I She was only five when Nancy Friday’s cult hit My Secret Garden in 1973: women’s sexual fantasies found their way onto bookshelves and into women’s handbags in America; Only seven when it reached central England. My Secret Garden was a testament to the fact that women enjoyed as rich and varied sensual inner lives as men. Finally, here was a book in which ordinary women and girls – “you, me and our neighbor” – were talking honestly about arousal, masturbation, sexual dreams and desires. In their minds, nothing was off limits, not even the Alsatian of the neighborhood.
What Friday’s book revealed is that, for some of us, the sex in our heads can be more stimulating than the physical nuts and bolts of any coupling, no matter how hot. Ignoring internal social constraints, self-consciousness, or perhaps fear of alienating our partner, we can indulge our deepest, dirty desires in our imaginations. It was revolutionary, even provocative, at first, and then it became required reading for everyone, a multi-million-copy worldwide bestseller, a classic.
I don’t know if my computer analyst mother, Rosemary, owns Friday’s book. It certainly wasn’t a puritanical household where such reading matter was frowned upon—but as liberal as my childhood was, it wasn’t something she’d leave lying on the coffee table. When I was a teenager, I once found a copy of The Story of O tucked behind a sofa cushion at our neighbor’s house and I definitely watched it. I also remember when, as a young child, I wandered into a living room where someone had left the TV on and was paralyzed with infatuation as the on-screen couple engaged in a perfectly pure but clearly illicit activity. To this day, I still remember those feelings. But undoubtedly, if unknowingly, as a young woman I benefited from this new dawn of the sex-positive feminist movement. Women, it seems, are starting to talk more openly and honestly about what they really want. Well, there was something.
In fact, I had to wait almost 50 years to discover this collection of private fantasies of unknown women for myself. In early 2018, I was cast in the Netflix series Sex Education as Jean Milburn, a brilliantly independent and outspoken sex therapist. I had always heard people talking about my secret garden, and so in preparation I read it for the first time. Its blunt and painful honesty shook me. These letters and interviews were incredibly intimate and very raw. They weren’t necessarily too polished, or trying to be literary; They seemed to come straight from the mysterious heart of women’s inner desires.
What also struck me, more than a little sadly, was the stark commentary on the sexual frustration expressed by many of these women in the 70s (despite the revolution!). The experience of women was still that they did not get what they wanted. Many had never experienced extreme happiness. Some did not know what sexual fantasy was; Others could not accept what they had. For many there was an admission of deep shame and guilt; There was still a lot of prudence and shame around sex and what they envisioned. Again and again, these women admitted their fear that they were the only ones having such fantasies, and wept heartbreakingly with relief at finally being able to express them. As one woman wrote: “I have never confided my sexual fantasies to a living soul, but I feel I must tell someone about them, and so I welcome the opportunity to unburden myself. I’ve always been embarrassed by them, because I think other people would think they’re unnatural, and think I’m a nymphomaniac, or something like that.” And another laughed: “I really think your book is a good idea, because non-fictional female sexual fantasies and Experiences are rarely discussed openly. They often occur in works of fiction written by men. ” Finally, women began to feel able to open up a little. They felt less alone.
Today, thank God, we live in a different world. We can talk about these things with our contemporaries. I think that’s one thing that people find very liberating about sex education. We show characters who struggle with their sexuality, and yet are brave enough to talk about it with their lovers and partners, so they can get what they need sexually. The show lays it all out on the table and makes it okay to talk about it.
And yet with shows like mine, and others like Naked Attraction or Cara Delevingne’s Planet Sex on television, I’m curious to know if it’s something that people feel comfortable with in real life. Since sex education aired, friends and journalists have asked me if women sometimes feel compelled to share their sexual problems or fantasies. I. Well, they don’t. Which eventually gave me the idea for a book – my secret garden for the 21st century, so to speak – that would be revealing and profound, and inclusive across the board.
I want women all over the world, and all of you who internally identify as women – queer, heterosexual and bisexual, non-binary, transgender, multisexual – all of you, old and young, whatever your religion, married, single or otherwise. , write me and tell me when you think about sex. Whether it’s by yourself or with a partner, or with more than one. tell me Fantasies, frustrations, explorations, taboos, childhood, voices, sexuality, guilt, insatiability. Fifty years later, boundaries have been erased, no more so than in our own sexuality: BDSM, the modern meaning of gender, etc., are up for grabs. Do women still have silent sex? I think that’s one of the things that we’re going to find out. I hope your voices from different nationalities and backgrounds will illuminate how far we have come since 1973.
As Friday wrote in her original introduction, “In trying to understand what it is to be a woman, neither nationality nor class help us define ourselves by the honesty of our feelings toward ourselves and our desires.” Let’s create an era-defining text that cuts to the heart of what it means to be a woman today. A book that will inspire women for generations to come.
For now, call it Dear Gillian: It will be published by Bloomsbury Publishing and we have set up a secure email address to receive your submissions – all identities will be protected and your submissions will be treated anonymously. Of course, I will include my own letter anonymously. I look forward to reading yours.
