I’m moving inexorably back into Hild world. Hopefully I’ll still be around here a lot, but if I’m not, you know why.
I’ve now plotted out the rest of this volume of Hild. I’m happily filling in environmental details. What does the sky look like in Yeavering in March? What birds are flying over Whitby in April? What shrubs flower on the moors in June? Next comes the deliciousness of delineating, exactly, human sexual awakening: at what point, exactly, do we become aware of the creaminess of a woman’s skin, the coppery tang of male adrenaline, the fall and swing of a beautiful person’s hair? How does that flash of understanding, that, Oh, so that’s what these weird feelings mean, work?
If you’ve read any fiction that does this convincingly, I’d like to know. This isn’t something I’ve spent time thinking about before. It might be interesting to see how others do it.
Nicola Griffith 
Ellen Kushner's The Privilege of the Sword does this beautifully, I thought. And the His Dark Materials series is sort of all about that, in a way — about the realization of sexuality as a force, if not about the experience of it, exactly.
I've read the Kushner twice–I liked it a lot. But I hadn't thought about it in those terms. I'll look at it again, thank you.
As for Pullman–I enjoyed Golden Compass but just couldn't connect (didn't want to?) with the rest. (Looks as though the filmmakers felt the same way; pity, because my cousin, Clare Higgins, played Ma Costa, and did a good job, I thought–there again, she always does.) But, oof, perhaps I should look at his work again, too.
I think it's a subtle and difficult moment, sliding from non-sexual being to sexual being, reaching an understanding of this particular energy underlying everything human beings do. I can remember being a child without sexual understanding, and I can remember being a mid-teen stuffed with (and fully cognisant of) hormones. I just don't remember the transition.
Eh, that's why I get paid the big bucks–I'll have to make shit up :)
My thoughts go immediately to Janie, who makes the transition you describe while contemplating a tree, from Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston:
“[Janie] was stretched on her back beneath the pear tree soaking in the alto chant of the visiting bees, the gold of the sun and the panting breath of the breeze when the inaudible voice of it all came to her. She saw a dust-bearing bee sink into the sanctum of a bloom; the thousand sister-calyxes arch to meet the love embrace and the ecstatic shiver of the tree from root to tiniest branch creaming in every blossom and frothing with delight. So this was a marriage! She had been summoned to behold a revelation. Then Janie felt a pain remorseless sweet that left her limp and languid.”
Oh, she was so good…
I think Dodie Smith's novel “I Capture the Castle” does the best job EVER of showing a young woman growing into the realization that this is sexual attraction, this is affection, this is what the big deal is. This is why I can't stop looking at him, why I want to hear his voice, etc.
Nicola —
It's interesting how the “environmental” details change from decade to decade and century to century. I remember as a child (for example) raking piles of leaves to make “graves” in my front yard for Halloween. Now the leaves don't even fall till mid November. The chilly, rainy late-summer days of my youth have been replaced by endless swelter.
Another big “environmental” change: the age of menarche. In 1850, girls on average didn't get their periods till they were 17; now it's around 12. Joan of Arc at age 19 hadn't had her period.
Yep. Though a lot of that–not all, but a lot–is related to food. The better fed you are, the more likely you are to mature early. So royals would start bleeding earlier than poor farmers. (Jeanne D'Arc was poor, right?)
And different parts of the country–even a small island like Britain–can have startlingly different climates, which is why I need specificity.
But I love doing this kind of work.
You don't have to go back that far to see a disturbing trend in earlier menarche in girls. While an increase in BMI (another point is that fat stores estrogen) may be part of it, I think the big reason girls today are having their periods earlier seems to be excess estrogen (or other pollutants metabolized as estrogen) pollution in our environment. It's entered the water and is not filtered out.
Excess estrogen is also the reason lots of women on HRT get cancer. They never needed estrogen – they only needed progesterone. Supplementing with estrogen led to estrogen dominance and causes cancer.
What's going to happen to these girls as the grow older?
Can't wait for Hild! So glad you are able to get back to her now.
Joan's father, Jacques d'Arc (1380–1440) was a farmer in Domremy who held the post of doyen a local tax-collector and organizer of village defenses. They weren't dirt poor, but probably weren't rich either.
By the time she was arrested, she could have eaten like a prince, but according to witnesses Joan ate “abstemiously,” and was probably undernourished. The mental and physical demands of her lifestyle may have contributed as well.
Also, there's been speculation that Joan/Jeanne/Johanne had AIS–though people seeking explanations of why strong women aren't really 'women' ticks me off.
Nicola — would she be less of a woman if she had AIS?
I have no doubt that in some people's eyes she would, cf the kerfuffle a few months ago about Caster Semenya.
I really felt for Semenya during that whole process. And I was pissed off at the way she was objectified.
I believe in expanded definitions, not narrow ones. Genetic makeup and gender are not always much to do with one another. What really annoys me is others' attempts to dictate definitions–and, in Johanne/Jeanne/Joan's case, to rewrite history.
We should be able to choose our own labels (if we want labels). Subject should never become object.