Variations: An interview with Juliet Jacques

Suite (212)

In this month’s Resonance 104.4fm show, former co-host Tom Overton returns to interview Suite (212)’s founder, Juliet Jacques, about Variations, her new collection of stories that tells a potted history of trans and non-binary people in the United Kingdom from the Victorian era to the present, published by Influx Press on 17 June 2021. They talk about how Juliet moved on from her ‘Transgender Journey’ series for the Guardian and her memoir, Trans, that came out of it in 2015; why she chose to write Variations as short stories rather than as a novel, or a more straightforward British trans history, or make it as a film; the different forms she uses in each story, and her research processes; how postmodern approaches have intersected with prejudice to make the compilation of trans histories more difficult; how Variations looks at trans people’s complex relationships with industrialisation, law, sexology and media, as well as literature, music and film; the context of a British – and global – backlash against trans visibility and rights as she wrote the book; the absence of trans authors and authentic trans characters from literary history, the influences on her work and the uses of trans writers telling trans stories; and what Juliet might write next. Pre-order Variations for £9.99 from the Influx Press website at https://www.influxpress.com/variations. For a full list of references, subscribe to Suite (212) on Patreon for as little as £1 per month via https://www.patreon.com/suite212.