Accessory to Murder: A Lesbian Masquerade

Authors

  • Rob Baum University of Haifa

Keywords:

Biography (literary form), Clothing and dress, Detective/Mystery storeies, Homosexuality, Lesbian authors, Literature, Transvestism

Abstract

Mabel Maney parodies Fifties-era "girl detective" Nancy Drew with lesbian Nancy Clue, mocking the original series' insistence upon heteronormativity while maintaining Keene's luxuriously white, upper class sanctity. This article explores Maney's comic structure from Freudian "dress-up" and professional disguise to lesbian masquerade, demonstrating their ideological difference from gay camp - one queer commentary has repeatedly confused. Maney's conflation of the disparate motives of lesbian masquerade and gay camp lead to her abandonment of lesbian feminist readers.

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Published

1998-10-01

Issue

Vol. 23 No. 1 (1998): Special Issue: Sexualities and Feminism

Section

Original Research

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