A Lady Without a Latitude

The leaden Lady Without a Latitude (the title has to do with the author's Southern roots being too close to the Mason Dixon line to count, or something like that) sinks like a stone or -since Phelps is interested in defining all types of ladies-a lady with a stone tied to her ankle. Phelps writes of anything and everything: character, academe, her suppository-loving grandmother, her evil uncles (Unc I and Unc II), cartoons. Her humor runs from vaudevillian to just plain unfunny: ""`Physicists announced today that they had found the top quark-an ephemeral building block of matter that probably holds clues to some of the ultimate riddles of existence.' And thus, we will finally find those missing socks."" The author on business: ""In the business world, individuals must reduce their entire lives to one or at most two pages, known as the resume (French. Meaning, a summary of one's experience.) This standard applies to all business professionals from the boardroom to the bathroom (Differences between activities occurring in either are yet to be established.)"" Phelps is a visiting fellow at Yale and a performer of one-woman shows. Maybe you just had to be there. (Feb.)