Everything you've always wanted to know about women's history but were afraid to ask, illuminated in this lively and contentious collection of essays.

Have lesbians been expunged from history by academics and biographers who wish to deny their existence? The authors of Not a Passing Phase certainly believe so. Here they redress the balance.

Re-examining the passionate friendships of writers such as Charlotte Bronte, George Eliot, Edith Simcox, Vera Brittain and Winifred Holtby; uncovering invisible networks between women; and exploring the fate of lesbians within the professions, they offer new insights into a range of literary and historical movements, and present a new and political approach to historical research.

The Lesbian History Group has provided a forum for feminist scholars since 1984. Contributors to this volume include Rosemary Auchmuty, author of A World of Girls (1992), Alison Oram, and Sheila Jeffreys, writer of The Spinster and Her Enemies (1985), Anticlimax (1990) and The Lesbian Heresy (1994).