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Natalie Clifford Barney
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==Legacy== By the end of Natalie Barney's life her work had been largely forgotten. In 1979, Barney was honored with a place setting in [[Judy Chicago]]'s feminist work of art ''[[The Dinner Party]]''. In the 1980s Barney began to be recognized for what Karla Jay calls an "almost uncanny anticipation" of the concerns of later feminist writers.{{sfn|Jay|1988|p=xv}} English translations of some of her memoirs, essays, and epigrams appeared in 1992, but most of her plays and poetry are untranslated. Her indirect influence on literature, through her salon and her many literary friendships, can be seen in the number of writers who have addressed or portrayed her in their works. ''Claudine s'en va'' (''[[Claudine (book series)|Claudine and Annie]]'', 1903) by Colette contains a brief appearance by Barney as "Miss Flossie",{{sfn|Wickes|1976|p=98}} echoing the nickname she had earlier been given in de Pougy's novel ''Idylle Saphique''. Renée Vivien wrote many poems about her, as well as a [[Symbolism (arts)|Symbolist]] novel, ''Une femme m'apparut'' (''A Woman Appeared to Me'', 1904), in which Barney is described as having "eyes{{nbs}}... as sharp and blue as a blade{{nbs}}... The charm of peril emanated from her and drew me inexorably."{{sfn|Jay|1988|pp=9, 13}} Remy de Gourmont addressed her in his ''Letters to the Amazon'', and Truman Capote mentioned her in his last, unfinished novel ''[[Answered Prayers: The Unfinished Novel|Answered Prayers]]''. She also appeared in later novels by writers who never met her. Anna Livia's ''Minimax'' (1991) portrays both Barney and Renée Vivien as still-living vampires. Francesco Rapazzini's ''Un soir chez l'Amazone'' (2001) is a historical novel about Barney's salon. The English translation by Sally Hamilton and Suzanne Stroh was published as an audiobook read by Suzanne Stroh under the title ''A Night at the Amazon's'' (2020). Barney appears in Hall's ''The Well of Loneliness'' as the salon hostess Valérie Seymour, a symbol of self-acceptance in contrast with the protagonist's self hatred.{{sfn|Stimpson|1981|pp=369–373}}{{sfn|Love|2000|pp=115–116}} Hall wrote: "Valérie, placid and self-assured, created an atmosphere of courage; everyone felt very normal and brave when they gathered together at Valérie Seymour's."{{sfn|Hall|1981|p=352}} According to [[Lillian Faderman]], "There was probably no lesbian in the four decades between 1928 and the late 1960s capable of reading English or any of the eleven languages into which the book was translated who was unfamiliar with ''The Well of Loneliness''."{{sfn|Faderman|1981|p=322}} Lucie Delarue-Mardrus wrote love poems to Barney in the early years of the century, and in 1930 depicted her in a novel, ''L'Ange et les Pervers'' (''The Angel and the Perverts''), in which she said she "analyzed and described Natalie at length as well as the life into which she initiated me". The [[protagonist]] of the novel is a hermaphrodite named Marion who lives a double life, frequenting literary salons in female dress, then changing from skirt to trousers to attend gay [[party|soirées]]. Barney is Laurette Wells, a salon hostess who spends much of the novel trying to win back an ex-lover loosely based on Renée Vivien.{{sfn|Livia|1995|pp=22–23}} The book's portrayal of her is, at times, harshly critical, but she is the only person whose company Marion enjoys. Marion tells Wells that she is "perverse{{nbs}}... dissolute, self-centered, unfair, stubborn, sometimes miserly{{nbs}}... [but] a genuine rebel, ever ready to incite others to rebellion{{nbs}}.... [Y]ou are capable of loving someone just as they are, even a thief—in that lies your only fidelity. And so you have my respect."{{sfn|Delarue-Mardrus|1995|pp=80–81}} After meeting Barney in the 1930s, the Russian poet [[Marina Ivanovna Tsvetaeva]] addressed her in a ''Letter to the Amazon'' (1934) in which she expressed her conflicted feelings about love between women. The result, according to [[Terry Castle]], is "an entirely cryptic, paranoid, overwhelming piece of reverie".{{sfn|Castle|2003|p=658}} [[File:Ncbarneyhistoricalmarker.jpg|thumb|Historical marker honoring Barney, in Dayton's Cooper Park]] Barney and the women in her social circle are the subject of Djuna Barnes's ''[[Ladies Almanack]]'' (1928), a ''roman à clef'' written in an archaic, [[Rabelaisian]] style, with Barnes's own illustrations in the style of [[Elizabethan]] [[woodcut]]s. She has the lead role as Dame Evangeline Musset, "who was in her Heart one Grand Red Cross for the Pursuance, the Relief and the Distraction, of such Girls as in their Hinder Parts, and their Fore Parts, and in whatsoever Parts did suffer them most, lament Cruelly".{{sfn|Barnes|1992|p=6}} "[A] Pioneer and a Menace" in her youth, Dame Musset has reached "a witty and learned Fifty";{{sfn|Barnes|1992|pp=9, 34}} she rescues women in distress, dispenses wisdom, and upon her death is elevated to sainthood. Also appearing pseudonymously are de Gramont, Brooks, Dolly Wilde, Hall and her partner Una, Lady Troubridge, Janet Flanner and Solita Solano, and Mina Loy.{{sfn|Weiss|1995|pp=151–153}} The obscure language, inside jokes, and ambiguity of ''Ladies Almanack'' have kept critics arguing about whether it is an affectionate satire or a bitter attack, but Barney herself loved the book and reread it throughout her life.{{sfn|Barnes|1992|pp=xxxii–xxxiv}} On October 26, 2009, Barney was honored with a [[historical marker]] in her home town of Dayton, Ohio. The marker is the first in Ohio to note the sexual orientation of its honoree.{{sfn|The Columbus Dispatch|2009}} Barney's French novel, ''Amants féminins ou la troisième'', believed to have been written in 1926, was published in 2013. It was translated into English by Chelsea Ray and published in 2016 as ''Women Lovers or The Third Woman''.{{sfn|Barney|2016}}
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