette!

And anyway, it turns out Winterson was nowhere near the thing; the blame lies with someone who works for her publisher, Penguin. Wouldn't it be cool if an actual penguin were to blame? After all, those flightless fowl are notorious for failing to return borrowed books.

It gets better: The manuscript was rescued by a Tooting teacher.

Ms. Oster, a teacher from Tooting, south London, was returning from a night out with colleagues when she spotted the manuscript. She said: "I sat down to wait for my train and it was just lying on the bench. There was no-one around, so it had obviously been left by someone. I'm nosey so I picked it up, had a flick through, and realised what it was. I was amazed to find it like that."

Ms. Oster said she recognised Ms. Winterson's name immediately. "I studied Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit for A-level, and I have a couple of her books at home."

At least it was found by an honest soul. If I'd happened upon the thing, I'm not sure I'd have been able to stop myself from penning a parody, to be published on the very same day as the novel. On second thought, Winterson would probably enjoy that.

I think she'd also enjoy this story, featured as a "related" link on the page that reports the lost manuscript: "Bizarre items left by commuters: A lawn mower, Rolex watches and a theatrical coffin are among the 150,000 items people have left on the Tube, buses and taxis this year."

"While Londoners are most likely to lose mobile phones and books on public transport, items left behind range from the mundane to the surreal. Three dead bats in a container, a jar of bull sperm and a £2,000 TV left in the back of a taxi are among them. ... Items held at the lost property office at Baker Street in the past have included two human skulls in a bag, a divan bed and three World War II gas masks."

Bats and bull sperm and skulls ... there's your next mythical memoir, Ms. Winterson. … continue reading