Valerie Solanas: The Defiant Life of the Woman Who Wrote SCUM (43 page)

acknowledgments

The work of constructing the life of Valerie Solanas
—doing justice to her complexity and uniqueness—has been a daunting and often overwhelming task, one that has called on so many sources of support for these many years. Sifting through thousands of fragments and grappling with the enormity of Valerie herself has put me in the debt of numerous people, most specifically those whom I have interviewed over the years about Valerie’s life and work. The book absolutely would not exist without the tremendous effort put forth in the early and mid-1990s by film director Mary Harron, who managed the herculean feat of constructing and reconstructing Valerie’s story with the help of her research and film team for the 1996 movie
I Shot Andy Warhol
. When she handed me boxes full of documents in September 2008, I knew that I finally had enough fragments to write this book.

I also extend deep gratitude to Ti-Grace Atkinson, a force of nature in her own right and one of the founders of the radical feminist movement, who not only spent an entire weekend telling me her story but also became a friend, mentor, confidante, and teacher. To radical feminists Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, Dana Densmore, Kathie Sarachild, and Rosalyn Baxandall, your stories and words have changed my life, taught me how to see the root of things, and added much depth and nuance to Valerie as provocateur. Thanks especially to Jane Caputi for capturing that combination of tragedy and awe that Valerie’s life summons for those of us still drawn to her orbit. Many thanks to Ben Morea, who left his other life in order to return as himself to tell the stories of Valerie and Up Against the Wall, Motherfucker. His graciousness and generosity attest to the profound connections made possible by radical social movements. To Jeremiah Newton, Valerie’s “baby brother,” and to Louis Zwiren, thank you for the conversations that painted Valerie as wholly human and, in these small circles, truly well loved.

I have immense gratitude for the team at the Feminist Press and for my editor, Amy Scholder, whose wisdom, patience, and dedication to Valerie’s story have ensured the publication of not only this manuscript but also the 2004 Verso Press edition of
SCUM Manifesto
. Many thanks to Romaine Perin, for copyediting the book, and to Jeanann Pannasch, Elizabeth Koke, and Drew Stevens, Feminist Press warriors.

Thank you to Ultra Violet, Lorraine Miller, Vivian Gornick, Sylvia Miles, CJ Scheiner, Paul Morrissey, Bud Maxwell Vasconcellos, Jacqueline Ceballos, Jo Freeman, Sheila Tobias, and Margo Feiden, who contextualized Andy Warhol and the Factory, filled in vivid details from the day of the shooting, mused about Valerie, and added further contradictions to such an already complicated woman. Donny Smith and Freddy Baer, your groundwork on Valerie paved the way for this story—thank you. I am enormously grateful to Valerie’s cousin, the ever gracious and recently departed Robert Fustero, for providing access to the family stories, photos, and idiosyncrasies, and to Valerie’s son, David Blackwell, and Valerie’s sister, Judith Martinez Solanas, for what they gave.

Certainly, this book would still be languishing in purgatory without the institutional support I have received from Arizona State University, Duke University, and the University of Michigan. Arizona State University’s Center for Critical Inquiry and Cultural Studies provided support for photos and travel costs to conduct some of the interviews, while the Scholarship for Research and Creative Activities grant through Arizona State University funded two summer’s worth of work. Dean Elizabeth Langland’s support of my work came at just the right time—thank you! I also had the true pleasure of doing archival research at the Duke University Sallie Bingham Center for Women’s History and Culture while on a Mary Lily Research Grant in the summer of 2008. Thank you to the superb archivist Kelly Wooten and to Duke for investing in, and preserving, the history of radical feminism. I am also grateful to the Dobkin Collection, particularly Sarah Funke Butler, who so generously helped me with documents and photos concerning Valerie from their collection. I owe thanks to the University of Michigan, which provided funding to visit the Andy Warhol Museum archives in Pittsburgh back in 2006 and to Matt Wrbican, lead archivist at the Warhol archives, and Greg Burchard, the rights and reproductions specialist, who provided many of the rich histories and documents about Valerie during the late 1960s and early 1970s.

For the many striking images in this book, I owe gratitude to numerous photographers, archivists, and friends: I thank the estate of Diane Arbus, Richard Avedon, Howard Berman, Jennifer Bertagni, David Blackwell, Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, Robert Fustero, Matt Grace, Bob Gruen, Jeremiah Newton, Fred Palumbo, Christopher Payne, Drew Stevens, and Louis Zwiren.

I have also had the great fortune of working with a number of talented students, whose energy, talent, and bravery humbles me every day. They have propelled the book along by fact-checking, taking photos, tracking down contact information, reading drafts, compiling references, thinking deeply about Valerie’s life, and providing humor and laughter amid this most tragic of stories. Love and thanks to Jennifer Bertagni, the crème de la crème, whose imprint is everywhere in this text, and whose support brought so much life and passion to the work—words cannot describe how much I have valued our many conversations about Valerie over the years. Thanks to the Feminist Research on Gender and Sexuality Group—the FROGS—whose extraordinary work ethic, diligence, earnestness, and passion have kept me going. I owe much to those who have worked on this text and who believed in Valerie’s story, particularly Michelle Ashley Gohr, Adrielle Munger, Kelly Trujillo, Jaqueline “Jax” Gonzalez, Kalen Brest, Denise Delgado, Jennifer Pryor, Kathleen Courter, Judith Sipes, Mitchell Call, Perla Solorzano, Michael Karger, Emily Dolan, Rose Coursey, Stephanie Robinson-Cestaro, Natali Blazevic, Yessica del Rincon, Eva Sisko, Amanda Garcia, Victoria Guinn, and Marisa Loiacono.

I extend appreciation to my many colleagues and friends who have contributed so much to this project. Susannah Straw-Gast gave me my first copy of
SCUM Manifesto
at college back in 1999—thank you, thank you, thank you. Carroll Smith-Rosenberg first validated my interest in writing a book on Valerie and, in so many ways, deserves recognition for this book’s existence. Thanks to Deborah Martinson, superwoman of feminist biography—I adore you and will never have enough words with which to sing your praises. Thanks to my colleagues at Arizona State University and beyond, particularly Marlene Tromp, Monica Casper, Stephanie Fink, Elizabeth Langland, Patrick Grzanka, Mary Margaret Fonow, Michael Starcliff, Ilana Luna, Gloria Cuadraz, Valerie Kemper, Clare Croft, Leonore Tiefer, Rebecca Plante, Andrew Smiler, Virginia Braun, Michelle Tea, Rose Carlson, Jennifer Baumgardner, Michael Kimmel, and Abby Stewart.

Thanks especially to my family, particularly my incredible mother, who dug up genealogy on Valerie, read drafts, tracked down
Holy Titclamps
for a Christmas present, and endured with such spirited and generous attention my many “daily briefings” in the world of Valerie research. To my sister, I love you and all the warmth you’ve shown for this project. To my cousin Chris Brown, thanks for all the laughs and for the mortician’s insights about Valerie’s death, and to my aunt Marilee Davis, I so appreciate our conversations about Our Lady of Sorrows and all the love you give to me. Sara McClelland, my simpatico friend who may very well be the most gracious person on earth, you never wavered from seeing this work as significant and reminding me why it matters. Sarah Stage and Mary Dudy, I would be lost without you and love you dearly. To my friends, near and far—especially Lori Errico-Seaman, Sean Seaman, Denise Delgado, Garyn Tsuru, Jennifer Tamir, Marcy Winokur, Steve DuBois, Devaki Ramalingam, Annika Mann, Joe Rheinhardt, Sharon Kirsch, Robert Wardy, Joanna Martori, Jan Habarth, Anne Hager, Damon Whitaker, Pat Hart, Karen Swank-Fitch, Ursula Swank, Wendy D’Andrea, Connie Hardesty, Toby Oshiro, Marc Lombardo, and David Frost—who never thought me foolish for writing a book about a feminist assassin while going up for tenure, and who never reduced the complexity and utter force of Valerie’s story, I love you all.

Finally, with full awareness of the irony in doing so, I dedicate this book to two extraordinary men. I wrote this book for Elmer Griffin, my great teacher, for showing me the power of radical thought and how to use its transformative energy to write, read, think, and live. And for Eric Swank, for all those qualities that evade words, and for showing me what is possible.