"I Should Have Done Target Practice": Why Valerie Solanas Missed

Abstract

Through performative writing, this article seeks to tell the story of Valerie Solanas. Solanas, the woman most notoriously known as the shooter of Andy Warhol, has had little media exposure that does not frame her outside of the violent female assassin trope. (Auto)ethnographic writing, coupled with theoretical interludes via footnotes, works to retell Solanas’ story. In this way this article is telling three stories: the main narrative of Solanas, the footnoted theoretical narrative, and the author’s relationship to Solanas.