Jennifer Finney
Boylan never set out to be a public face for transgender
people.
But the novelist
and English professor at Colby College was thrust into
that role by her 2002 best-selling memoir about the
transition to womanhood that freed her from the
decades-long torment of being a female trapped in a
male body.
With three
appearances on The Oprah Winfrey Show, two on
Larry King Live, and numerous other
interviews and public appearances, Boylan, 49, has
become a sunny-faced activist for transgender citizens
and one of the most widely recognized transsexuals of recent
years.
''Activism for me
takes the form of living a normal life and doing so
very publicly,'' she said.
Boylan's public
schedule is getting busier with this year's publication
of her second memoir, I'm Looking Through You, a
poignant but laugh-out-loud story about growing up in
a Charles Addams-like Victorian mansion on
Philadelphia's Main Line.
The author, then
named James, concealed her conflicted sexuality, hiding
her stash of lingerie in a secret panel in her bedroom. The
spooky old house, with footsteps in the attic, clouds
of blue mist, and a ghostlike figure of an old woman
in a mirror, serves as backdrop for an adolescence
haunted by gender issues that forced Boylan to keep the
nature of her true self hidden. In so doing, she
became something of a ghost herself.
''As I wrote the
book, it became clear to me that the Scooby Doo ghosts,
as I call them, were less interesting than the metaphorical
ghosts,'' she said. ''While not everybody believes in
ghosts, everybody knows what it means to be haunted.''
The inner turmoil
about which she wrote is now ancient history for
Boylan, who detailed her 2000 sex change in the earlier
memoir, She's Not There. Today, she lives with her
spouse, Deedie, their two boys, and two Labrador retrievers
within a mile of the lake on which Henry Fonda and
Katharine Hepburn starred in the 1982 Academy
Award-winning film On Golden Pond.
James Boylan had
met Deedie (named Grace in the two books) while in
college and only told her of his secret about a decade ago,
well after they were married. Boylan had hoped that
their love would be enough to keep the gender demons
at bay. They remain legally married.
Boylan said she
didn't go public with her life story to become a role
model or a poster child for the transgender community, but
rather because writing and storytelling is what she
does.
''A lot of good
is done simply by being public, by being visible and by
telling stories so people can see that a life like mine, a
family like mine is familiar and it's normal, and that
it's a lot less extraordinary than it seems,'' she
said.
She hopes her
story will help to reshape the public's image of
transsexuals.
''We think of
transgendered people as living in a big locked house
somewhere. They never show their faces, or when they do show
their faces they seem tortured and unknowable,'' she
said. ''When people see me and they see my family,
they see something that's familiar.''
Now in the midst
of a yearlong sabbatical, Boylan juggles her writing and
family chores (she's both a soccer mom and a tuba mom) with
appearances in support of her latest book and on
transgender issues. She's also writing occasional
op-ed pieces for The New York Times, which
focus largely on the political campaign and do not
mention that she's transgender.
Besides book
tours, she speaks at colleges, corporate events, and law
firms. Although she's not comfortable in a lobbying role,
Boylan addressed the National Press Club last spring
in support of legislation to bar discrimination
against transgender people.
Boylan has been a
valuable asset in helping to change public attitudes,
said Mara Keisling, executive director of the National
Center for Transgender Equality.
''Her sense of
humor, her wit, are really an important part of the
education she does. She has a communication style that's
accessible to a lot of people,'' Keisling said.
Boylan, tall with
strawberry-blond hair that flows to the middle of her
back, remains equivocal about offering her private life for
everyone to see. But because she had a hard time
finding role models while growing up, she said it's
probably good to have someone recognizable to look to.
There are many
ways of dealing with gender variance, she said, and her
story is not the only one that deserves to be told.
''There are
plenty of people who have, one way or another, gotten on
with their lives and live lives of fulfillment and
happiness,'' she said.
Although such
positive outcomes are not always the case, some employers,
such as Boylan's, are increasingly showing more compassion
and understanding. The overall society, too, seems to
be showing more awareness of transgender issues, she
said. (Jerry Harkavy, AP)
