Girl Meets Boy: The Myth of Iphis (Myths) (10 page)

I’ve adapted the story of Burning Lily from the account of the early life of Lilian Lenton in
Rebel Girls
by Jill Liddington (Virago, 2006).

The myth of Iphis originates in Book 9 of Ovid’s
Metamorphoses
. ‘Carry your gifts to the temples, happy pair, and rejoice, confident and unafraid!’ It is one of the cheeriest metamorphoses in the whole work, one of the most happily resolved of its stories about the desire for and the ramifications of change.

The statistics in chapter four were collated by Womankind (www.womankind.org.uk), a UK charity whose raison d’être is to provide voice, aid and rights to disempowered women worldwide.

I’ve borrowed the rhetorical structure of one of Keith’s talks from a paper given in 2001 by the sociologist

J-P Joseph about the global water corporation Vivendi Universal, quoted in
Blue Gold
by Maude Barlow and Tony Clarke (Earthscan, 2002). The writings of Vandana Shiva are another good place to help comprehend what’s happening right now, worldwide, when it comes to the politics of water, as is
H20: A Biography of
Water
by Philip Ball (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1999), which lets us know, among many other marvellous things, that ‘water is bent’.

Thank you, Xandra. Thank you, Jeanette.

Thank you, Rachel, Bridget and Kasia.

Thank you, Robyn and Hiraani at This ASFC.

Thank you, Andrew, and everyone at Wylie’s, especially

Tracy. Thank you, Anya.

Thank you, Lucy.

Thank you, Sarah.

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The Seer

‘
Girl meets boy
pulls you in and doesn’t let you go. Never afraid of big ideas, morality or politics, Smith’s retelling is bold and brilliant – containing the best sex I’ve read in years.’

Jackie Kay,
Observer
Books of the Year

‘Ali Smith has delivered another exuberant cascade of words; the romance is described in a lyrical flood.’

Spectator

‘Rich, complex and thrillingly life-affirming … Gentle, generous and wonderfully imaginative, this is a joy to read.’

Metro

‘Smith’s style encompasses both the lyricism of poetry and the energy of a well-told joke, and she has a keen appreciation for magic of the everyday kind, be it the way musical notes are transformed into the song of a blackbird, or the precise moment two people meet and fall in love.’

Daily Mail

‘Joyful … Smith deftly employs all kinds of linguistic tricks to paint her characters … I’m sure that the urbane and witty Ovid would have wholeheartedly approved.’

Scotland on Sunday

‘It’s queer, it’s out there, and the sex scene will leave you gasping.’

Diva

‘
Girl meets boy
delights because it refuses to stop at a single metamorphosis; despite its compactness, its stories multiply and rebound exuberantly, its echoes calling to one another across the pages.’

Times Literary Supplement