“I guess my writing through time has focused on a number of dimensions that reflect separately on the meaning and social place of the female body.” WritingBodySocialNumbersFemaleFocusedDimensionsRough TimesFemale Body Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
“Growing up in Asia in a particular time period - the '50s and '60s - I attended a Catholic missionary school where I was taught by nuns and where consciousness of the body was repressed. Yet at the same time, the female body was a highly visible and sensitive site.” BodySchoolConsciousnessGrowing UpGrowingTaughtParticularPeriodsFemaleCatholicSensitiveVisibleMissionarySiteAsiaNunRepressedFemale BodyTime Periods Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
“The consciousness of one's physical self had to be repressed because, socially, the female body was so visible, an ongoing provocation and incitement of specular curiosity and fascination.” SelfBodyConsciousnessFemaleCuriosityVisibleOngoingFascinationRepressedProvocationFemale BodyIncitement Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
“As the only girl growing up for a long time with only boys, as you pointed out, it seems like I was always surrounded by guys. There was this sense in which my female body was a problem.” LongProblemBodySeemsGuyGirlBoysGrowing UpGrowingLong TimeFemaleFemale BodyGirls Growing Up Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
“The problem of the female body is not something that I've studied, but my memoir does treat that theme.” DoeProblemBodyFemaleTreatsMemoirThemeFemale Body Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
“As a female in a home with a whole bunch of brothers and being very close to my father, without a mother and later having a hostile relationship with my stepmother, there were all kinds of Freudian issues rising from possessing a female body that I had to negotiate with no guidance, and I did this negotiation almost instinctually.” KindWholeHomeBodyMotherFatherIssuesBrotherFemaleBunchAll KindsGuidanceRisingNegotiationHostilePossessingFemale BodyStepmothers Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
“There are a couple of poems I've written with masculine muses, very often the muse to me is a female.” WrittenCoupleFemaleMuseMasculine Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
“I'm not sure why my muse is female, except when I am deliberately playing against that figure.” FiguresFemaleNot SureMuse Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
“Once you stop talking about the female body empowering itself vis-à-vis male forays or invasions or male demands or the necessity to respond to husband and son to bring the issue down to a more concrete level, the body is a different manifestation physically.” DifferentBodyLevelsTalkingIssuesSonHusbandDemandFemaleMalesManifestationEmpoweringConcreteInvasionFemale Body Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
“From the world of the muse and writing, there will come, hopefully, the book. You're right, for me, that the muse is always female, and the book comes from a separate gender dimension than the concrete male world that, as you pointed out, has been surrounding me since I was an infant.” WorldWritingHas BeensBookFemaleMalesGenderHopefullyDimensionsConcreteMuseInfant Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
“When I write, I put aside the heterosexual world to admit a muse that is a woman-loving-woman female.” WorldWritingFemaleMuse Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
“When you're a female poet, would you, therefore, invoke a male muse? When nuns get consecrated into their vocations, they become brides of Christ. Christ is the bridegroom. In these symbolic actions, rather than in physical actions, where a male reaches sexuality or participates in intimate exchanges, if one uses a different term - there's often a heterosexual figuring that takes place. The male poet invokes a beautiful female muse. The virginal nun consecrated invokes the male bridegroom, Christ.” IfsDifferentUseActionBeautifulTermChristPoetFemaleMalesSexualityIntimateMuseVocationSymbolicBridesNunInvokeBridegroom Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
“What happens when a female writer invokes a female muse? Does something else happen? With Sappho's figures of desire, we have a different lesbian energy.” DoeDifferentHappensDesireEnergyFiguresFemaleMuseInvokeFemale Writers Author:Shirley Geok-lin Lim
