Megan Casey's Blog
June 6, 2024
Is Enola Gay?
Is Enola Gay?
The Use of Ambiguous Language
in the Enola Holmes Mystery Novels
There are a number of online threads discussing the possibility of Enola Holmes—protagonist of Nancy Springer’s young adult mystery series—being a lesbian.
Interest in the character—who was created by Springer in 2007—has sprung up only after a couple of Netflix movies (2020, 2022) featuring the girl sleuth, who is played by superstar Millie Bobbie Brown.
Ironically, the movies contain not even a hint of sapphism (with the possible exception of Enola’s mother and her mother’s feminist friends). Viscount Lord Tewksbury is her only possible love interest—although Enola is never that excited about it.
The books, however, are quite different. Tewksbury, for instance, after making Enola’s acquaintance in book 1, appears only sporadically in the subsequent novels. There is another character, however, that pops up rather more frequently: Lady Cecily Alistair.
So the online buzz, doubtless added to by fan fiction, has created quite a controversy. Several zines have tried to quiet the fans who want Enola to be gay by quoting Springer’s own tweet, which they say is definitive in quashing the idea. But it does no such thing. Check it out:
“Readers who imagine Enola Holmes is going to marry Tewksbury are entitled to their dreams. Readers who imagine Enola Holmes is lesbian are entitled to their dreams.”
In other words, Springer neither confirms nor denies either of these possibilities.
Let’s stop here and get grounded a little more firmly. First of all, in the first 6 books—the ones written before the movies came out—Enola is only 14 years old and may never have thought about her feelings for another person, male or female. But this doesn’t mean that she doesn’t have them. So read this essay with a grain or two of salt. It is simply a literary exercise and not a serious doctoral dissertation topic. That said, and ignoring the movies, let’s ask two important questions.
1. Is there any solid textual evidence or hint that Enola is straight? The answer to both is a resounding no.
2. Is there any solid evidence or hint that Enola is gay? Evidence? No. But hints? Yeah, there are quite a few.
As both a Sherlock Holmes aficionado and a scholar on lesbian mystery novels, I decided to go through the books—augmented now by three new titles—again, where I found some very interesting and ambiguous passages. It is even more interesting if the passages are deliberately ambiguous. Let’s take a look at what I mean by this.
In William Dean Howells’ 1879 novel, The Lady of the Aroostook, one of the male characters is described as “making love” to a female passenger on the deck of an ocean liner. I was taken aback by the phrase until I realized that in the 19th century, the phrase meant “chatting up” or “flirting” and not copulating, as it does today.
By chance, the Enola Holmes series also begins in 1879. As a student of language, Springer uses phrases that may mean one thing to her characters and something quite different to modern readers. The difference is that Springer, unlike Howells, knows both the 19th century and 21st century meaning of the words she chooses. In addition, certain passages and words that seem innocent enough by themselves point to a different meaning when collected.
Toward the end of the second book in the series, Enola reminds the reader that her name spelled backwards is ‘alone’. But then she waxes into an eloquent description of her loneliness. She desperately wants someone to share her thoughts—and her life. Loneliness can easily be seen as a synonym of lack of love.
Enola first sets eyes on Lady Cecily Alastair in Chapter 15 of book 2: The Case of the Left-Handed Lady. Cecily has been mesmerized and kidnapped by a fraudster, made to wear beggar’s clothes, and forced to hand out political pamphlets on a street corner. Enola manages to locate Cecily, and her first impressions of the girl—even in her ragged clothing—are suggestive:
“Lady Cecily, strong and beautiful,” she muses. “A small and icy flame.”
But Enola already had a favorable opinion of the 16-year-old heiress as she had earlier found a cache of drawings hidden in the missing girl’s room.
“Lady Cecily’s charcoal drawings had strongly affected me, touched some deep recognition in me. Almost as if she and I could be soul mates. Perhaps she might similarly recognize me.”
Enola, disguised as a nun, approaches and introduces herself to the mesmerized girl in an attempt to rescue her. And it seems that Enola’s favorable impression of Cecily is, in fact, mutual.
“‘You’re no num,’ she said in a light tone, as if teasing a girlfriend.”
The word ‘girlfriend,’ is one of those ambiguous words; it has a much different meaning today than it did in 1879. When Enola addresses her, she uses “my most aristocratic accent—so that she would know that we were alike in class as well as in other ways.”
I’m not sure what other ways Springer was alluding to, but today—in some circles—this sounds like gaydar pure and simple.
“I opened my mantle and invited her to share its warmth. Wrapping it around both of us, my left arm around her shoulder. As if she were a little sister.”
This is not the last time that Enola uses the word sister to imagine what her relationship with Cecily might become. But what other term of close familiarity could Enola use? She had probably never even heard the word ‘lesbian.’ Even the idea of women loving each other would probably have been a surprise to her. But this doesn’t mean that deep down she didn’t have these feelings.
Before Springer began her series, the name Enola was virtually unheard of. In fact the only Enola I knew of was Enola Gay—the name of the bomber that delivered the first atomic bomb in warfare. Does this mean that Springer named her character as a hint to her sexuality? Of course not, but it is impossible for a sixtyish, educated woman not to have been aware of the name Enola Gay.
Here are a few more interesting quotes from The Left-Handed Lady.
Lady Cecily lets Enola know that her father was “intending to marry me off to anything titled and wearing trousers” It makes the reader wonder what else could her father marry her off to? Someone in skirts? In other words, why mention the trousers at all?
Enola: “Just talking to her I experienced great warmth of feeling for her.”
Enola: “I yearned to tell her all about myself—my most lonely, peculiar, eccentric self.” At that point, Enola has the thought that Lady Cecily might come to live with her. After a beat, she adds, “like a sister.” Of course.
Enola: “The greatest harm I could possibly suffer would be to lose my liberty—to be forced into a conventional life of domestic duties and matrimony.” In other words, Enola, like Cecily, has no desire to have a traditional marriage or be a traditional wife.
Enola: “This particular woman-to-be prefers to remain indecent or, more accurately speaking, a disgrace to her family.” This is another ambiguous use of language. In the 20th or 21st centuries, lesbians, not spinsters, would be considered disgraces to the family.
The next time Enola sees Lady Cecily is in the beginning of book 4: The Case of the Peculiar Pink Fan. She encounters her by accident in a public ladies lavatory and sparks fly. Enola is excited to see Cecily again. She thinks, “Snap! It was as if a whip had cracked—such was the force with which our gazes met.”
“She was a lovely creature. The sight of her sensitive, cultured face magnetized me.”
Using ‘fan language’—a series of quick semaphoric signals sometimes used by young ladies using folding hand fans—Cecily lets Enola know that she is in trouble and needs help. It seems that Cecily’s snooty aunts are taking her by force to a dressmaker shop to buy a trousseau. However, Enola—for some reason—lets the reader know that “The language of the fans had been invented by young lovers.” One particular sign “was meant to encourage a timid lover.” Indeed.
And if the reader still doesn’t believe the strong attachment between the two girls, Enola (via Springer) knocks us on the head with it again: “I felt once again that sense of electric shock when our gazes met and locked.” This is a trope used in at least half of what are now called “Lesbian Romantic Suspense” novels and more than a few lesbian mysteries.
Lady Cecily is mostly absent from the novels until book 8, Enola Holmes and the Elegant Escapade, where she is back with a vengeance.
This is the first book in which she appears that was written after the Netflix adaptations. My scholar’s hope was that Springer would be a bit more forthcoming about Enola’s attraction to Cecily. Unfortunately, she decided to punt. As in the previous books featuring the two girls, they spend very little time together and because of this, little time to form greater bonds.
At the beginning of Enola Holmes and the Elegant Escapade, Cecily’s father has locked her in her room with plans to marry her off to the first rich man who has an interest. She is, however, is able to send a note to Enola asking for help. Enola manages to rescue her, but any furtherance of their relationship is put off to another date when Cecily mysteriously disappears again.
So all we come away with is the fact that each girl considers the other to be her very best—or maybe her only—friend.
Still, on two occasions in the Prologue, the author mentions Lady Cecily’s ‘coming out.’ Of course in the 1800s, coming out meant being presented to society. In the 2000s it means something quite different. Do I think that Springer used the term deliberately as a tease? Yes, I absolutely do. Springer is playing with the reader. But does this mean the Cecily was gay? Of course not.
In the next book in the series, The Mark of the Mongoose, Lady Cecily is traveling in Europe, but Enola thinks of her fondly as “my very best friend.”
But then Springer does something remarkable. In Enola’s guise as the world’s first ‘perditorian’—finder of lost people—she comes into contact with a very youthful but already famous Rudyard Kipling. His friend Wolcott Balestier has disappeared. In the ensuring chapters, the reader learns that “Ruddy”: has little use for women and that he is obviously in love with Balestier. There are repeated phrases wondering how he can go on living without his friend. Again, this kind of ebullient friendship might pass muster in Victorian society, but in the modern world it would more likely be taken as a passionate love affair. Read it for yourself if you don’t believe me.
Although Kipling fires Enola from her job of finding Wolcott and refuses to see her again, she dresses up in the style of Oscar Wilde—arguably the most famous homosexual in the Victorian world—and visits him again. Inexplicably (or not), Kipling finds it much easier to talk to Enola when she is dressed as a man. And hearken back to book 1 in which she also disguises herself as male.
Is Springer embracing her new queer fans? Yep. And is she playing with her readers as I suspected in The Elegant Escapade? Again, yes. So at this point, I suspect that Springer will never delve deeply into Enola’s sexuality but will continue to give us little teases along the way.
So where does that leave us? Is Enola gay? Here’s summary.
Pro: The numerous suggestions listed above. The sparks, the tenderness, the admiration, the friendship, Enola’s absolute—and repeated—determination to save Lady Cecily from marriage.
Con: The romantic language cited above is very ambiguous. It could be quite Platonic, totally innocent. Also, Springer herself is not a lesbian and is not known for writing about LGBTQ subjects.
Conclusion: There is not enough evidence to label Enola—or Lady Cecily—as a lesbian. But there is also no evidence at all that either is straight. I will read any future volumes of the series in hope that Springer will be more forthcoming. At this point, though, I think that she is just having fun.
The Use of Ambiguous Language
in the Enola Holmes Mystery Novels
There are a number of online threads discussing the possibility of Enola Holmes—protagonist of Nancy Springer’s young adult mystery series—being a lesbian.
Interest in the character—who was created by Springer in 2007—has sprung up only after a couple of Netflix movies (2020, 2022) featuring the girl sleuth, who is played by superstar Millie Bobbie Brown.
Ironically, the movies contain not even a hint of sapphism (with the possible exception of Enola’s mother and her mother’s feminist friends). Viscount Lord Tewksbury is her only possible love interest—although Enola is never that excited about it.
The books, however, are quite different. Tewksbury, for instance, after making Enola’s acquaintance in book 1, appears only sporadically in the subsequent novels. There is another character, however, that pops up rather more frequently: Lady Cecily Alistair.
So the online buzz, doubtless added to by fan fiction, has created quite a controversy. Several zines have tried to quiet the fans who want Enola to be gay by quoting Springer’s own tweet, which they say is definitive in quashing the idea. But it does no such thing. Check it out:
“Readers who imagine Enola Holmes is going to marry Tewksbury are entitled to their dreams. Readers who imagine Enola Holmes is lesbian are entitled to their dreams.”
In other words, Springer neither confirms nor denies either of these possibilities.
Let’s stop here and get grounded a little more firmly. First of all, in the first 6 books—the ones written before the movies came out—Enola is only 14 years old and may never have thought about her feelings for another person, male or female. But this doesn’t mean that she doesn’t have them. So read this essay with a grain or two of salt. It is simply a literary exercise and not a serious doctoral dissertation topic. That said, and ignoring the movies, let’s ask two important questions.
1. Is there any solid textual evidence or hint that Enola is straight? The answer to both is a resounding no.
2. Is there any solid evidence or hint that Enola is gay? Evidence? No. But hints? Yeah, there are quite a few.
As both a Sherlock Holmes aficionado and a scholar on lesbian mystery novels, I decided to go through the books—augmented now by three new titles—again, where I found some very interesting and ambiguous passages. It is even more interesting if the passages are deliberately ambiguous. Let’s take a look at what I mean by this.
In William Dean Howells’ 1879 novel, The Lady of the Aroostook, one of the male characters is described as “making love” to a female passenger on the deck of an ocean liner. I was taken aback by the phrase until I realized that in the 19th century, the phrase meant “chatting up” or “flirting” and not copulating, as it does today.
By chance, the Enola Holmes series also begins in 1879. As a student of language, Springer uses phrases that may mean one thing to her characters and something quite different to modern readers. The difference is that Springer, unlike Howells, knows both the 19th century and 21st century meaning of the words she chooses. In addition, certain passages and words that seem innocent enough by themselves point to a different meaning when collected.
Toward the end of the second book in the series, Enola reminds the reader that her name spelled backwards is ‘alone’. But then she waxes into an eloquent description of her loneliness. She desperately wants someone to share her thoughts—and her life. Loneliness can easily be seen as a synonym of lack of love.
Enola first sets eyes on Lady Cecily Alastair in Chapter 15 of book 2: The Case of the Left-Handed Lady. Cecily has been mesmerized and kidnapped by a fraudster, made to wear beggar’s clothes, and forced to hand out political pamphlets on a street corner. Enola manages to locate Cecily, and her first impressions of the girl—even in her ragged clothing—are suggestive:
“Lady Cecily, strong and beautiful,” she muses. “A small and icy flame.”
But Enola already had a favorable opinion of the 16-year-old heiress as she had earlier found a cache of drawings hidden in the missing girl’s room.
“Lady Cecily’s charcoal drawings had strongly affected me, touched some deep recognition in me. Almost as if she and I could be soul mates. Perhaps she might similarly recognize me.”
Enola, disguised as a nun, approaches and introduces herself to the mesmerized girl in an attempt to rescue her. And it seems that Enola’s favorable impression of Cecily is, in fact, mutual.
“‘You’re no num,’ she said in a light tone, as if teasing a girlfriend.”
The word ‘girlfriend,’ is one of those ambiguous words; it has a much different meaning today than it did in 1879. When Enola addresses her, she uses “my most aristocratic accent—so that she would know that we were alike in class as well as in other ways.”
I’m not sure what other ways Springer was alluding to, but today—in some circles—this sounds like gaydar pure and simple.
“I opened my mantle and invited her to share its warmth. Wrapping it around both of us, my left arm around her shoulder. As if she were a little sister.”
This is not the last time that Enola uses the word sister to imagine what her relationship with Cecily might become. But what other term of close familiarity could Enola use? She had probably never even heard the word ‘lesbian.’ Even the idea of women loving each other would probably have been a surprise to her. But this doesn’t mean that deep down she didn’t have these feelings.
Before Springer began her series, the name Enola was virtually unheard of. In fact the only Enola I knew of was Enola Gay—the name of the bomber that delivered the first atomic bomb in warfare. Does this mean that Springer named her character as a hint to her sexuality? Of course not, but it is impossible for a sixtyish, educated woman not to have been aware of the name Enola Gay.
Here are a few more interesting quotes from The Left-Handed Lady.
Lady Cecily lets Enola know that her father was “intending to marry me off to anything titled and wearing trousers” It makes the reader wonder what else could her father marry her off to? Someone in skirts? In other words, why mention the trousers at all?
Enola: “Just talking to her I experienced great warmth of feeling for her.”
Enola: “I yearned to tell her all about myself—my most lonely, peculiar, eccentric self.” At that point, Enola has the thought that Lady Cecily might come to live with her. After a beat, she adds, “like a sister.” Of course.
Enola: “The greatest harm I could possibly suffer would be to lose my liberty—to be forced into a conventional life of domestic duties and matrimony.” In other words, Enola, like Cecily, has no desire to have a traditional marriage or be a traditional wife.
Enola: “This particular woman-to-be prefers to remain indecent or, more accurately speaking, a disgrace to her family.” This is another ambiguous use of language. In the 20th or 21st centuries, lesbians, not spinsters, would be considered disgraces to the family.
The next time Enola sees Lady Cecily is in the beginning of book 4: The Case of the Peculiar Pink Fan. She encounters her by accident in a public ladies lavatory and sparks fly. Enola is excited to see Cecily again. She thinks, “Snap! It was as if a whip had cracked—such was the force with which our gazes met.”
“She was a lovely creature. The sight of her sensitive, cultured face magnetized me.”
Using ‘fan language’—a series of quick semaphoric signals sometimes used by young ladies using folding hand fans—Cecily lets Enola know that she is in trouble and needs help. It seems that Cecily’s snooty aunts are taking her by force to a dressmaker shop to buy a trousseau. However, Enola—for some reason—lets the reader know that “The language of the fans had been invented by young lovers.” One particular sign “was meant to encourage a timid lover.” Indeed.
And if the reader still doesn’t believe the strong attachment between the two girls, Enola (via Springer) knocks us on the head with it again: “I felt once again that sense of electric shock when our gazes met and locked.” This is a trope used in at least half of what are now called “Lesbian Romantic Suspense” novels and more than a few lesbian mysteries.
Lady Cecily is mostly absent from the novels until book 8, Enola Holmes and the Elegant Escapade, where she is back with a vengeance.
This is the first book in which she appears that was written after the Netflix adaptations. My scholar’s hope was that Springer would be a bit more forthcoming about Enola’s attraction to Cecily. Unfortunately, she decided to punt. As in the previous books featuring the two girls, they spend very little time together and because of this, little time to form greater bonds.
At the beginning of Enola Holmes and the Elegant Escapade, Cecily’s father has locked her in her room with plans to marry her off to the first rich man who has an interest. She is, however, is able to send a note to Enola asking for help. Enola manages to rescue her, but any furtherance of their relationship is put off to another date when Cecily mysteriously disappears again.
So all we come away with is the fact that each girl considers the other to be her very best—or maybe her only—friend.
Still, on two occasions in the Prologue, the author mentions Lady Cecily’s ‘coming out.’ Of course in the 1800s, coming out meant being presented to society. In the 2000s it means something quite different. Do I think that Springer used the term deliberately as a tease? Yes, I absolutely do. Springer is playing with the reader. But does this mean the Cecily was gay? Of course not.
In the next book in the series, The Mark of the Mongoose, Lady Cecily is traveling in Europe, but Enola thinks of her fondly as “my very best friend.”
But then Springer does something remarkable. In Enola’s guise as the world’s first ‘perditorian’—finder of lost people—she comes into contact with a very youthful but already famous Rudyard Kipling. His friend Wolcott Balestier has disappeared. In the ensuring chapters, the reader learns that “Ruddy”: has little use for women and that he is obviously in love with Balestier. There are repeated phrases wondering how he can go on living without his friend. Again, this kind of ebullient friendship might pass muster in Victorian society, but in the modern world it would more likely be taken as a passionate love affair. Read it for yourself if you don’t believe me.
Although Kipling fires Enola from her job of finding Wolcott and refuses to see her again, she dresses up in the style of Oscar Wilde—arguably the most famous homosexual in the Victorian world—and visits him again. Inexplicably (or not), Kipling finds it much easier to talk to Enola when she is dressed as a man. And hearken back to book 1 in which she also disguises herself as male.
Is Springer embracing her new queer fans? Yep. And is she playing with her readers as I suspected in The Elegant Escapade? Again, yes. So at this point, I suspect that Springer will never delve deeply into Enola’s sexuality but will continue to give us little teases along the way.
So where does that leave us? Is Enola gay? Here’s summary.
Pro: The numerous suggestions listed above. The sparks, the tenderness, the admiration, the friendship, Enola’s absolute—and repeated—determination to save Lady Cecily from marriage.
Con: The romantic language cited above is very ambiguous. It could be quite Platonic, totally innocent. Also, Springer herself is not a lesbian and is not known for writing about LGBTQ subjects.
Conclusion: There is not enough evidence to label Enola—or Lady Cecily—as a lesbian. But there is also no evidence at all that either is straight. I will read any future volumes of the series in hope that Springer will be more forthcoming. At this point, though, I think that she is just having fun.
