bibliogramma | Gael Baudino: Gossamer Axe (Reply)

Gael Baudino's Gossamer Axe is one of my favourite books, which is probably why I keep rereading it. It's hard to put into words what draws me to it over and over again, except to say that it hits all the right emotional and thematic buttons for me, with a good hard punch that generally has me crying about a dozen times.

Bare bones synopsis: two sixth century Irish lovers, both student bards, sneak out at night to listen to the elves. They are caught and taken to the land of the far, where nothing ages or changes. One of the lovers, Chairiste, uses a magic elven harp to escape, but cannot free her lover Siubd. The magic of the harp keeps her young as she tries again and again to break her lover free, but fails in the face of elven harper Orfide's superior technique, knowledge and magic. Finally, after 200 years, she discovers heavy metal, realises that this new musical form, with it's raw energy, power and passion is weapon she neds to counter Orfide's advantage, trades in her harp for a double-headed axe, forms an all-woman band, and blasts her way into the Twilight Realm to rescue her beloved.

What grabs me about it:

It's powerfully feminist and woman-centred.
It's a Celtic-themed fantasy (even though it's woefully historically inaccurate).
It's a lesbian love story with a happy ending.
It's one of the first fantasies with an unrepentant queer protagonist.
It's all about women breaking free of the control of men and owning their power - each member of the band is a woman with a misogynist past to overcome.
It's music and magic - and to me these have always gone together.
It takes on the nasty guilt and shame elements of Pauline Christianity that surround women and sexuality, and counters them with a sex-positive goddess spirituality.
It's about undying, totally unconditional love.

Sure, it has flaws, but it also has a cult following and if you are one of those who gets caught up in it, it's a part of you forever. And in recent years, it has become even dearer to me because when I read it, I hear echoes of a good friend, now departed for the Summerland, who loved this book as I do, and who lived parts of it as a woman who loved women, as a master musician, and as a woman who fought to be freely and fully herself. So now as I read it again, I raise a cup and sing for all the women who love women, and fight for their right to be proud and free, and especially for the memory of Julie Songweaver.