Learned by Heart (2023) is the latest beautifully-written novel by Emma Donoghue (Room. The Wonder). It’s a fictional retelling of the story of Eliza Raine and her relationship with Anne Lister. Lister kept extensive diaries, is known as “the first modern lesbian,” and is the subject of the 2-season HBO series Gentleman Jack.
Set primarily around 1805, Eliza has already been attending a boarding school in York. She is the biracial child of a British surgeon and an Indian woman, sent to England after the death of her father. She and Anne share a room, although Anne is the strangest and most compelling person Eliza has ever met. She doesn’t remember India, just a long boat ride. She stands to inherit a substantial sum upon her marriage or majority, but she knows that she doesn’t fit in to British society because of her skin color.
Eliza and Anne become best friends, and eventually lovers. But it’s not easy to be a woman in the early 1800s, let alone a biracial woman who is in love with another woman. The story is separated by letters to Anne from Eliza in the asylum where she spends the rest of her life.
The writing is beautiful and so is the love story. Though they are initially separated by circumstance (and the poor judgment of being teenagers in love), Lister eventually proves to be fickle, pursuing multiple lesbian relationships over the course of the rest of her life.
Highly recommend if you like historical fiction based on true events or want to read about queer people in history. It is also weight-neutral.
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