This summer, the Bar Harbor Historical Society is sponsoring a series of dramatic readings with local actors, presenting the secret lives of four Maine writers through an exploration of their own writings about their same-sex relationships, including letters, poems, and memoirs. The readings celebrate Maine history and culture, and broaden our understanding of some of our most famous authors.

In her sixties, poet and memoirist May Sarton moved to York, Maine, where she lived out her last two decades and wrote eight journals about her life. One of the first mainstream authors to be publicly “out” as a lesbian, Sarton was embraced by a rising women’s movement celebrating the significance of women’s personal writings. In the final decades of her life, Sarton looked back on her first love, and continued to celebrate the expressions of love between old women.