Herstory
Top 10 Herstory
: Virginia Woolf, The Pillow Book, The Book of the City of Ladies, The Rape of Nanking, The Book of Margery Kempe, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, America's Women: 400 Years of Dolls, Drudges, Helpmates, and Heroines, Revelations of Divine Love, The Long Loneliness: The Autobiography of the Legendary Catholic Social Activist, Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster
| Author | Hermione Lee |
| ISBN | 0375701362 |
While Virginia Woolf--one of our century's most brilliant and mercurial writers--has had no shortage of biographers, none has seemed as naturally suited to the task as Hermione Lee. Subscribing to Virginia Woolf's own belief in the fluidity and elusiveness of identity, Lee comes at her subject from...
| Author | Sei Shōnagon |
| ISBN | 0231073372 |
"The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon" is a fascinating, detailed account of Japanese court life in the eleventh century. Written by a lady of the court at the height of Heian culture, this book enthralls with its lively gossip, witty observations, and subtle impressions.
Lady Shonagon was an erstwhile...
The Book of the City of Ladies
| Author | Christine de Pizan |
| ISBN | 0892552301 |
In dialogues with three celestial ladies, Reason, Rectitude, and Justice, Christine de Pizan (1365-ca. 1429) builds an allegorical fortified city for women using examples of the important contributions women have made to Western Civilization and arguments that prove their intellectual and moral...
| Author | Iris Chang |
| ISBN | 0140277447 |
In December 1937, the Japanese army invaded the ancient city of Nanking, systematically raping, torturing, and murdering more than 300,000 Chinese civilians.
This book tells the story from three perspectives: of the Japanese soldiers who performed it, of the Chinese civilians who endured...
The Book of Margery Kempe
| Author | Margery Kempe |
| ISBN | 0393976394 |
The Book of Margery Kempe (c. 1436-8) is the extraordinary account of a medieval wife, mother, and mystic. Known as the earliest autobiography written in the English language, Kempe's Book describes the dramatic transformation of its heroine from failed businesswoman and lustful young wife to devout...
The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism
| Author | Naomi Klein |
| ISBN | 0805079831 |
In her ground-breaking reporting from Iraq, Naomi Klein exposed how the trauma of invasion was being exploited to remake the country in the interest of foreign corporations. She called it "disaster capitalism." Covering Sri Lanka in the wake of the tsunami, and New Orleans post-Katrina, she witnessed...
America's Women: 400 Years of Dolls, Drudges, Helpmates, and Heroines
| Author | Gail Collins |
| ISBN | 0061227226 |
A landmark work of history telling the story of more than four centuries of history featuring a stunning array of personalities.
America's Women tells the story of more than four centuries of history. It features a stunning array of personalities, from the women peering worriedly over the...
Revelations of Divine Love
| Author | Julian of Norwich |
| ISBN | 0140446737 |
One of the first woman authors, Julian of Norwich produced in Revelations of Divine Love a remarkable work of revelatory insight, that stands alongside The Cloud of Unknowing and Piers Plowman as a classic of Medieval religious literature
After fervently praying for a greater understanding...
The Long Loneliness: The Autobiography of the Legendary Catholic Social Activist
| Author | Dorothy Day |
| ISBN | 0060617519 |
This inspiring and fascinating memoir, subtitled, “The Autobiography of the Legendary Catholic Social Activist,” The Long Loneliness is the late Dorothy Day’s compelling autobiographical testament to her life of social activism and her spiritual pilgrimage. A founder of the Catholic...
Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster
| Author | Svetlana Alexievich |
| ISBN | 0312425848 |
Winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature
On April 26, 1986, the worst nuclear reactor accident in history occurred in Chernobyl and contaminated as much as three quarters of Europe. Voices from Chernobyl is the first book to present personal accounts of the tragedy. Journalist Svetlana Alexievich...
| Author | Hồ Xuân Hương |
| ISBN | 1556591489 |
Hồ Xuân Hương — whose name translates as "Spring Essence" — is one of the most important and popular poets in Vietnam. A concubine, she became renowned for her poetic skills, writing subtly risqué poems which used double entendre and sexual innuendo as a vehicle for social, religious, and...
""It is such fun out here, and of course I'm loving every minute of it"... tell them that all the ideals and beliefs you ever had have crashed about your gun-deafened ears... and they will reply on pale mauve deckle-edged paper calling you a silly hysterical little girl."
These are the thoughts...
| Author | Lady Hyegyeong |
| ISBN | 0520200551 |
Lady Hyegyong's memoirs, which recount the chilling murder of her husband by his father, is one of the best known and most popular classics of Korean literature. From 1795 until 1805 Lady Hyegyong composed this masterpiece, which depicts a court life whose drama and pathos is of Shakespearean proportions....
When and Where I Enter: The Impact of Black Women on Race and Sex in America
| Author | Paula J. Giddings |
| ISBN | 0688146503 |
When and Where I Enter is an eloquent testimonial to the profound influence of African-American women on race and women's movements throughout American history. Drawing on speeches, diaries, letters, and other original documents, Paula Giddings powerfully portrays how black women have transcended...
| Author | Gerda Lerner |
| ISBN | 0195090608 |
A pioneer in women's studies and long-term activist for women's issues, and a past president of the Organization of American Historians, Gerda Lerner is one of the founders and foremost scholars of Women's History. The Creation of Patriarchy, the first book in her two-volume Women and History Series...
Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body and Primitive Accumulation
| Author | Silvia Federici |
| ISBN | 1570270597 |
Caliban and the Witch is a history of the body in the transition to capitalism. Moving from the peasant revolts of the late Middle Ages to the witch-hunts and the rise of mechanical philosophy, Federici investigates the capitalist rationalization of social reproduction. She shows how the battle against...
| Author | Hildegard of Bingen |
| ISBN | 0140436049 |
Benedictine nun, poet and musician, Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1179) was one of the most remarkable figures of the Middle Ages. She undertook preaching tours throughout the German empire at the age of sixty, and was consulted not only by her religious contemporaries but also by kings and emperors,...
The Body Project: An Intimate History of American Girls
| Author | Joan Jacobs Brumberg |
| ISBN | 0679735291 |
"Timely and sympathetic . . . a work of impassioned advocacy." --People
A hundred years ago, women were lacing themselves into corsets and teaching their daughters to do the same. The ideal of the day, however, was inner beauty: a focus on good deeds and a pure heart. Today...
A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812
| Author | Laurel Thatcher Ulrich |
| ISBN | 0679733760 |
I read this book 15 years ago shortly after it won the Pulitzer, and it was amazing then, and I was equally impressed this time. In fact I was surprised as I read how much of it I could remember reading even that many years ago, so it must have made a deep impression.
I'm just in awe if LTU, the depth and...
| Author | Margot Lee Shetterly |
| ISBN | 0062363603 |
The #1 New York Times Bestseller. Set amid the civil rights movement, the never-before-told true story of NASA’s African-American female mathematicians who played a crucial role in America’s space program. Before Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, a group of professionals worked as ‘Human...
At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape, and Resistance--A New History of the Civil Rights Movement from Rosa Parks to the Rise of Black Power
| Author | Danielle L. McGuire |
Groundbreaking, controversial, and courageous, here is the story of Rosa Parks and Recy Taylor—a story that reinterprets the history of America's civil rights movement in terms of the sexual violence committed against black women by white men.
Rosa Parks was often described as a sweet...
| Author | Fanny Burney |
| ISBN | 0140436243 |
Novelist and playwright Frances (Fanny) Burney, 1752-1840, was also a prolific writer of journals and letters, beginning with the diary she started at fifteen and continuing until the end of her eventful life. From her youth in London high society to a period in the court of Queen Charlotte and her years...
| Author | Marie de France |
| ISBN | 0140447598 |
This is a prose translation of the lais or poems attributed to Marie de France. Little is known of her but she was probably the Abbess of the abbey at Shaftesbury in the late 12th century, illegitimate daughter of Geoffrey Plantagenet and hence the half-sister of Henry II of England. It was to a king, and...
| Author | Kimberly Springer |
| ISBN | 0822334933 |
The first in-depth analysis of the black feminist movement, Living for the Revolution fills in a crucial but overlooked chapter in African American, women’s, and social movement history. Through original oral history interviews with key activists and analysis of previously unexamined organizational...
Too Heavy a Load: Black Women in Defense of Themselves, 1894-1994
Too Heavy a Load celebrates this century's rich history of black women defending themselves, from Ida B. Wells to Anita Hill. Although most prominently a history of the century-long struggle against racism and male chauvinism, Deborah Gray White also movingly illuminates black women's painful...
Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter
| Author | Kate Clifford Larson |
| ISBN | 0547250258 |
They were the most prominent American family of the twentieth century. The daughter they secreted away made all the difference.
Joe and Rose Kennedy’s strikingly beautiful daughter Rosemary attended exclusive schools, was presented as a debutante to the Queen of England, and traveled...
| Author | Mikiso Hane |
| ISBN | 0520084217 |
In this book, for the first time, we can hear the startling, moving voices of adventurous and rebellious Japanese women as they eloquently challenged the social repression of prewar Japan. The extraordinary women whose memoirs, recollections, and essays are presented here constitute a strong current...
| Author | Shelley Emling |
| ISBN | 0230611567 |
Mary Anning was only twelve years old when, in 1811, she discovered the first dinosaur skeleton--of an ichthyosaur--while fossil hunting on the cliffs of Lyme Regis, England. Until Mary's incredible discovery, it was widely believed that animals did not become extinct. The child of a poor family,...
On the morning of October 31, 1984, as she walked through her garden, smiling, with hands raised and palms pressed together in the traditional Indian namaste greeting, Indira Nehru Gandhi was assassinated by her own bodyguards. She died as she had lived, surrounded by men, yet isolated. It was a violent...
Women's Work: The First 20,000 Years: Women, Cloth, and Society in Early Times
| Author | Elizabeth Wayland Barber |
| ISBN | 0393313484 |
New discoveries about the textile arts reveal women's unexpectedly influential role in ancient societies.Twenty thousand years ago, women were making and wearing the first clothing created from spun fibers. In fact, right up to the Industrial Revolution the fiber arts were an enormous economic...
Freedom's Daughters: The Unsung Heroines of the Civil Rights Movement from 1830 to 1970
| Author | Lynne Olson |
| ISBN | 0684850133 |
THE FIRST COMPREHENSIVE HISTORY OF THE VITAL ROLE
WOMEN -- BOTH BLACK AND WHITE -- PLAYED
IN THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT
In this groundbreaking and absorbing book, credit finally goes where credit is due -- to the bold women who were crucial to the success of the civil rights movement. From...
A Jury of Her Peers: American Women Writers from Anne Bradstreet to Annie Proulx
| Author | Elaine Showalter |
| ISBN | 1400041236 |
A Jury of Her Peers is an unprecedented literary landmark: the first comprehensive history of American women writers from 1650 to 2000.
In a narrative of immense scope and fascination—brimming with Elaine Showalter’s characteristic wit and incisive opinions—we are introduced...
| Author | Sharon Rudahl |
| ISBN | 1595580646 |
The anarchist and radical hero Emma Goldman, brought to vivid life in a graphic biography by an acclaimed artist.
"You are a terrible child and will grow into a worse woman! You have no respect for your elders or for authority! You will surely end on the gallows as a public menace!"—Emma Goldman's...
The Origin of Satan: How Christians Demonized Jews, Pagans and Heretics
| Author | Elaine Pagels |
| ISBN | 0679731180 |
From the religious historian whose The Gnostic Gospels won both the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award comes a dramatic interpretation of Satan and his role on the Christian tradition. With magisterial learning and the elan of a born storyteller, Pagels turns Satan's story...
Surpassing the Love of Men: Romantic Friendship and Love Between Women from the Renaissance to the Present
| Author | Lillian Faderman |
| ISBN | 0688133304 |
I found this book wholly fascinating and compelling, yet sad. It tells the story of love between women and how perceptions and prejudices have shaped it across the centuries. As it was first published in 1981, the subtitle is no longer accurate. The lesbian-feminist movement of the 1970s is the last...
Charity and Sylvia: A Same-Sex Marriage in Early America
| Author | Rachel Hope Cleves |
| ISBN | 0199335427 |
Conventional wisdom holds that same-sex marriage is a purely modern innovation, a concept born of an overtly modern lifestyle that was unheard of in nineteenth century America. But as Rachel Hope Cleves demonstrates in this eye-opening book, same-sex marriage is hardly new.
Born in 1777,...
From Eve to Dawn: A History of Women in the World, Vol. 1
| Author | Marilyn French |
| ISBN | 1558615652 |
Origins is the first of four volumes of a momental, readable, and unprecedented history of women throughout the world. The internationally celebrated author of The Women's Room, Marilyn French, spent over fifteen years with a team of researchers and prominent historians examining women's lives...
Seneca Falls and the Origins of the Women's Rights Movement
| Author | Sally G. McMillen |
| ISBN | 0195182650 |
In a quiet town of Seneca Falls, New York, over the course of two days in July, 1848, a small group of women and men, led by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott, held a convention that would launch the woman's rights movement and change the course of history. The implications of that remarkable convention...
| Author | Lady Nijō |
| ISBN | 0804709300 |
In about 1307 a remarkable woman in Japan sat down to complete the story of her life. The result was an autobiographical narrative, a tale of thirty-six years (1271-1306) in the life of Lady Nijo, starting when she became the concubine of a retired emperor in Kyoto at the age of fourteen and ending, several...
| Author | Kim Todd |
| ISBN | 0151011087 |
Before Darwin, before Audubon, there was Merian. An artist turned naturalist known for her botanical illustrations, she was born just sixteen years after Galileo proclaimed that the earth orbited the sun. But at the age of fifty she sailed from Europe to the New World on a solo scientific expedition...
| Author | Adrienne Mayor |
| ISBN | 0691147205 |
Amazons--fierce warrior women dwelling on the fringes of the known world--were the mythic archenemies of the ancient Greeks. Heracles and Achilles displayed their valor in duels with Amazon queens, and the Athenians reveled in their victory over a powerful Amazon army. In historical times, Cyrus...
In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens: Womanist Prose
| Author | Alice Walker |
| ISBN | 0156028646 |
In this, her first collection of nonfiction, Alice Walker speaks out as a black woman, writer, mother, and feminist in thirty-six pieces ranging from the personal to the political. Among the contents are essays about other writers, accounts of the civil rights movement of the 1960s and the antinuclear...
Nine Parts of Desire: The Hidden World of Islamic Women
| Author | Geraldine Brooks |
| ISBN | 0385475772 |
With a New Afterword
As a prizewinning foreign correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, Geraldine Brooks spent six years covering the Middle East through wars, insurrections, and the volcanic upheaval of resurgent fundamentalism. Yet for her, headline events were only the backdrop...
| Author | Barbara Hodgson |
| ISBN | 1580084419 |
While it's a noticeable improvement over my last attempt at reading a book about female travelers, No Place for a Lady still wasn't what I was hoping for.
My main disappointment was the book's superficial feel. Some of that likely has to do with its location-based organization, which turns...
| Author | Merlin Stone |
| ISBN | 0880295333 |
It's definitely written in a way that is accessible to pretty much anyone, and should be part of your education in that it remains a perspective that people hold on to. But most academics - feminist archaeologists, Classicists and historians included - agree that the majority of the evidence cited doesn't...
