LETTERS
A STAGE FOR OUR STORIES
Literature is about exploring and experiencing. It’s about learning and teaching and growing and being inspired, and sometimes it’s about knowing that we’re not alone in the world. What happens when you love to read, but you never get to read stories about people who are like you? You start to believe that your voice, your story, doesn’t matter. You end up feeling like you shouldn’t be who you are. I was in my late 20s before it occurred to me that I could write stories about women and girls who loved other women and girls. Almost the entire world is designed for straight people. And I’m lucky, I’m surrounded by kind, accepting and loving people for whom my identity is not an issue. If the most trying experience I come up against day-to-day is referring to “my partner” and having to correct someone when they ask what “he” does, then I’m endlessly privileged compared to the horrific experiences of other LBTQ women. But what I realised this weekend, is that there’s an insistent pressure there, all the time.