Seeking Sisterhood

Anne Lister and the Ladies of Llangollen

In 1822, Anne Lister, an unmarried thirty-one year old woman wrote in her diary, speculating on the relationship status of two celebrities she had just visited.

I cannot help thinking that surely it was not platonic. It excited in me a sort of peculiar interest tinged with melancholy.

Anne Lister had visited Eleanor Butler and Sarah Ponsonby, known as The Ladies of Llangollen.

Hil and I attended the 2023 Anne Lister Birthday Weekend in Halifax and later made this short film about Anne Lister and a visit she made to the "Ladies of Llangollen." During that year’s festival, costumes from the BBC/HBO series Gentleman Jack were on display at Plas Newdd, their home.

I wrote an essay these early 19th-century women-who-loved-women. Hil and I adapted the essay into this film, using the footage and photos from our iPhones.