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emily2348's reviews
243 reviews
Excellent Women by Barbara Pym
3.0
great cover boring book, need mildred to grow a backbone stat and get away from those useless men
Cut: One Woman's Fight Against FGM in Britain Today by Hibo Wardere
4.0
amazing book on a problem that needs to be talked about more especially in the feminist community!
Heartbreak: The Political Memoir of a Feminist Militant by Andrea Dworkin
5.0
andrea dworkin’s books changed my life, i don’t think any other author will live up to the emotions that she has made me feel. this memoir is so deeply beautiful as not only an insight into her life but also into what it truly means to be a radical feminist. i will continue to think about her all the time.
“Sitting with Ricki, talking with Ricki, I made a vow to her: that I would use everything I knew, including from prostitution, to make the women's movement stronger and better; that I'd give my life to the movement and for the movement. I promised to be honor-bound to the well-being of women, to do anything necessary for that well-being. I promised to live and to die if need be for women. I made that vow some thirty years ago, and I have not betrayed it yet.”
“Sitting with Ricki, talking with Ricki, I made a vow to her: that I would use everything I knew, including from prostitution, to make the women's movement stronger and better; that I'd give my life to the movement and for the movement. I promised to be honor-bound to the well-being of women, to do anything necessary for that well-being. I promised to live and to die if need be for women. I made that vow some thirty years ago, and I have not betrayed it yet.”
The Creation of Patriarchy by Gerda Lerner
5.0
i put it down for a while because it was hurting my brain, but finally picked it back up and oh my god?? that was so well-written and researched! i think this should be in like the top 10 most essential feminist reads. The analysis on the book on genesis was especially outstanding, has me deeply thinking about what i was taught when i was younger.
“To step outside patriarchal thought means: Being skeptical toward every known system of thought; being critical of all assumptions, ordering values and definitions. Testing one's statement by trusting our own, the female experience. Since such experience has usually been trivialized or ignored, it means overcoming the deep-seated resistance within ourselves toward accepting ourselves and our knowledge as valid. It means getting rid of the great men in our heads and substituting for them ourselves, our sisters, our anonymous foremothers. Being critical toward our own thought, which is, after all, thought trained in the patriarchal tradition. Finally, it means developing intellectual courage, the courage to stand alone, the courage to reach farther than our grasp, the courage to risk failure. Perhaps the greatest challenge to thinking women is the challenge to move from the desire for safety and approval to the most "unfeminine" quality of all—that of intellectual arrogance, the supreme hubris which asserts to itself the right to reorder the world. The hubris of the god-makers, the hubris of the male system-builders.”
“To step outside patriarchal thought means: Being skeptical toward every known system of thought; being critical of all assumptions, ordering values and definitions. Testing one's statement by trusting our own, the female experience. Since such experience has usually been trivialized or ignored, it means overcoming the deep-seated resistance within ourselves toward accepting ourselves and our knowledge as valid. It means getting rid of the great men in our heads and substituting for them ourselves, our sisters, our anonymous foremothers. Being critical toward our own thought, which is, after all, thought trained in the patriarchal tradition. Finally, it means developing intellectual courage, the courage to stand alone, the courage to reach farther than our grasp, the courage to risk failure. Perhaps the greatest challenge to thinking women is the challenge to move from the desire for safety and approval to the most "unfeminine" quality of all—that of intellectual arrogance, the supreme hubris which asserts to itself the right to reorder the world. The hubris of the god-makers, the hubris of the male system-builders.”
Woman Hating by Andrea Dworkin
3.0
the last chapter really let this book down and i will continue to ignore it’s existence because it actually repulsed me, i liked the rest of it though i do prefer her later works that have more structure.
Silenced Women: Why The Law Fails Women and How to Fight Back by Jennifer Robinson, Keina Yoshida
4.0
amazingly written book on how the law continues to allow abusive males to re-traumatise their victims, the chapters on amber heard were so emotionally impacting especially as it’s from the perspective of amber’s uk lawyer. i will always stand with amber heard. highly recommend!
“But what troubled me was that it didn't seem to matter. It didn't seem to matter that Depp had lost the case. It didn't seem to matter, to many at least, that the British courts had found him to be a wife-beater. The vile, misogynistic and violent language that Depp had used about the women in his life-which was on display in court and reported in the media for all to see— didn't seem to matter either. It was Amber who continued to face suspicion and online attacks and abuse. The online noise attacking her drowned out the fact that a judge had ruled she was a survivor-and that Depp had been violent towards her. What consequences were there for Depp?”
“But what troubled me was that it didn't seem to matter. It didn't seem to matter that Depp had lost the case. It didn't seem to matter, to many at least, that the British courts had found him to be a wife-beater. The vile, misogynistic and violent language that Depp had used about the women in his life-which was on display in court and reported in the media for all to see— didn't seem to matter either. It was Amber who continued to face suspicion and online attacks and abuse. The online noise attacking her drowned out the fact that a judge had ruled she was a survivor-and that Depp had been violent towards her. What consequences were there for Depp?”
Pornography: Men Possessing Women by Andrea Dworkin
5.0
never has descriptions of something in a book made me feel this physically sick, a must-read for any woman who still thinks porn can be “feminist”
Dracula by Bram Stoker
2.0
so boring oh my god, alot of unnecessary waffle this did not help my distain of male authors
On Women by Susan Sontag
3.5
mixed thoughts on this while i think Sontag is one of the smartest people i have read i really don't agree on some of her feminist stances and one of her comments on lesbianism rubbed me the wrong way, i think it is definitely worth reading "The Third World of Women" and "The Double Standard of Aging", will definitely get my hands on another of her books at some point though!
“The domination of men over women is to the advantage of men; the liberation of women will be at the expense of male privilege. Perhaps afterward, in some happy sense, men will be liberated too- liberated from the tiresome obligation to be "masculine”. But allowing oppressors to lay down their psychological burdens is quite another, secondary sense of liberation. The first priority is to liberate the oppressed. Never before in history have the claims of oppressed and oppressors turned out to be, on inspection, quite harmonious. It will not be true this time either”
“The domination of men over women is to the advantage of men; the liberation of women will be at the expense of male privilege. Perhaps afterward, in some happy sense, men will be liberated too- liberated from the tiresome obligation to be "masculine”. But allowing oppressors to lay down their psychological burdens is quite another, secondary sense of liberation. The first priority is to liberate the oppressed. Never before in history have the claims of oppressed and oppressors turned out to be, on inspection, quite harmonious. It will not be true this time either”
Women and Madness by Phyllis Chesler
3.5
more academic than i thought it would be and i mean you can definitely tell it was written in the 70s but i loved the chapter past, present and future, the interviews were good too.