The Orchid Nursery. Louise Katz

PEARL 45.

      THE HAG 46. 47. 48.

      MICA 49.

      PEARL 50.

      THE HAG 51. 52.

      PEARL 53.

      THE HAG 54. 55.

      MICA 56.

      PEARL 57.

      MICA 58.

      THE HAG 59. 60. 61.

      MICA 62.

      PEARL 63.

      THE HAG 64.

      MICA 65.

      THE HAG 66.

      MICA 67.

      PEARL 68.

      THE HAG 69.

      PEARL 70.

      MICA 71. 72. 73. 74. 75. 76. 77. 78. 79. 80.

       EPILOGUE

       Acknowledgements

       About the author

       Imprint, copyright and credits

      Over the past few years, the revival of religion has taken on spectacular and, in many ways, frightening dimensions … Is it a revival of spirituality? If it were, we could only welcome it with open arms. Is it a revival of faith? That wouldn’t be a problem either. Unfortunately, it is all too often accompanied by dogmatism, obscurantism, fundamentalism – and sometimes fanaticism. It would be a mistake to leave the field to these forces … it is a struggle for freedom … in favour of the separation of church and state, in favour of the freedom to believe or not believe.

      Andre de Compte-Sponville, The Little Book of Atheist Spirituality, Viking Press, 2006.

      Ideological purity. Compromise as weakness. A fundamentalist belief in scriptural literalism. Denying science. Unmoved by facts. Undeterred by new information. A hostile fear of progress. A demonization of education. A need to control women’s bodies. Severe xenophobia. Tribal mentality. Intolerance of dissent. Pathological hatred of the U.S. government. They can call themselves the Tea Party. They can call themselves conservatives … But we should call them what they are – The American Taliban.

      ‘The Greater Fool’, episode 10, series 1, The Newsroom, HBO Entertainment, 2012.

      How confident can you appear at being lascivious? How credible is your air of lewdness? A girl who is just a try-hard will lose credibility and become an outcast. So a lot depends on how much support you can get from other girls … Girls spray their “likes”. They comment: … “F--k you’re hot” … [G]irls have to conform to what boys see in pornography. And then girls post photos to “out-hot” the other girls by porn star criteria.

      Olympia Nelson (age 11), ‘Dark undercurrents of teenage girls’ selfies’, The Age, 11 July 2013.

      The parts that are cut away are disgusting and hideous to look at. It is done for the beauty of the suture … An uncircumcised vulva is unclean and only the lowest prostitute would leave her daughter uncircumcised. No man would dream of marrying an unclean woman. He would be laughed at by everyone.

      Cited in Hanny Lightfoot-Klein, Prisoners of Ritual: An Odyssey into Female Genital Circumcision in Africa, Routledge, 1989.

      They wore blouses with buttons down the front that suggested the possibilities of the word undone. These women could be undone; or not. They seemed to be able to choose.

      Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale, Virago, 1987.

      MICA

      1.

      The door is thick and made of iron. The key is so big and heavy I must hold it in both hands. It’s more like a bolt really, a long, hard shaft of black metal, scored and notched along its whole length. I quake at the blasphemy I am about to commit, then insert the key and push until I feel it bite. I turn it with both hands and the door opens.

      The smell is powerful, raw, ammoniac. My breath catches in my throat and my eyes water. I am angry with myself for this simplistic animal response, so typical of weak (wo)Mankind, and make myself take a step forward into the close atmosphere. I have smelled similar in the stables, this reek of straw, of livestock and vegetarian excrement. It should not upset me so much. Of course the womanidols are made of flesh. This cannot be helped. But I had not expected this, our hallowed citadel, to smell like shit.

      The Orchid