GLR July-August 2025

INTERVIEW

Colin Carman converses with the author of Cleavage

‘We have seen dark times before.’

T HE COVER of Jennifer Finney Boylan’s new memoir, Cleavage: Men, Women and the Space BetweenUs (Celadon Books), features a famous photograph of actress Sophia Loren eyeing Jayne Mansfield’s copious décolletage. Boylan, who burst onto the scene with the bestselling memoir She’s Not There in 2003, is again interested in exploring what it means to be a man or a woman, and what the trans experience reveals, and how all this has changed since the year 2000. Since 2010, the bestselling author has been the inaugural Anna Quindlen Writer-in-Residence and professor of English at Barnard College of Columbia University and a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times . The author of nine

J ENNIFER F INNEY B OYLAN

filled with so much hope and joy. I love the way all the charac ters orbit around each other. Lots of goofy little touches. The character representing Mars has two daughters, Phoebe and Demi, echoing the moons of Mars, Phobos and Deimos. The character representing Jupiter has one red eye—the one repre senting Saturn wears lots of rings. And then there’s the chapter “Asteroids,” in which I visit all these tiny stories of people ad jacent to the main story—like they are busted up fragments of bigger planets. And so on. It’s a ton of fun. I originally wanted to write a trilogy—with The Constella tions as book two. But Constellations was a dud. I got lost while I was writing it, and should have worked on something else. It was a classic second book problem, although actually,

teen books, her last publication was yet another new venture, MadHoney (2022), a courtroom drama cowritten with Jodi Picoult after the two had agreed to write alternating chapters while isolated due to the pandemic. MadHoney is not only a page-turner but a vehicle to help Amer ican moms—women like my mother and her sisters, who make up much of Pi coult’s fan base—to wrap their minds around issues related to trans identity. I interviewed Boylan fifteen years ago for this magazine (May–June 2011 issue), and again this spring, via email, for this issue. Colin Carman: I did my homework and re-read The Planets , your 1991 novel

since my first book was the short story collection Remind Me to Murder You Later , Planets was number two. The third book was going to be The Galaxies —but it never happened. Someday maybe I’ll go back to it. My third novel after Constellations was Getting In . True Boylan enthusiasts will note that one of the college tour guides (it’s a novel about a family taking the col lege tour in New England) is Phoebe, the youngest daughter in Planets . So she had one little visit. Maybe I’ll stick her in an other story someday. CC: Let’s get President Trump and pol itics out of the way right off the bat: Pennsylvanians went for Trump in the

Jennifer Finney Boylan. Cover photo for Cleavage .

published under the name of James Finney Boylan. It’s set in “Centralia, Pennsylvania.” I also re-read Long Black Veil (2017), a novel set in Philadelphia. How has your relationship with your home state changed over the years? Jennifer Finney Boylan: I only know one or two old high school pals in PA now, so I hardly ever get back there anymore. Channeling my inner James Thurber, though, I can assure you that in all my dreams, the clocks that tick are the “clocks of Pennsylvania.” I miss it. Like Centralia itself (the site of The Planets ), mostly the Pennsylvania I dream about is one that only exists in memory. That was kind of you to visit The Planets —it is such a wild story! I wrote it during the first year of my marriage, and I was Colin Carman is an assistant professor of English at Colorado Mesa University. His forthcoming book is titled A Friend of Mine: Bob Dylan & Allen Ginsberg .

largest Republican margin since 1988. How do you explain their support for him and his baffling appeal to working-class Americans? JFB: I don’t know. I guess people thought that having a con victed rapist and failed businessman who is also a convicted felon would be better than having a woman of color as presi dent. [ Editor’s note: In May 2023, a jury found Trump liable for sexual abuse against advice columnist E. Jean Carroll but re jected her allegation of rape .] CC: Trump was still in campaign mode when he addressed Congress and declared that there are only two sexes, male and female. He even went so far as to showcase a female student who allegedly was injured by a trans athlete. Why has the trans sports issue become such a lightning rod? JFB: Because understanding trans stuff, and the sports ques tion in particular, takes nuance and compassion and wisdom.

TheG & LR

10