The Trials of Radclyffe Hall

Diana Souhami’s Lambda Award–winning biography is a fascinating look at one of the twentieth century’s most intriguing lesbian literary figures. Born in 1880, Marguerite Radclyffe-Hall was a young unwanted child when her parents put an end to their tempestuous marriage by filing for divorce. She had already made tentative forays into lesbian love when her father died, leaving her an heiress at eighteen. Her income assured, Hall moved out of her mother’s house, renamed herself John in honor of he