Free Les Guerilleres by Monique Wittig

intermittently lit up by the spheres and their rays, resemble great insect heads with antennae and stalked eyes.
    The women await their emissaries on their doorsteps, a smile on their lips. They have let down their hair, they have assumed the military costume that leaves the body free in its movements. Within the houses they have poured out the dishwater and scattered the dirty linen. One of them, standing in the middle of the square, rotates slowly on herself arms extended on either side of her body saying, The summer day is brilliant but more brilliant still is the fate of the young girl. Iron plunged into ice is cold but colder still is the lot of the young girl who has given herself in marriage. The young girl in the house of her mother is like seed in fertile ground. The woman under the roof of her husband is like a chained dog. The slave, rarely, tastes the delights of love, the woman never.

    RAYMONDA ATALA ENRICA
    CALAMITA AMANDA COSIMA
    GARANCE REGINA NU-TIAO
    GELSOMINA SHOGUN ALICE
    OLUMEAI GYPTIS NU-TIAO
    BENJAMINA SELENE CURACA

    They resuscitate those males who founded their celebrity on the women's downfall, exulting in their slavery whether in their writings in their laws in their actions. For these there are got ready the racks the screw-plates the machines for twisting and grinding. The women stop their ears with wax so as not to hear their discordant cries. When they have soaked them in baths of water mixed with acid, when they have drawn twisted beaten them, they treat their skins according to the usual technique of tanning or else they have them dried in the sun without especial care or else they exhibit them with labels that record the name of their former proprietors or that recall their most striking catch-phrases. It forms a subject of unending humour among them. They continually cast doubt on the attribution of a particular phrase or name to a particular skin that they judge too old for that phrase from the chronological standpoint or on the contrary too recent.
    The women say with an oath, it was by a trick that he expelled you from the earthly paradise, cringing he insinuated himself next to you, he robbed you of that passion for knowledge of which it is written that it has the wings of the eagle, the eyes of the owl, the feet of the dragon. He has enslaved you by trickery, you who were great strong valiant. He has stolen your wisdom from you, he has closed your memory to what you were, he has made of you that which is not which does not speak which does not possess which does not write, he has made of you a vile and fallen creature, he has gagged abused betrayed you. By means of stratagems he has stultified your understanding, he has woven around you a long list of defects that he declares essential to your wellbeing, to your nature. He has invented your history. But the time approaches when you shall crush the serpent under your heel, the time approaches when you can cry, erect, filled with ardour and courage, Paradise exists in the shadow of the sword.
    From pedal canoes in ambush behind the rocks the women attack the bearded strangers when they attempt a landing. They make their machines move backwards if the men abandon their intention, and hide as best they can. Relieving each other as often as is necessary not to reduce their speed of propulsion they operate their boats by means of cranks. One of these is situated at the front of the canoe, controlling backward motion, the other at the rear controls advance. A violent eddy of disturbed water from beneath the canoe comes inboard. The splashes leave white marks of salt on the bare copper-coloured breasts. They stay hidden so long as the strangers keep away from the coasts. They advance openly if the men show signs of approaching and greet them with clouds of arrows.
    They exchange pleasantries about what is usually called the choice of husband. One of them cites Gyptis who for this procedure presented a cup to the solitary Euxène. Another