I hear that there is a backlash on Tik Tok and a regressive view that women should go back to baby rearing and keeping the house is increasingly popular.
In literature however, the spurned, oppressed female has caught the attention of writers and readers alike.
I allude to 3 recent books.
1. How to say Babylon, a memoir by Safiya Sinclair, 37 INK, Simon & Schuster, N.Y. 2023 (book in 4 parts, 29 chapters, 352 pages)
2. Prize women by Caroline Lea, Penguin Random House, U.K. 2023 (book in 3 parts, 45 chapters, 322 pages)
3. Lessons in chemistry by Bonnie Garmus, Penguin 2022 (45 chapters, 400 words)
The last one is wildly popular today and has been converted into a popular TV series along with translations in 42 languages. The other two have been critically acclaimed.
All have suppression of women as their leit motif. Their popularity means that the audience is into the message of different shades of this suppression.
Read my next post for a short description of each book. Do read them.
6 comments:
Being a Canadian, and and an avid reader I am embarrassed I have not heard of the book Prize Money which is a Canadian story. I have written it down to search my library for a copy. I will also search for Babylon. But I did just finish reading Lessons In Chemistry. The protagonist, Elizabeth Zott changes the lives of those who begin to watch her TV cooking show. She treats the audience members seriously. She also refuses to wear the provacative clothes given to her by the studio. She is scientist, and she elevates the art of cooking by explaining the chemical reactions that happen when adds heat, or specific ingredients to the food. In one episode an audience member, a mother of four, asks a question and confesses she wanted to be a doctor, and Ms. Zott encourages her to follow that path. Later in the book we find out this person has begun Medical school.and the audience cheers. The show becomes a catalyst for change to the women who watch her show, and challenges the narrow view of what women can and should do in the USA in the 1950s. Throughout the book, men do not take her seriously and in some cases hinder her studies or research by trying to sexually abuse her. They don't believe a woman can be scientist. She charts a lonely course. With her frank, no nonsense approach to life, she also provokes some very funny situations. It is an entertaining read.
Sorry the book Prize Women, not Prize Money
Yes, that is why Lessons in Chemistry is uplifting.
??
Ah! Leslie wrote Prize money by mistake.
Bonnie Garmus who wrote Lessons in chemistry, worked as a technical writer in an IT company. She had to put up with all the discrimination she mentions in her novel. She had prepared a presentation for a group meeting. There were no comments and it was ignored. Then a male colleague made the same presentation without any credit to her and people went ga-ga over it. That was when she quit the job and took up writing.!!
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