[Mad Dawg]

I haven’t read word one (not counting this bit) of Sappho. I have something to which to look forward, uh... to, um. which.

[AnAmericanMother]

Well, the poor lady has been maligned as a poster child for the lesbian feminists . . . when actually very little is known about her life. She was already ancient history when the Greeks started making up comic stuff about her in the 5th century B.C., and then the Victorians had a shot at biography, and then the 20th c. feminists . . .

I ignore all that stuff - we just don't KNOW if she was a lesbian, or married, or even for sure who her father was. So I think the best thing to do is read the actual fragments we have left, and resist the temptation to speculate on her biography (or to add on to the poems).

An excellent (and very fair-minded) overview is here: The Divine Sappho.