If you think it hasn't been a struggle for the female half of our race to get and keep equal rights in this country, even in the last few decades, this book will make you think again. It will make your guts churn with anger and frustration, but it will also make you proud of the fight women have got in them. In US.
ML:
ML:
Interview with Michele Landsberg
What central issues do you see facing Canadian feminists today?
ML:
The central issue facing women today is that we are still excluded from and underrepresented in every sphere of real power (banks, government, etc) and thus our vital concerns are ignored or trampled on, for example — high quality, universally accessible child care; universal access to reproductive choice; prompt and effective remedies for harassment, battering and other forms of violence directed at women.
I would say that the most grievous injustices are inflicted on aboriginal women and girls, and immigrant and refugee women. The poverty and harms they face are sickening and a disgrace to our democracy.
In your opinion, what news outlets (large or small) in Canada today provide valuable and vital points of view for readers concerned about social justice?
ML:
Among the news outlets that still care about social justice and provide the lively analysis and research one needs are: The Monitor, from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives; Briarpatch; StraightGoods.ca, Herizons Magazine (one of the last feminist magazines in the country), Shameless, Rabble.ca.
Of course, the Star and the Globe and Mail occasionally do eye-opening investigations into issues of the public interest, and these are invaluable.
Michele's response to those who say that feminism is dead:
“Feminism dead? They said that from the beginning, and they were always wrong: Feminism is a passion for justice and equality, and that cannot die.”
Excerpts from the book:
"Nietzsche wrote, 'All truly great thoughts are conceived while walking,' and his observation is backed up by science; exercise-induced brain chemicals help people think clearly.
In fact, just stepping outside clarifies thinking and improves energy.
Even five minutes of daylight stimulates production of serotonin and dopamine — brain chemicals that improve mood.
'It is by studying little things,' wrote Samuel Johnson, 'that we attain the great art of having as little misery, and as much happiness as possible.'
"Both men and women find relationships with women to be more intimate and enjoyable than those with men. Women have more feelings of empathy for other people than men do (though women and men have about the same degree of empathy for animals, whatever that means). In fact, for both men and women, the most reliable predictor of not being lonely is the amount of contact with women. Time spent with men doesn't make a difference. Men and women both turn to women for understanding."
Found a review for you: click here.
This is a collection of Gloria Steinem's essays over the years. Her sensible and comprehensive outlook is always inspiring, and people who believe in equality of the sexes still need inspiration.
She talks about the first meetings among women who thought they were alone in feeling disenfranchised and unsatisfied with their limited choices in life, only to discover that women from all walks of life felt the same way and could join together in sisterhood and help each other.
Her infamous article about going undercover as a Playboy Bunny is here, too. Nothing glamorous about that job, that's for sure, much as the Hefnerites worked to make young women believe there was, in order to get them to work long hard hours in high heels for low pay.
Steinem was interviewed on CBC's national morning program, Q, and said (my poor paraphrase), "It's not hard to be criticized by those who like or agree with you. What's hard is to be criticized by those who are on the same side."
Aunt Reta recommended this one, a collection of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's letters published only recently, when his family finally decided to release all his personal correspondence. The author of the Sherlock Holmes detective stories was a letter writer from early boyhood, and wrote faithfully to his beloved mother as well as cared for and admired her all his life. He'd grown up poor, with an alcoholic father, and his mother had managed to raise her children virtually alone; it was a struggle. He was a doctor by training and later in life became an outspoken spiritualist.Here you can see Arthur Conan Doyle reading one of his letters to his mom, whom he always addressed as "Mam."
The late actor David Niven knew everyone in Hollywood's heyday. At least that's how it sounds in this collection of stories about the movie stars of the era ... Errol Flynn, Marilyn Monroe, Clark Gable, and so on. Los Angeles was party central to actors and screenwriters and moguls, and Niven was a goodtime friend to many. His earlier book, The Moon's a Balloon, was written in an equally witty and goodhumoured tone, well worth the read.
The following books have gone back to the library, where I get most of my books, as I can't afford to buy them and don't have a place to keep them all if I did. And it would really piss me off to spend 20 or 30 bucks for a book, only to get it home and learn that I didn't want to read past the first chapter. Thank god for libraries:
About 100 pages in I considered ditching The Birth House, because to be honest I didn't "buy" any of the characters, but being endlessly curious about methods of helping women give birth without medical interventions, and about herbal concoctions and kitchen witchery, I soldiered through.
A few interesting tidbits:
Moss from a good woman's grave will bring you luck.
The maid who dances barefoot with the marigold will know the language of the birds.
Headache: Walk backwards half a mile, slow as a snail.
Flax: make tea with seeds, lemon and honey, for coughs and sore throats.
Feverfew: make tea with the leaves; good for a lady who frets.
Bay: write your wishes on leaves of bay, then burn them and your wishes come true the same day.
Borage: seeds and leaves cure a broken heart.
Moss from a good woman's grave will bring you luck.
The maid who dances barefoot with the marigold will know the language of the birds.
Headache: Walk backwards half a mile, slow as a snail.
Flax: make tea with seeds, lemon and honey, for coughs and sore throats.
Feverfew: make tea with the leaves; good for a lady who frets.
Bay: write your wishes on leaves of bay, then burn them and your wishes come true the same day.
Borage: seeds and leaves cure a broken heart.
Here's a review I found online; click here:
http://reidsreadings.blogspot.com/2011/02/birth-house-by-ami-mckay.htmlThe book's author has her own website and she's posted some interesting stuff in support of her next book, The Virgin Cure. Click here to check it out.
I've finished Uncrowned King; The Life of Prince Albert. Apparently the German-born husband of Britain's Queen Victoria was worth his weight in gold. He was forward-thinking, politically moderate, organized, efficient, dedicated, kind, loving, creative, well educated and highly intelligent. He practically ran the English monarchy's show singlehandedly, but didn't get much credit for it; because of anti-German sentiment in the country, he was always considered a foreigner and had to do much of his work behind the scenes. He wrote most all of Queen Victoria's business letters, drafts and memorandums for government, and she re-wrote them in her own hand, or signed them. He was her advisor and her rock.
Though we think of Queen Victoria as having gone considerably overboard in her mourning for her dead husband — wearing black for the 40 years she outlived him; keeping his rooms as they were when he was alive, fresh daily linens and all; and so on — her actions were apparently common to the bereaved of the day, the main difference being that she could afford to mourn in dramatic style, while average folk could not.
From the biography:
‘Love’ for the God of clerical sermons, he told Victoria, who later (7 Feb 1862) told Vicky, was ‘most preposterous.’ For him ‘the love for God was quite of a different kind — it was the trust and confidence in and adoration of a great, incomprehensible spirit.’
For a humorously skewed perspective, check out this website.
This other fellow, George Gordon, also known as Lord Byron, comes across as a bit of a dink. The author tells us that everyone who knew him well, though, adored him.
Would I recommend Byron, the Flawed Angel? Not really. It doesn't make Byron come alive and leaves me wondering what it was about him that his close friends loved so much. Maybe we'd be better off reading Byron's own works if we want to taste the flavour of the man's heart.
He had actually written personal memoirs, which his friends threw into a fire after his death. How disappointing is that. They were memoirs he wanted published, to boot! (as opposed to those of author Louisa May Alcott, who wrote Little Women; she directed that her diaries be destroyed and never read by the public, and her wishes were ignored. I'm glad for us when this happens, but it also seems extremely disrespectful of a person's privacy. Apparently we lose all rights to it when we die.)
