The Well of Loneliness

When it appeared in 1928, this novel was put on trial for obscenity in Britain and banned there for decades, though its only truly offending line was a woman’s plea that two lovers ‘were not divided.’ Radclyffe Hall tells the life of Stephen Gordon, a wealthy Englishwoman who knows from girlhood that she loves other women. Raised on a country estate, gifted and lonely, she serves as an ambulance driver in the First World War and there meets Mary Llewellyn, but the couple’s happiness is slowly worn down by a society that refuses to let them exist. Hall argues, without apology, that same-sex love is natural and deserving of acceptance. It remains a landmark of lesbian literature. Free PDF and EPUB editions are available here.