Frustrated by the patriarchal, heteronormative, gendered conventions of Valentine’s Day? This year, celebrate V-Day in feminist fashion, without becoming a slave to commercialism. Here are a few ideas for a very feminist Valentine’s Day: 1) Scrap the manufactured “holiday” altogether. Celebrate V-Day instead. Contrary to popular usage, the “V” in V-Day is not just a […]
Virginia Woolf
Virginia Woolf was a literary pioneer who wrote about how the female experience is shaped by misogyny and male perceptions.
Was Mary Sidney Really William Shakespeare?
Does the name Mary Sidney ring a bell? No, I thought not. According to Tudor Place, she was born into the aristocracy in 1561; was “carefully educated, acquiring a knowledge of Latin, Greek, and Hebrew;” became a member of Queen Elizabeth’s Royal Household in 1575; lost her mother, father and brother (Sir Philip Sidney) in […]
10 Women Who Would Have Ruled the Blogosphere
Centuries before Al Gore “invented the Internet” and we began blogging in droves, women were recording the details of their lives in journals, letters, memoirs and newspaper columns. From complaining about their husbands and lamenting their infertility to speaking out for social justice and building community where little existed, these proto-bloggers told it like it […]
Ms. Readers’ 100 Best Non-Fiction Books of All Time: The Top 10 and the Complete List!
Scholar, activist, provocateur, teacher, community-builder, inspiration: No one word can span the career of bell hooks or capture how much we love her work. According to Ms. readers’ selections of the best feminist non-fiction of all time, she’s your favorite writer, with three books in our top ten–including number one–and a total of seven books […]
The Makings of the Modern Heroine: Truong’s Bitter in the Mouth
Like so many outsiders, Linda(mint) Hammerick is a synesthete. Unlike Vladimir Nabokov, who, as Linda discovers, saw color in letters and sounds, or Wassily Kadinsky, whose paintings evoke the colors he heard in music, Linda tastes words as she hears and speaks. Linda is the heroine of Bitter in the Mouth, the new novel by […]