One cannot thank Serpent’s Tail enough for making this most significant, vital and hugely entertaining collection of writings by Jill Johnston available. Hers was a voice of assurance, rage, inspiration and intelligence that gave an entire generation the incentive to declare and be proud of our lesbian identity. More than any other writer from this era, Johnston was a trail-blazer, a lone voice in the early Stonewall period, before Lesbian chic and Queer theory. Revisiting these weekly columns, published in the Village Voice during the early to mid-seventies, one is dazed by her clarity and wisdom, her empowering and insightful observations, the sheer speed and force of her writing, and the breadth of her experience and knowledge. It is reassuring to find that the impact and tremendous shifts experienced by us who partook in the second wave of the (real) women’s movement are as stupendous as we recall. I recommend that all the "straight" feminists writing about us in their queer theories immerse themselves in “The Comingest Womanifesto,” sample “Dyke Nationalism & Heterosexutility,” or “The March of the Real Women.” Vintage Jill Johnston!

In Johnston’s current incarnation as critic and (auto)biographer, we must be grateful that the forces that rule have not been able to shut down this enormously talented, creatively inventive and brilliant author. Her integrity and passions are alive, and her writing has retained its seething vigor despite being properly punctuated and paragraphed.

Admission Accomplished should be required reading on any Women’s Studies and/or Queer Studies syllabus. On a clear day, you might be lucky enough to read Jill Johnston.

                                                                                           —Caroline Bell, New York City

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