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Theodora Goss

Theodora Goss Books

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“Is it not strange how such things can happen, momentous things, things that seem to change the world itself and yet they do not? The river flows, the sun shines, the birds sing. Nature is indifferent to man. Which is perhaps why we can find in it a source of healing. We may be wounded, but it is not. Despite our weariness, it renews itself continually. I find that thought comforting.”

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Book:European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman
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“You really want to know?” Beatrice nodded. Catherine simply waited. If he wanted to tell them, he would. Clarence was not the sort of man you could persuade or plead with. “All right. It was the year I graduated from law school. Like the other black men in my class, I was inspired by Judge Ruffin, the first black man to graduate from Harvard Law and the first to become a judge in Massachusetts. I thought I was going to be just like him. Me, a poor boy raised by a widowed mother who used to clean other people’s houses to pay the rent. Well, I went through Howard on scholarship, then Harvard on scholarship, and my first year out I worked for an organization offering legal aid to other poor folk—black, Irish, Italian, all sorts. I was sent to one of the counties in the western part of the state, to defend a black man accused of raping a white woman. That was the first time a judge called me ‘boy.’ I got my client off all right—the woman herself stood in the witness stand to say it wasn’t rape. They wanted to get married. That was legal in Massachusetts, and she was of age, but her father didn’t want her to marry a black man, so he told the sheriff that my client had raped her. She was visibly pregnant. “My client walked out of that courthouse a free man, but there was a crowd waiting for him outside, and suddenly her brother stepped out of that crowd. He was the sheriff’s deputy. He had a gun, and he said he was going to shoot that damn . . . his language isn’t fit to repeat. He was determined to kill my client. Without thinking, I jumped on him and wrestled with him for the gun. It went off. . . . He bled to death in my arms. So I was tried for manslaughter in that courthouse, in front of that judge. Despite his jury instructions, I was acquitted—you could almost see him frothing at the mouth with fury and tearing his hair out, the day I walked out of that courtroom, a free man. Everyone in that crowd had seen it was an accident, but who was going to give me a job after that? It didn’t matter that I was innocent. My face had been on the cover of the Boston Globe as the black man who’d killed a white policeman.”

SadRacism
Book:European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman
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“MARY: I don’t think you have dulcet tones. Dulcet means sweet. When are you ever sweet? CATHERINE: My most dulcet tones. I was using the superlative. Everyone has a most something, even if it’s not very much. BEATRICE: I think Catherine can be quite sweet when she wants to. CATHERINE: I just don’t want to very often.”

SweetMary JekyllCatherine MoreauBeatrice RappacciniSuperlative
Book:European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman
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“Irene took a sip of coffee. “Ahhh!” she said, almost involuntarily. “I really, really needed that.” She turned back to Lucinda. “All right, tell me about your father. Your earthly father.” “I have no father anymore,” said Lucinda. “He has sinned, grievously he has sinned. He has consorted with demons, and surely the Lord will send him down to perdition.” “What the hell does that mean?” asked Diana. “Hush,” said Mary. “You haven’t even finished what’s on your plate. Are you Diana, or some sort of doppelgänger? Because the Diana I know doesn’t leave food uneaten.” “Go to hell,” said Diana, but she said it under her breath and stuffed her mouth with a poppy-seed roll.”

Sister LoveMary JekyllIrene AdlerDiana Hyde
Book:European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman
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“DIANA: You never appreciate me, even when I’m being nice! MARY: It was nice of you to defend me like that, Diana. I did appreciate it, you know. I do appreciate it, even now. DIANA: Well, you’re my sister. I mean, you’re annoying, and you have a stick up your—Catherine doesn’t want me to say that word anymore—but you’re still my sister. MRS. POOLE: That may be the most affectionate thing I’ve heard you say, Miss Scamp. DIANA: Go back to your kitchen, you old (unprintable).”

AffectionateSister LoveMary JekyllDiana Hyde
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“MARY: Catherine! Is it necessary to include such a detail? CATHERINE: Do you expect our readers to believe that we had no bodily needs or functions for entire days at a time? MARY: No, but such things are simply—unstated. They go without saying. CATHERINE: It’s very fashionable now to include realistic details, no matter how unpleasant or improper. Look at the French writers. Look at Émile Zola. MARY: We are not French.”

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Book:European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman
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“BEATRICE: Do you truly not know who he was? Mr. Dorian Gray, the lover of Mr. Oscar Wilde, who was sent to Reading Gaol for—well, for holding opinions that society does not approve of! For believing in beauty, and art, and love. What guilt and remorse he must feel, for causing the downfall of the greatest playwright of the age! It was Mr. Gray’s dissolute parties, the antics of his hedonistic friends, that exposed Mr. Wilde to scandal and opprobrium. No wonder he has fallen prey to the narcotic. MARY: Or he could just like opium. He didn’t seem particularly remorseful, Bea. JUSTINE: Mr. Gray is not what society deems him to be. He has been greatly misunderstood. He assures me that he had no intention of harming Mr. Wilde. MARY: He would say that. CATHERINE: Can we not discuss the Wilde scandal in the middle of my book? You’re going to get it banned in Boston, and such other puritanical places.”

Oscar WildeDorian GrayMary JekyllCatherine MoreauBeatrice Rappaccini
Book:The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl
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“BEATRICE: They are the clothing of the New Woman. They are meant not to be feminine, but practical. CATHERINE: On women they look like men’s clothing, on men they look like women’s clothing. That’s where the New Woman meets the Dandy. BEATRICE: Why is it necessary to categorize people in that fashion? Why can we not all wear whatever we wish, whatever is useful and aesthetically pleasing? I believe that someday we shall all wear garments that are light and of a pleasing texture, easy to put on and take off. At the same time, they will express the aspirations of the spirit. They will be like the garments of the Greeks, both graceful and functional. Why can we not dress in such a fashion now? MRS. POOLE: Because this is England, and you would all catch your deaths of cold.”

PracticalityCatherine MoreauBeatrice Rappaccinice
Book:The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl
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“MARY: My wrath! When do I ever get wrathful? CATHERINE: It’s your particular kind of wrath. You don’t shout—you just get precise and icy. MARY: That’s not wrath. I don’t think that counts as wrath. DIANA: It’s Mary wrath. Your particular kind, as Cat said. Not that I’m scared of it, mind you. But it’s worse than being shouted at. MARY: I have no idea what either of you are talking about. Alice, am I ever wrathful? ALICE: Well, yes, actually. If you don’t mind my saying so, miss. When you learned what the Order of the Golden Dawn had done to me and Mr. Holmes— CATHERINE: Oh no, you don’t! We have chapters to go before you can talk about that. Really, not one of you has any idea of narrative timing.”

SpoilersMary JekyllCatherine MoreauDiana HydeWrathful
Book:The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl
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“BEATRICE: You make me sound so dramatic, Catherine! CATHERINE: Well, you are dramatic, with your long black hair and the clear olive complexion that marks you a daughter of the sunny south, of Italy, land of poetry and brigands. You would be the perfect romantic heroine, if only you weren’t so contrary about it. BEATRICE: But I have no desire to be a romantic heroine. MARY: Brigands? Seriously, Cat, this isn’t the eighteenth century. Nowadays Italy is perfectly civilized.”

Mary JekyllCatherine MoreauBeatrice RappacciniBrigands
Book:European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman
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“You know, I’ve been called a thief before. Growing up in Hackney, going to the markets with my mother—the shopkeepers always kept an eye on us, in case we pilfered anything. Because we looked Indian, and you could never tell with those wogs, could you? The number of times I was told I wasn’t welcome because I wasn’t really English, even though I’d been born in London, same as them. I thought the circus was going to be different. I thought you”—she looked at Catherine accusingly—“were going to be different. But you know what? Why don’t you just search my stuff. Go on. Whatever you’re missing, jewelry or money—you just go ahead and look for it!” She bent down and drew her suitcase out from under the seat, threw it on top, and opened it violently, so that dresses and scarves spilled out. She shook the contents directly onto the seat cushions, then scattered them about. “Here you go, that’s what you wanted, right? And if you find whatever you’re looking for, you can go ahead and put me in gaol, or whatever they have for gaol here in Austria. I’m going to feed the snakes—they need their lunch too. They may be poisonous, but they’ve never made me feel like dirt. It takes a human being to do that.”

Catherine MoreauWrong Conclusion
Book:European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman
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“CATHERINE: Readers who are not familiar with the tale of Beatrice and Giovanni can find it in the first of these adventures of the Athena Club, in an attractive green cloth binding that will appear to advantage in a lady’s or gentleman’s library. Two shillings, as I mentioned before. BEATRICE: You would use the story of my grief to sell copies of your book? CATHERINE: Our book. I may be writing it, but you are all as responsible for its contents as I am. What is the point if we don’t reach readers? And honestly, Bea, you’re not the only one whose sorrows are being recorded here. I mean . . . Bea? MARY: She’s gone back to the conservatory. I think you offended her—seriously offended her. The way you offended Zora. CATHERINE: Why do you humans have to be so emotional?”

Mary JekyllCatherine MoreauBeatrice RappacciniTactless
Book:European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman
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“MARY: Cat, should you be writing all this? I mean, Irene still lives in Vienna. Her secret room won’t be a secret once this book is published. CATHERINE: She said I could. Granted, she said no one would believe it anyway, the way no one believes Mrs. Shelly’s biography of Victor Frankenstein. Everyone assumes it’s fiction. She says people rarely believe in what they think to be improbable, although they often believe in the impossible. They find it easier to believe in spiritualism than in the platypus. BEATRICE: So she thinks our readers might assume this is a work of fiction? CATHERINE: Bea, you sound upset by that. BEATRICE: And you are not? Do you not care whether readers understand that this is the truth of our lives? CATHERINE: As long as they buy the book, no, not much. As long as they pay their two shillings a volume, and I receive royalties . . .”

FrankensteinMary JekyllCatherine MoreauIrene AdlerBeatrice Rappaccini
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“MARY: Renaissance, not medieval. Most of the castle was built during the sixteenth century, although I believe its foundations date from the fourteenth. CATHERINE: And our readers will care why? MARY: You may not care for accuracy, but I do—and Carmilla will, when she reads this book. CATHERINE: If I ever get the damn thing written, with all these interruptions!”

RenaissanceAccuracyMary JekyllCatherine MoreauCarmilla
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“MARY: It’s called a Schloss. That’s what small castles are called in Styria, Laura told me. CATHERINE: Yes, but do you think our English readers are going to know that? Or our American readers? I’m hoping for some American sales, if the deal with Collier & Son comes through, and there are no Schlosses in America—just teepees and department stores. BEATRICE: The slaughter of the native population is a shameful stain on American history. Clarence says— CATHERINE: For goodness’ sake, how are we going to sell to readers in the United States if you go on about the slaughter of the native Americans? Who’s going to want to read about that? BEATRICE: Those who do not want to read about it are exactly those who should be made aware, Catherine. This may be a story of our adventures, but we must not shy away from confronting the difficult issues of the times. Literature exists to educate as well as entertain, after all. DIANA: You all went from Schlosses to teepees to a political discussion, and you think I ramble?”

AmericanLauraMary JekyllCatherine MoreauBeatrice RappacciniDiana Hyde
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“CATHERINE: All these questions, and more, will be answered in the third volume of these adventures of the Athena Club, assuming this volume sells sufficiently well—two shillings in bookstores, train stations, and directly from the publisher. And should anyone wish to bring out an American edition— MARY: You really have to stop it with the advertisements! CATHERINE: If our readers want to find out what happens to Alice, they will need to buy the first two books! Of course, if they want me to leave Alice in peril . . .”

Mary JekyllCatherine Moreau
Book:European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman
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“MARY: Hysterical mutism is most often associated with trauma, such as an assault of some sort. I learned that in Vienna, when we were discussing symptoms of madness before Diana was— CATHERINE: Could you please not spoil the plot for our readers? You can talk about researching symptoms of madness all you want when I get to Vienna. I mean when you get to Vienna, later in the narrative.”

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“MRS. POOLE: I would have done just the same as Alice, if I hadn’t remembered my training. A good servant never gives way to emotion, my father used to tell me when he was alive, bless his soul. You girls going so far away, and not knowing when you’d be back! MARY: But we did get back safely in the end, Mrs. Poole. MRS. POOLE: Eventually! But the worry I had along the way . . . CATHERINE: Can you please do your best to not give away the plot? Like the fact that Mary eventually made it safely home . . . I won’t say whether or not the others did! MARY: Oh please. If we hadn’t made it back, we wouldn’t be writing this book. The important thing is, what happened to us on the way? CATHERINE: It’s unbelievable, what authors have to put up with from their own characters. Remind me why I agreed to do this? MARY: Excuse me. We are not your characters, but fellow members of the Athena Club. And as to why you agreed . . . we need money, remember? CATHERINE: Oh, right.”

SpoilersMary JekyllCatherine Moreau
Book:European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman
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“Well, there’s one thing that gives me hope.” “What’s that?” asked Beatrice, shaking out one of the blankets and wrapping it around herself. Catherine smiled. It was a grim smile. “Diana’s with them. There is no situation so well-planned that Diana can’t introduce chaos into it. Whoever is holding them, wherever they’re being held, is going to regret it.”

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Book:European Travel for the Monstrous Gentlewoman
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“Dr. Freud said he would like to see me again,” she said, finally. “I just bet he would!” Irene laughed. “He collects beetles of all sorts, and you resemble a gray beetle that seems ordinary, but shine a light on it and it begins to shimmer like an opal—blue and green, all cool colors for you, I think. You know, when all of you had just arrived here, I admired your self-control. Here you were in a strange country, determined to rescue a woman you didn’t know from a danger you didn’t understand, all because a friend had asked you to. You were tired from a long journey, yet there you were, coolly making plans. Then later I realized it wasn’t self-control at all—it’s simply the way you are, like Sherlock. He can’t help it either. When there’s a problem to be solved, he sits down and solves it: rationally, efficiently.” Mary opened her mouth to protest. “I don’t mean that you’re emotionless, my dear. I just mean that your emotions are, themselves, efficient, rational. Please don’t misunderstand me—I admire you very much and I would like to be your friend. But you remind me of Sherlock more than anyone I’ve ever met.” “I think that’s a compliment?” said Mary. “I mean, I find him dreadfully aggravating, sometimes. . . .” “Don’t we all!”

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“All right,” said Mary. “When do you want us to leave?” “As soon as Diana changes back into women’s clothes,” said Irene. “Why?” asked Diana, outraged. “I don’t want to.” “Because you’re supposed to be neurasthenic and hysterical. No one will question that diagnosis in a girl going through puberty.” “Puberty yourself!” said Diana, then whispered to Hannah, “That’s a dirty word, isn’t it? I’m pretty sure that’s a dirty word.”

PubertyMary JekyllIrene AdlerDiana Hyde
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“Mary.' The voice was familiar, but oh, so tired. Startled, she looked up. Sherlock Holmes was awake! He was looking at her with kind, grey eyes. 'I shot you. I almost killed you!' She wanted to make sure he knew that, her culpability. 'I know. I remember.' 'I don't expect you to forgive me. You could have died.' He reached up and touched her cheek. 'Mary.' 'If you wish me to hand in my letter of resignation, I will, of course, do so. I can't imagine that you would want to work with me after—' 'Mary, come here.' He pulled her down toward him. And suddenly, it seemed so natural, so inevitable, that she should lean down and kiss him with all the longing of the last few days, the last few months.”

Sherlock HolmesMary Jekyll
Book:The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl
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“Selkie women are the women you don’t understand. They are the women who know that they belong to another tribe, in another element. And so they seem as though they don’t belong in yours – and they don’t. They are the women who live by other rules and values, because their rules and values are different from those of this world. They are the women who sometimes seem to be listening to other voices, or music you can’t hear, or the call of distant bells. There is a faraway look in their eyes. Selkie women are the ones who look as though they came out of faerytales, because they did. The ones who look at the sea longingly, who look at the sky as their home. They do not fear death. They only fear imprisonment. Selkie women are the ones you can’t keep.”

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Author:Theodora Goss
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“This is magnificent,” said Justine. “I’ve never seen anything like it. But I can’t make out the artist’s name?” “It’s by a friend of mine,” said Irene. “His name is not known outside of Vienna, but it will be—I think someday soon, all of Europe will be talking about Gustav Klimt. I was the model for this one. I don’t know if you can see the resemblance.”

Irene AdlerKlimt
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“BEATRICE: Laura told me it might help if I read aloud. Mina had given us a book of fairy tales. Blue Fairy Tales? Blue Book of Fairy Tales? I do not remember the exact title. I was never given fairy tales to read as a child, only scientific treatises. How I would have enjoyed them! Although I do not understand how a shoe could fit only one woman in an entire kingdom. DIANA: It was a magical shoe. BEATRICE: Still, that is not logical. I can accept pumpkins turning into coaches, and lizards into footmen, but a shoe will fit many women of the same size. How could the prince know he was choosing the right one?”

SenseCinderellaLauraBeatrice RappacciniDiana Hyde
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“The editor, Stephen Segal, actually called me with the idea of creating an accordion book [ "The Thorn & The Blossom"], and asked if I could write a story for it. I was so intrigued! I immediately knew that it had to be a love story told from the points of view of the two main characters. Right away, I started working on a proposal. And once I had my main characters, Brendan and Evelyn, it was as though they started telling me their stories.”

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Author:Theodora Goss
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“I would tell myself to get more sleep! Believe it or not, I wrote the book while finishing my PhD in English literature. It was wonderful to get away from doing literary scholarship by writing this mythical love story. I think so much of my own love for books and scholarship comes through in The Thorn and the Blossom.”

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Author:Theodora Goss
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“The format of the book was the idea of my wonderful editor, Stephen Segal. Stephen and I had worked together before, on projects for the Interstitial Arts Foundation, and when he got the idea for an accordion-style book, he called and asked if I could write the story for it. I told him that I would love to try! And I knew it had to be a love story, because that's the sort of story you really want to hear from both perspectives. I mean, imagine if Pride and Prejudice were told from Darcy's perspective as well as Elizabeth's. It would be quite a different story!”

IfsWantWritingTryingWellsMeanArtBookIdeasDifferentStoriesWould BeTogetherImagineWonderfulStylePerspectivePrideProjectsPrejudiceFoundationLove StoryIf I CouldEditorsFormatDarcyAccordions
Author:Theodora Goss
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