Girl Meets Boy Paperback by Ali Smith

Product Details

• Publisher: Vintage Canada (2009-07-07)
• Language: English
• Paperback: 176 pages
• ISBN-13: 9780676978766
• Item Weight: 170.1 grams
• Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.12 x 0.46 cm

Another internationally acclaimed writer contributes a fascinating, compelling reinterpretation of a myth that resonates deeply today.

Ligdus and Telethusa are having a child, but they cannot afford to have a girl. Ligdus informs Telethusa that she had better hope for a boy. While this decision makes them both sad, Telethusa “must/obey.” She prays to Isis, but births a girl and names her Iphis, a name that “suited male or female–/a neutral name.” She convinces everyone, including Ligdus, that Iphis is a boy.

Iphis matures and falls in love with another girl, Ianthe, and is engaged for marriage, yet s/he is ruled by the sexual norms of the time: “[P]ossessed by love so strange . . . no female wants/a female!” but “no learned art–can ever make of me/a boy.” She attempts to reconcile her love for Ianthe against the pressures of “nature.” The wedding day is near, Telethusa is desperate, and prays again to Isis. Iphis is transformed, looking like a boy.

Is Ovid suggesting that what we think is nature is attitude? Does Iphis grow a penis? Or does Iphis, adopting the characteristics of a boy, remain a girl married to a girl, undermining traditional values?

About the Author

ALI SMITH is the author of many works of fiction, including Companion Piece, the "Seasonal Quartet," Public Library and other stories, and How To Be Both, which won the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction, the Goldsmiths Prize, and the Costa Novel of the Year Award. Her work has been shortlisted four times the Booker Prize. Most recently, she won the George Orwell Prize for Fiction for Summer. Born in Inverness, Scotland, she lives in Cambridge, England.