Among Others

written my Tempest response, and most of Deirdre’s, for her to copy out in prep. To make them different, I’ve made hers mostly about Miranda, and mine mostly about Prospero. She’s doing my maths in return. I just can’t cope with all these simultaneous equations, especially as I’ve missed some explanation.
    Finished LOTR, with the usual sad pang of reaching the end and there being no more of it.
    T UESDAY 29 TH J ANUARY 1980
    Book club tonight, but I don’t know the subject.
    W EDNESDAY 30 TH J ANUARY 1980
    The subject was Tiptree! I’m so glad I knew she was a woman in advance, because it would have been an awful shock to have discovered it when everyone started saying “she.” I haven’t read all of Tiptree, only the two collections, and I can see I’ll have to rectify this. Having said that, there was no problem having enough to talk about, because we talked for ages about “The Girl Who Was Plugged In,” such a brilliant story, and “Love Is the Plan, the Plan Is Death,” both of which I know really well. Harriet led it, which was nice, except that I remembered she’d also led the one on Le Guin, which made me wonder if there was something going on there. I mean, why have both of her sessions been on women writers, when none of the sessions done by the men have been?
    Keith really doesn’t like Tiptree, he thinks she’s anti-men, and did even when he thought she was a man. He thinks “Houston, Houston” is a horror story. I don’t think that, though I can understand men feeling threatened by it.
    It was Pete’s birthday, so we all went to the pub afterwards for a little bit. Brian asked a funny question he said he’d heard at work. “Which would you rather meet, an elf or a Plutonian?” I had to think about it for a moment, because the question is really about the past and the future, or about fantasy and science fiction. I’ve met plenty of elves, though they’re not exactly elves. Not like Tolkien’s elves. I said a Plutonian, and so did everyone eventually, except Wim, who said elf and stuck to it.
    Next week Wim’s doing Zelazny. I gave him back the two books he’d lent me, and he gave me Doorways in the Sand and Roadmarks .
    He asked me if I could meet him on Saturday. I said I would, and I said maybe he could meet an elf. He looks as if he wants to believe, but isn’t quite sure about it. “Where?” he said.
    “We can go looking in the Poacher’s Wood, so why not meet in the little cafe across from there?” I said.
    “Those woods belong to Harriet,” he said. “Hey, Harriet, is it all right if Mori and I go walking in your woods on Saturday?”
    Harriet turned around from her conversation with Hussein and Janine about whether Tiptree was misogynistic and raised her eyebrows. “Certainly you may, William, though you may find them a little muddy at this time of year. It’s too early for violets or primroses, I should think.”
    I hadn’t known Wim’s name was William, but I suppose it makes sense. I wonder why he isn’t Will or Billy?
    Meanwhile, Janine was giving me a look like the one Gill had given me when she saw me with Hugh. I wonder why Wim did that, making it open to everyone like that? Because we could have done it quietly without anyone else knowing. And if we’re doing it so he can see a fairy, or see magic, which is what he thinks, then why would he want them to know? They won’t believe it, even if he tells them. People just think you’re mad, or lying. He might think I am if he can’t see them. If there even are any. I’m not, no matter what he says, going to do magic just for the sake of it. Anyway, magic is always deniable, if you want to deny it, and he might well. Or did he want them to know I was going somewhere with him? Why? So if they disapprove of him, they’d disapprove of me too? Certainly that’s what Janine did.
    It’s so complicated. I want lots of friends, not just one.
    On the way back in the car, Greg warned me about Wim. He wasn’t as specific as Janine and Hugh had been. He just said that Wim had had a girlfriend who thought she’d got into trouble, and I should be careful how I went.
    “It’s not like that,” I explained. “He’s got a girlfriend. He wouldn’t be interested in me. I mean I have a bad leg and I’m kind of funny-looking and I’m getting fat because I never get any exercise and I eat all the time, while Wim’s, well, Wim could have anybody.”
    “You’ve got a lovely smile,” Greg said, which