Category: Book Lists

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Five poetical novels to read for poetry month

Do you want to read more poetry but not sure where to start?

For April, poetry month, I’ll be sharing various poetry recommendations to help you find poetry you enjoy and just read more poetry.

Sometimes it can feel overwhelming to read poetry, especially if you’re not used to reading it. You may not know where to start or who to read first.

One easy way to ease yourself into reading more poetry is to start by reading poetical novels. These are books that may be written in a prose style poetry (looks like paragraphs not stanzas), or may just have very lyrical writing. These books may follow a story or may be a collection of vignettes/short passages that flow together.

Poetical novels can give you the rhythm and lyrical prose often seen in poetry, while also providing more concrete content or plot. This allows you to gain appreciation for how the words flow together without getting lost in trying to understand what is being said.

Sometimes poetry can be very abstract with much of the meaning left up to interpretation. This is both the beauty of poetry, and sometimes a huge source of frustration for those new to poetry. However, poetical novels can be a nice stepping stone into the world of poetry.

Keep reading for a list of five poetical novels that you can read this poetry month.

Photo by Mona Eendra on Unsplash

Five poetical novels

Here’s a list of five books considered to be poetical novels that span across the past 100 years.

  1. The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran
  2. The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros
  3. Bluets by Maggie Nelson
  4. Citizen by Claudia Rankine
  5. The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo

I’ve listed them in order of their publication.

Keep reading to find out more about each one.

The Prophet (1923)

by Kahlil Gibran

  • Year Published: 1923
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, classics, philosophy, poetry, inspiring, reflective, fast-paced
  • Importance:
    One of the most translated books

The Prophet is a collection of 26 prose style poetry fables written by the Lebanese-American poet and writer Kahlil Gibran.

This novel has been translated into over 100 languages, making it one of the most translated books in history. It has never been out of print, and is one of the best selling books of all time.

This year, the book turns 100!

Summary (from Goodreads):

Kahlil Gibran’s masterpiece, The Prophet, is one of the most beloved classics of our time. Published in 1923, it has been translated into more than twenty languages, and the American editions alone have sold more than nine million copies.

The Prophet is a collection of poetic essays that are philosophical, spiritual, and, above all, inspirational. Gibran’s musings are divided into twenty-eight chapters covering such sprawling topics as love, marriage, children, giving, eating and drinking, work, joy and sorrow, housing, clothes, buying and selling, crime and punishment, laws, freedom, reason and passion, pain, self-knowledge, teaching, friendship, talking, time, good and evil, prayer, pleasure, beauty, religion, and death.

Links:

The House on Mango Street (1985)

by Sandra Cisneros

  • Year Published: 1985
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, literary, young adult, emotional, reflective, fast-paced
  • Importance:
    Considered a modern classic of Chicano literature

This novel is considered a modern classic of Chicano Literature. It was met with much praise from the Hispanic community for the novel’s realistic portrayal of the Hispanic experience in America.

The novel won the American Book Award in 1985, and is commonly included in school curriculums across the USA. It’s an influential coming of age novel, with themes of race, sexuality, identity, social class, and gender integrated throughout.

However, due to the inclusion of sensitive subject matter (like puberty, domestic violence, sexual harassment and racism) it has been banned from several school curriculums.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Acclaimed by critics, beloved by readers of all ages, taught everywhere from inner-city grade schools to universities across the country, and translated all over the world, The House on Mango Street is the remarkable story of Esperanza Cordero.

Told in a series of vignettes – sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes deeply joyous–it is the story of a young Latina girl growing up in Chicago, inventing for herself who and what she will become. Few other books in our time have touched so many readers.

Links:

Bluets (2009)

by Maggie Nelson

  • Year Published: 2009
  • Storygraph Categories:
    nonfiction, essays, memoir, poetry, emotional, reflective, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    Hybrid prose and poetry, considered a cult favourite

This book by Maggie Nelson is a hybrid of prose and poetry (often called lyric essay or prose poetry) focused on Nelson’s experience with the color blue, and has been considered a cult favorite.

It’s a personal meditation on the color blue, along with Nelson’s experience of lost love, grief and existential solitude.

The work is a “formal experiment” whereby Nelson has arranged 240 “propositions”. Each proposition is a prose poem, that may be a sentence or a short paragraph, with none longer than 200 words.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Suppose I were to begin by saying that I had fallen in love with a color…

A lyrical, philosophical, and often explicit exploration of personal suffering and the limitations of vision and love, as refracted through the color blue. With Bluets, Maggie Nelson has entered the pantheon of brilliant lyric essayists.

Links:

Citizen: An American Lyric (2014)

by Claudia Rankine

  • Year Published: 2014
  • Storygraph Categories: nonfiction, essays, poetry, race, challenging, emotional, reflective, fast-paced
  • Importance:
    Critique of racism and visibility in America, won multiple awards

This book by American poet Claudia Rankine is both a book-length poem and a series of lyrical essays considered a portrait of racial relations in America.

It’s also a form of mixed media, as the seven chapters include both text (poetry) and media (images & artwork). Rankine’s goal was to “render visible the black experience”through use of multiple mediums.

The book has won multiple awards, including the:

  • 2014 National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry,
  • 2015 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work in Poetry,
  • 2015 Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Legacy Award for Poetry,
  • 2015 PEN Open Book Award
  • 2015 Forward prize for Poetry Best Collection
  • 2015 Los Angeles Times Book Prize in Poetry
  • 2017 Rebekah Johnson Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry.

Citizen also commercially successful as it was a New York Times Bestseller in 2015.

Summary (from Goodreads):

A provocative meditation on race, Claudia Rankine’s long-awaited follow up to her groundbreaking book Don’t Let Me Be Lonely: An American Lyric.

Claudia Rankine’s bold new book recounts mounting racial aggressions in ongoing encounters in twenty-first-century daily life and in the media. Some of these encounters are slights, seeming slips of the tongue, and some are intentional offensives in the classroom, at the supermarket, at home, on the tennis court with Serena Williams and the soccer field with Zinedine Zidane, online, on TV-everywhere, all the time. The accumulative stresses come to bear on a person’s ability to speak, perform, and stay alive. Our addressability is tied to the state of our belonging, Rankine argues, as are our assumptions and expectations of citizenship. In essay, image, and poetry, Citizen is a powerful testament to the individual and collective effects of racism in our contemporary, often named “post-race” society.

Links:

The Poet X (2018)

by Elizabeth Acevedo

  • Year Published: 2018
  • Storygraph Categories: fiction, contemporary, poetry, young adult, emotional, inspiring, reflective, fast-paced
  • Importance:
    Winner of multiple awards: National Book Award, Michael L. Printz Award, Pura Belpré Award & others

A young adult fiction/poetical novel that follows a teenager coming of age in Harlem. This novel has been very well received and won multiple awards.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Fans of Jacqueline Woodson, Meg Medina, and Jason Reynolds will fall hard for this astonishing New York Times-bestselling novel-in-verse by an award-winning slam poet, about an Afro-Latina heroine who tells her story with blazing words and powerful truth.

Xiomara Batista feels unheard and unable to hide in her Harlem neighborhood. Ever since her body grew into curves, she has learned to let her fists and her fierceness do the talking.

But Xiomara has plenty she wants to say, and she pours all her frustration and passion onto the pages of a leather notebook, reciting the words to herself like prayers—especially after she catches feelings for a boy in her bio class named Aman, who her family can never know about.

With Mami’s determination to force her daughter to obey the laws of the church, Xiomara understands that her thoughts are best kept to herself. So when she is invited to join her school’s slam poetry club, she doesn’t know how she could ever attend without her mami finding out. But she still can’t stop thinking about performing her poems.

Because in the face of a world that may not want to hear her, Xiomara refuses to be silent.

Links:

Final thoughts

These five books are obviously such a small selection of the options out there. But hopefully this gives you some suggestions of where to start and how to get started reading more poetry.

Have you read any of these books? Do you have any poetical novels that you would recommend?

I would love to hear your thoughts and recommendations in a comment below!

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Five modern classics: Feminist fiction books from the 1970’s until now

As April is Women’s History Month, I’ll be sharing book lists with a focus on books considered classic feminist texts and other books by women authors.

Are you interested in reading fiction books that shaped literature and how women were perceived?

Here are five fiction books considered modern classic feminist fiction from the 1970’s until recently. A lot of books have been published in that time, so this is just a small selection of books.

All of these books have had a significant impact on literature and the way women have been perceived. I’ve listed them in order of when they were published.

Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash

Five modern feminist fictional books

Here’s a list of five fiction books considered to be modern feminist classics.

  1. The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter (1979)
  2. Kindred by Octavia Butler (1979)
  3. The Color Purple by Alice Walker (1982)
  4. The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood (1985)
  5. Kim Jiyoung, born 1982 by Cho Nam-Joo (2016)

Keep reading to find out more about each one.

1. The Bloody Chamber (1979)

by Angela Carter

  • Year Published: 1979
  • Storygraph Categories: fiction, magical realism, short stories, dark, mysterious, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    One of the first feminist retellings of fairy tales

This is a collection of ten stories that are some kind of retelling or are based on fairytales or folk tales. As Carter stated: “My intention was not to do ‘versions’ or, as the American edition of the book said, horribly, ‘adult’ fairy tales, but to extract the latent content from the traditional stories.”

In general, the stories challenge the representation of women in fairy tales and was considered one of the first feminist retellings of fairy tales.

The stories vary in length, and the novelette which inspired the title, “The Bloody Chamber” is significantly longer than the rest. It won the Cheltenham Festival Literary Prize in 1979, the first year of the prize.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Angela Carter was a storytelling sorceress, the literary godmother of Neil Gaiman, David Mitchell, Audrey Niffenegger, J. K. Rowling, Kelly Link, and other contemporary masters of supernatural fiction. In her masterpiece, The Bloody Chamber—which includes the story that is the basis of Neil Jordan’s 1984 movie The Company of Wolves—she spins subversively dark and sensual versions of familiar fairy tales and legends like “Little Red Riding Hood,” “Bluebeard,” “Puss in Boots,” and “Beauty and the Beast,” giving them exhilarating new life in a style steeped in the romantic trappings of the gothic tradition.

Links:

2. Kindred (1979)

by Octavia Butler

  • Year Published: 1979
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, classics, historical, speculative fiction, dark, emotional, tense, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    Science fiction that centers Black characters

Octavia Butler was one of the most influential Black Women authors in Science Fiction. She grew up loving science fiction and set out to write books that she could see herself in and is often considered to cross genre boundaries.

In Kindred, it combines time travel with slave narratives. The story focuses on two interracial couples, and explores how issues of power, gender, and race intersect.

In an interview about the novel in 2004, Butler said, she “set out to make people feel history.”

Summary (from Goodreads):

The first science fiction written by a black woman, Kindred  has become a cornerstone of black American literature. This combination of slave memoir, fantasy, and historical fiction is a novel of rich literary complexity. Having just celebrated her 26th birthday in 1976 California, Dana, an African-American woman, is suddenly and inexplicably wrenched through time into antebellum Maryland. After saving a drowning white boy there, she finds herself staring into the barrel of a shotgun and is transported back to the present just in time to save her life. During numerous such time-defying episodes with the same young man, she realizes the challenge she’s been given…

Links:

3. The Color Purple (1982)

by Alice Walker

  • Year Published: 1982
  • Storygraph Categories:
  • fiction, classics, historical, lgbtqia+, literary, emotional, reflective, slow-paced
  • Importance:
    Winner of the 1983 Pulitzer Prize (making Walker the first black woman to win the prize)

The Color Purple won both the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award for Fiction. It was also on the BBC News’ list of the 100 most influential novels.

However, the novel has also frequently been thee target of censors or book challenges, as it appears at #17 on the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 2000-2010. It’s usually challenged due to explicit content, specifically in terms of its depiction of violence.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. Alice Walker’s iconic modern classic is now a Penguin Book.

A powerful cultural touchstone of modern American literature, The Color Purple depicts the lives of African American women in early twentieth-century rural Georgia. Separated as girls, sisters Celie and Nettie sustain their loyalty to and hope in each other across time, distance and silence. Through a series of letters spanning twenty years, first from Celie to God, then the sisters to each other despite the unknown, the novel draws readers into its rich and memorable portrayals of Celie, Nettie, Shug Avery and Sofia and their experience.

The Color Purple broke the silence around domestic and sexual abuse, narrating the lives of women through their pain and struggle, companionship and growth, resilience and bravery. Deeply compassionate and beautifully imagined, Alice Walker’s epic carries readers on a spirit-affirming journey towards redemption and love.

Links:

4. The Handmaid’s Tale (1985)

by Margaret Atwood

  • Year Published: 1985
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, dystopian, literary, dark, reflective, tense, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    Classic feminist dystopian novel

The Handmaid’s Tale is considered a feminist dystopian novel and is notable for sparking intense debate.

The novel is considered a feminist dystopian novel because it explores themes of how women are subjugated, especially their lost of agency, individuality and reproductive rights.

Atwood used history as inspiration as all scenarios portrayed within the novel have actually occurred in real life. In an interview Atwood stated, “…I didn’t put in anything that we haven’t already done, we’re not already doing, we’re seriously trying to do, coupled with trends that are already in progress… So all of those things are real, and therefore the amount of pure invention is close to nil.” The overlap with reality makes the novel that much more impactful and scary.

In 1985, the novel won the Governor General’s Award in Canada, along with the Arthur C. Clarke Award in 1987. It has also been nominated for a handful of other awards: the Nebula Award in 1986, the Booker Prize in 1986, and the Prometheus Award in 1987.

However, it has been criticized as “white feminism” for both the treatment of marginalized communities in the book (basically ”doing away with them” in a few lines and removing them from the conversation), while also primarily borrowing from the lived experiences of those communities but applying it to white women. A lot of the reproductive and human rights exploitation highlighted in the novel came from how Black and Indigenous women were treated in the past.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead. She may leave the home of the Commander and his wife once a day to walk to food markets whose signs are now pictures instead of words because women are no longer allowed to read. She must lie on her back once a month and pray that the Commander makes her pregnant, because in an age of declining births, Offred and the other Handmaids are valued only if their ovaries are viable. Offred can remember the years before, when she lived and made love with her husband, Luke; when she played with and protected her daughter; when she had a job, money of her own, and access to knowledge. But all of that is gone now . . .

Funny, unexpected, horrifying, and altogether convincing, The Handmaid’s Tale is at once scathing satire, dire warning, and tour de force.

Links:

5. Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 (2016)

by Cho Nam-Joo

  • Year Published: 2016
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, contemporary, literary, emotional, informative, reflective, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    Highlights everyday sexism in Korea

This is the most recent of the five novels, but it’s notable for how it depicts sexism in Korea and the recent impact it has had on sparking discussion around women’s experiences.

Even though it’s a fictional novel, all the main character’s experiences are based on statistics and research done by the author (with footnotes and references to back it up).

The novel focuses on sexism experienced throughout everyday life, the constant and pervasive sexism.

The author, Cho Nam-Joo, said that she intended to “make this into a public debate.”

“I thought of Kim Jiyoung’s character as a vessel that contains experiences and emotions that are common to every Korean woman.”

Cho Nam-Joo

In 2020, the novel was longlisted for both the U.S. National Book Award for Translated Literature and the French Emile Guimet Prize for Asian Literature.

Summary (from Storygraph):

One of the most notable novels of the year, hailed by both critics and K-pop stars alike, Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 follows one woman’s psychic deterioration in the face of rampant misogyny. In a tidy apartment on the outskirts of Seoul, millennial “everywoman” Kim Jiyoung spends her days caring for her infant daughter. But strange symptoms appear: Jiyoung begins to impersonate the voices of other women, dead and alive. As she plunges deeper into this psychosis, her concerned husband sends her to a psychiatrist. Jiyoung narrates her story to this doctor—from her birth to parents who expected a son to elementary school teachers who policed girls’ outfits to male coworkers who installed hidden cameras in women’s restrooms. But can her psychiatrist cure her, or even discover what truly ails her?

Links:

Have you read any of these books? I’d love to hear your thoughts on the book in a comment below?

Final thoughts

I know this is such a small selection of books, and it’s clearly not representative of all feminist fiction in the past 50 ish years. Though, I did try and provide a range of novels both in genre and authors.

Each one of these is so distinct and I like how each book has it’s own way of sparking conversation and provoking debate. I believe each of these will leave a strong impression on you and give you lots to think about. However you feel about these books, you’ll likely have an opinion about it and something to say.

I think some of the best books help inspire both questions and conversation. If it can make you reconsider aspects of reality or get you talking to others about big topics, I think that’s powerful.

Do you have a favourite feminist fictional book? I’d love you to share it in a comment below.

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Five classics: Feminist fiction books from before the 1960’s

As April is Women’s History Month, I’ll be sharing book lists with a focus on books considered classic feminist texts and other books by women authors.

Are you interested in reading fiction books that shaped literature and how women were perceived?

Here are five older fiction books considered classic feminist fiction from the 19th century up to the 1960’s. Obviously that’s a large time span, so this is just a small selection of books.

All of these books have had a significant impact on literature and the way women have been perceived. I’ve listed them in order of when they were published.

Photo by Jr Korpa on Unsplash

Five feminist fictional texts

Here’s a list of five feminist fictional books written before the 1970’s.

  1. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (1868)
  2. The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1892)
  3. The Awakening by Kate Chopin (1899)
  4. The Golden Notebook by Doris Lessing (1962)
  5. The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath (1963)

Keep reading to find out more about each one.

1. Little Women (1868)

by Louisa May Alcott

  • Year Published: 1868
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, classics, literary, emotional, hopeful, lighthearted, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    Created a new genre

Alcott wrote this coming-of-age novel focused around the lives of the four March sisters.

Through this novel, Alcott developed a new genre of literature by combining romantic children’s fiction with sentimental novels.

The book was an immediate success! Readers were eager for more about the characters, so Alcott quickly completed a second part. It was originally published in two volumes, however now the two volumes are often sold together in a single novel.

Summary (from Storygraph):

The lives and adventures of the four March sisters–Jo, Meg, Beth, and Amy–are set against the backdrop of nineteenth-century New England while their father is off fighting in the Civil War.

Links:

2. The Yellow Wallpaper (1892)

by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

  • Year Published: 1892
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, classics, horror, short stories, dark, mysterious, fast-paced
  • Importance:
    Mental health portrayal

This is a short story that powerfully portrays health issues and their treatment faced by women of this era (late 19th century).

It’s considered an important work of early American feminist literature due to its portrayal of women’s mental and physical health. It’s also considered a great work of horror fiction.

I find it’s a short story you can keep re-reading, getting something new from it each time.

Summary (from Storygraph):

First published in 1892, The Yellow Wall-Paper is written as the secret journal of a woman who, failing to relish the joys of marriage and motherhood, is sentenced to a country rest cure. Though she longs to write, her husband and doctor forbid it, prescribing instead complete passivity. Narrated with superb psychological and dramatic precision, this short but powerful masterpiece has the heroine create a reality of her own within the hypnotic pattern of the faded yellow wall-paper of her bedroom–a pattern that comes to symbolize her own imprisonment.

This key women’s studies text by a pivotal first-wave feminist writer, lecturer, and activist (1860-1935) is reprinted as it first appeared in New England Magazine in 1892, and contains the essential essay on the author’s life and work by pioneering Gilman scholar Elaine R. Hedges.

Links:

3. The Awakening (1899)

by Kate Chopin

  • Year Published: 1899
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, classics, reflective, slow-paced
  • Importance:
    Landmark of early feminism

The Awakening is considered a precursor to American modernist literature, due to its blend of social commentary, a realistic narrative, and psychological complexity. It’s also one of the earlier American novels that discussed women’s issues without condescension (surprise surprise it took a woman to accomplish that).

It was considered quite controversial at the time of publication, mostly due to its open discussion of female marital infidelity.

Chopin faced many barriers when she tried to publish stories after she published this novel, and unfortunately she did not write another novel after this one.

Summary (from Goodreads):

When first published in 1899, The Awakening shocked readers with its honest treatment of female marital infidelity. Audiences accustomed to the pieties of late Victorian romantic fiction were taken aback by Chopin’s daring portrayal of a woman trapped in a stifling marriage, who seeks and finds passionate physical love outside the confines of her domestic situation.

Aside from its unusually frank treatment of a then-controversial subject, the novel is widely admired today for its literary qualities. Edmund Wilson characterized it as a work “quite uninhibited and beautifully written, which anticipates D. H. Lawrence in its treatment of infidelity.” Although the theme of marital infidelity no longer shocks, few novels have plumbed the psychology of a woman involved in an illicit relationship with the perception, artistry, and honesty that Kate Chopin brought to The Awakening.

Links:

4. The Golden Notebook (1962)

by Doris Lessing

  • Year Published: 1962
  • Storygraph Categories: fiction, classics, literary, reflective, slow-paced
  • Importance:
    Realistic depiction of women’s lived experiences

The Golden Notebook is considered as a companion volume to Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex. It also became popular with feminists due to its realistic depiction of women’s lived experiences.

This 1962 novel by the British writer Doris Lessing is considered one of the best English-language novels since 1923 (according to Time Magazine).

Margaret Drabble describes Lessing’s writing style as “inner space fiction” because Lessing’s work explores a combination of mental and societal breakdown.

Doris Lessing was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2007 for being “that epicist of the female experience, who with scepticism, fire and visionary power has subjected a divided civilisation to scrutiny”.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Anna is a writer, author of one very successful novel, who now keeps four notebooks. In one, with a black cover, she reviews the African experience of her earlier year. In a red one she records her political life, her disillusionment with communism. In a yellow one she writes a novel in which the heroine relives part of her own experience. And in the blue one she keeps a personal diary. Finally, in love with an American writer and threatened with insanity, Anna tries to bring the threads of all four books together in a golden notebook.

Links:

  • Find out more on:
  • You can read the book online here.
    • This was an experiment where seven women read the book online, while also commenting on the book and discussing it together. Each page/website has a short part of the book with the comments from the seven women below. You can read along the book together as if in a group.
    • Chapter 1 starts here.

5. The Bell Jar (1963)

by Sylvia Plath

  • Year Published: 1963
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, classics, literary, dark, emotional, reflective, medium-paced
  • Check trigger warnings before reading this book
  • Importance:
    Powerful depiction of mental health and Plath’s only novel

The Bell Jar is the only novel written by Sylvia Plath, an American writer and poet. It was originally published under a pseudonym (”Victoria Lucas”) as it is semi-autobiographical.

The novel portray’s the main character, Esther Greenwood, as she descends into mental illness. The book is often considered a roman à clef as the protagonist’s experience tends to mirror the author’s, with Plath dying by suicide only a month after its publication in the UK.

I think it’s important to acknowledge and warn individuals that there are racists parts of the book. I personally don’t think that those parts are enough to negate the rest of the book, but I completely understand if you don’t want to read the book because of this.

Summary (from Goodreads):

We follow Esther Greenwood’s personal life from her summer job in New York with Ladies’ Day magazine, back through her days at New England’s largest school for women, and forward through her attempted suicide, her bad treatment at one asylum and her good treatment at another, to her final re-entry into the world like a used tyre: “patched, retreaded, and approved for the road” … Esther Greenwood’s account of her year in the bell jar is as clear and readable as it is witty and disturbing.

Links:

Final thoughts

I couldn’t help to think that so many of the books considered to be “feminist texts” are just a genuine portray of women’s experiences.

Most of them are just women written as fully developed characters dealing with normal life experiences. Or, if they were considered controversial at the time, it might just be women going through experiences that society didn’t want to know about (like mental health and unfulfilling marriages).

I know that older male authors are not known for writing strong or well-rounded women characters, but I didn’t realize that the bar was so low.

I recently read Kafka’s novel The Trial and I was astounded at how terrible the women characters were. Now, I understand that his stories were groundbreaking and powerful commentaries on society, but the one-dimensional female characters were such a turn off, and made it extremely difficult to finish the book.

All that to say, I think we need to understand what it means to be considered a feminist text within the literary context of that era. It’s unlikely for it to match with what we consider feminism to be today.

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Six recent prize winning books from women authors

As April is Women’s History Month, I’ll be sharing book lists with a focus on books considered classic feminist texts and other books by women authors.

Are you hoping to read more award winning books? While also wanting to read more books by women?

Here’s the perfect list for you. Here are six books by women that have recently (within the last 10 years) won international prizes!

I have included a diverse collection of prizes to showcase a range of genres and book recommendations.

Photo by Robin Edqvist on Unsplash

Award winning books

Here’s a list of books with women authors that have won an award in the past 10 years.

  1. The Vegatarian by Han Kang 2016 Man Booker International Prize
  2. Olga Takarczuk Won the Novel Prize for Literature in 2018 Two books to highlight are: Flights & Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead
  3. Piranesi by Susanna Clarke 2021 Women’s Prize for Fiction
  4. Network Effect by Martha Wells 2021 Hugo Award for Best Novel
  5. Tomb of Sand 2022 International Booker Prize

Keep reading to find out more about each one.

1. The Vegetarian – 2016 Man Booker International

by Han Kang
Translated by Deborah Smith

  • Year Published: 2007
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, contemporary, literary, dark, sad, tense, medium-paced
  • Language: Korean
  • Importance:
    Winner of the 2016 Man Booker International Prize

The Vegetarian was published in 2007 in Korea, with the English version published in 2015. This is Han’s second book that has been translated into English.

The Vegetarian is considered the biggest win for Korean translated literature since the book Please Look After Mom by Kyung-Sook Shin, which won the Man Asian Literary Prize in 2012.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Before the nightmare, Yeong-hye and her husband lived an ordinary life. But when splintering, blood-soaked images start haunting her thoughts, Yeong-hye decides to purge her mind and renounce eating meat. In a country where societal mores are strictly obeyed, Yeong-hye’s decision to embrace a more “plant-like” existence is a shocking act of subversion. And as her passive rebellion manifests in ever more extreme and frightening forms, scandal, abuse, and estrangement begin to send Yeong-hye spiraling deep into the spaces of her fantasy. In a complete metamorphosis of both mind and body, her now dangerous endeavor will take Yeong-hye—impossibly, ecstatically, tragically—far from her once-known self altogether.

Links:

2. Olga Tokarczuk – Nobel Prize 2018

Olga won the Nobel Prize for literature in 2018 for “a narrative imagination that with encyclopedic passion represents the crossing of boundaries as a form of life”. She was the first Polish female prose writer to win the Nobel Prize.

Here are two of her novels that have been translated into English.

Flights

by Olga Tokarczuk
Translated by Jennifer Croft

  • Year Published: 2007
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, literary, magical realism, short stories, adventurous, challenging, reflective, slow-paced
  • Language: Polish
  • Importance:
    Won the Man Booker International Prize in 2018

This is a book of vignettes that are all narrated by a “nameless female traveller.” There are 116 vignettes in the book, varying in length with some only one sentence and others up to 31 pages.

Flights has gotten quite a bit of literary attention. In 2008, it won the Nike Award, Poland’s highest literary award. Then after it was translated, it won the Man Booker International Prize in 2018.

Summary (from Goodreads):

From the incomparably original Polish writer Olga Tokarczuk, Flights  interweaves reflections on travel with an in-depth exploration of the human body, broaching life, death, motion, and migration. Chopin’s heart is carried back to Warsaw in secret by his adoring sister. A woman must return to her native Poland in order to poison her terminally ill high school sweetheart, and a young man slowly descends into madness when his wife and child mysteriously vanish during a vacation and just as suddenly reappear. Through these brilliantly imagined characters and stories, interwoven with haunting, playful, and revelatory meditations, Flights explores what it means to be a traveler, a wanderer, a body in motion not only through space but through time. Where are you from? Where are you coming in from? Where are you going? we call to the traveler. Enchanting, unsettling, and wholly original, Flights is a master storyteller’s answer.

Links:

Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead

by Olga Tokarczuk
Translated by: Antonia Lloyd-Jones

  • Year Published: 2009
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, contemporary, literary, thriller, dark, mysterious, reflective, medium-paced
  • Language: Polish
  • Importance:
    Shortlisted for the 2019 International Booker Prize

The title of the book comes from William Blake’s poem call “Proverbs of Hell.” These are the specific lines:

In seed time learn, in harvest teach, in winter enjoy. Drive your cart and your plow over the bones of the dead.

William Blake
Source: Proverbs of Hell

It was shortlisted for the 2019 International Booker Prize, and as mentioned above the author won the Nobel Prize for Literature.

The main character of the novel is a middle aged woman, which is quite rare, but very enjoyable to read.

Summary (from Goodreads):

One of Poland’s most imaginative and lyrical writers, Olga Tokarczuk presents us with a detective story with a twist in DRIVE YOUR PLOW OVER THE BONES OF THE DEAD. After her two dogs go missing and members of the local hunting club are found murdered, teacher and animal rights activist Janina Duszejko becomes involved in the ensuing investigation. Part magic realism, part detective story, DRIVE YOUR PLOW OVER THE BONES OF THE DEAD is suspenseful and entertaining reimagining of the genre interwoven with poignant and insightful commentaries on our perceptions of madness, marginalised people and animal rights.

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3. Piranesi – 2021 Women’s Prize for Fiction

by Susanna Clarke

  • Year Published: 2020
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, fantasy, literary, adventurous, mysterious, reflective, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    Winner of the 2021 Women’s Prize for Fiction

Susanna Clarke is well known for her debut novel, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell from 2004. After her debut novel was published, she became ill with chronic fatigue syndrome, which made writing torturous for her. Piranesi is her second novel, published 16 years later.

The title, Piranesi, alludes to an Italian artist from the 18th century named Giovanni Battista Piranesi. He produced a series of prints prints entitled Imaginary Prisons that depict large, intricate architectural structures.

Piranesi was a finalist for the Hugo Award and nominated for a Nebula Award in 2021. Both awards are for works within the genres of science fiction and fantasy.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Piranesi’s house is no ordinary building: its rooms are infinite, its corridors endless, its walls are lined with thousands upon thousands of statues, each one different from all the others. Within the labyrinth of halls an ocean is imprisoned; waves thunder up staircases, rooms are flooded in an instant. But Piranesi is not afraid; he understands the tides as he understands the pattern of the labyrinth itself. He lives to explore the house.

There is one other person in the house—a man called The Other, who visits Piranesi twice a week and asks for help with research into A Great and Secret Knowledge. But as Piranesi explores, evidence emerges of another person, and a terrible truth begins to unravel, revealing a world beyond the one Piranesi has always known.

Links:

4. Network Effect – 2021 Hugo Award for Best Novel

by Martha Wells

  • Year Published: 2020
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, science fiction, adventurous, emotional, funny, fast-paced
  • Importance:
    Winner of the 2021 Hugo Award for Best Novel

Martha Wells is well known for her Murderbot series (The Murderbot Diaries), a science fiction series about a part human and part robot construct called a Security Unit.

Network effect is the fifth book in the Murderbot series. The first book is called All Systems Red.

The first four books in the series are quite short, whereas this fifth book is much longer. It has been described as “… if the first books were episodes in a four-part TV miniseries, then ‘Network Effect’ is the feature-length movie with the bigger budget and scope, and it is no less enjoyable.”

So far I’ve only read the first book (due to a very long hold time line at my library), but I really enjoyed it and can’t wait to read the rest of the series.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Murderbot returns in its highly anticipated, first, full-length standalone novel.

You know that feeling when you’re at work, and you’ve had enough of people, and then the boss walks in with yet another job that needs to be done right this second or the world will end, but all you want to do is go home and binge your favorite shows? And you’re a sentient murder machine programmed for destruction? Congratulations, you’re Murderbot.

Come for the pew-pew space battles, stay for the most relatable A.I. you’ll read this century.

—

I’m usually alone in my head, and that’s where 90 plus percent of my problems are.

When Murderbot’s human associates (not friends, never friends) are captured and another not-friend from its past requires urgent assistance, Murderbot must choose between inertia and drastic action.

Drastic action it is, then.

Links:

5. Tomb of Sand – 2022 International Booker Prize

by Geetanjali Shree
Translated by Daisy Rockwell

  • Year Published: 2018
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, literary, emotional, mysterious, reflective, medium-paced
  • Language: Hindi
  • Importance:
    Winner of International Booker Prize in 2022

Tomb of Sand won the International Booker Prize in 2022, making it the first novel translated from an Indian Language to win the prize.

The English version of the book was published by Titled Axis Press, a small non-profit publishing house that focuses on work by Asian and African writers.

The main character is an 80-year old woman! I think it’s important to read stories both from diverse authors and about diverse characters, which would include a range of ages. I’m really excited to read more books with older women main characters.

Summary (from Goodreads):

An eighty-year-old woman slips into a deep depression at the death of her husband, then resurfaces to gain a new lease on life. Her determination to fly in the face of convention – including striking up a friendship with a hijra (trans) woman – confuses her bohemian daughter, who is used to thinking of herself as the more ‘modern’ of the two.

At the older woman’s insistence they travel back to Pakistan, simultaneously confronting the unresolved trauma of her teenage experiences of Partition, and re-evaluating what it means to be a mother, a daughter, a woman, a feminist.

Rather than respond to tragedy with seriousness, Geetanjali Shree’s playful tone and exuberant wordplay results in a book that is engaging, funny, and utterly original, at the same time as being an urgent and timely protest against the destructive impact of borders and boundaries, whether between religions, countries, or genders.

Links:

Final thoughts

If you spend much time on booktube, booktok, or other book-social media areas you’ve probably heard of some of these book awards.

When I started trying to understand which was what, it got to be a bit overwhelming as there are so many book awards out there. But that also means you can find awards for almost any category you want to read.

Here’s the wikipedia page for literary awards, it’s a decent place to start if you’re looking for something specific.

Literary awards can be a great way to find good books. But just because they’ve won an award, doesn’t always mean you’re going to love it.

I would recommend finding some awards that reflect your reading interest and check out their past winning books. You might find a new favourite.

Are there any specific book awards that you follow?

Have you read any of these books? I’d love to know your thoughts in a comment below.

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Five classics: Nonfiction feminist texts written before the 1980’s

As April is Women’s History Month, I’ll be sharing book lists with a focus on books considered classic feminist texts and other books by women authors.

Are you interested in learning more about the history of women’s movements and gaining tools to think critically about how society is shaped by the patriarchy?

Here are five older nonfiction books considered classic feminist texts from a range of eras, from as early as 1792 up until the 1970’s. They each had a considerable impact on women and society.

However, as these are older, they may lack the depth of insight provided by intersectionality (considering more than just gender to affect one’s experience). I’ve listed them in order of when they were published.

It’s important to note that these books are primarily focused on the women’s movements in the Western societies (including North America and the UK). They are also all written by white women, who tend to have a limited understanding of gender.

If you have suggestions for books that focus on women’s movements from elsewhere around the world, especially from early in the 20th or 19th century, please let me know in a comment below!

Photo by Sharon Pittaway on Unsplash

Five books from White Women Feminists

Here’s a list of five classic feminist books with white women authors.

  1. A Vindication of the Rights of Women by Mary Wollstonecraft (1792)
  2. A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf (1929)
  3. The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir (1949)
  4. The Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan (1963)
  5. The Female Eunuch by Germaine Greer(1970)

Keep reading to find out more about each one.

1. A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792)

by Mary Wollstonecraft

  • Year Published: 1792
  • Storygraph Categories:
    nonfiction, classics, feminism, philosophy, challenging, informative, reflective, slow-paced
  • Importance:
    One of the earliest feminist philosophy works

Mary Wollstonecraft argues in this work that women should have access to education and that we are depriving society of their contributions. It’s considered on the of the earliest feminist philosophical works.

The book was generally well received when it was first published in 1792.

Wollstonecraft’s work ended up having significant impacts on the women’s rights movements, especially those in the 19th century. The influence of her work can be seen during the suffragette movement in the US, particularly at the 1848 Seneca Falls Convention.

Summary (from Goodreads):

In the present state of society, it appears necessary to go back to first principles in search of the most simple truths, and to dispute with some prevailing prejudice every inch of ground. To clear my way, I must be allowed to ask some plain questions, and the answers will probably appear as unequivocal as the axioms on which reasoning is built; though, when entangled with various motives of action, they are formally contradicted, either by the words or conduct of men.In what does man’s pre-eminence over the brute creation consist?The answer is as clear as that a half is less than the whole; inReason.

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2. A Room of One’s Own (1929)

by Virginia Woolf

  • Year Published: 1929
  • Storygraph Categories:
    nonfiction, classics, essays, feminism, informative, inspiring, reflective, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    Highlights the importance of space for women

This book is actually a collection of lectures she delivered to two women’s colleges in October 1928, which is important to note to better understand the audience and context of the work. She was addressing women enrolled in higher education, which would be quite privileged women of that era.

This quote sums up her key message:

“A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction.”

Virginia Woolf
Source: A Room of One’s Own

The book highlights the need for women to have space to create, both a physical space (a room) with sufficient needs ($) to alleviate stress from daily tasks, along with a metaphorical space to be accepted in the literary world.

The book also highlights the lived experiences of different women authors in fiction, along with theorizing what would happen if Shakespeare had an equally talented sister.

I found this book quite enlightening and interesting. However, it does come with limitations. The book is primarily focused on a certain demographic (white, privileged and educated women), limiting her analysis.

Summary (from Goodreads):

A Room of One’s Own is an extended essay by Virginia Woolf. First published on the 24th of October, 1929, the essay was based on a series of lectures she delivered at Newnham College and Girton College, two women’s colleges at Cambridge University in October 1928. While this extended essay in fact employs a fictional narrator and narrative to explore women both as writers and characters in fiction, the manuscript for the delivery of the series of lectures, titled Women and Fiction, and hence the essay, are considered nonfiction. The essay is seen as a feminist text, and is noted in its argument for both a literal and figural space for women writers within a literary tradition dominated by patriarchy.

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3. The Second Sex (1949)

by Simone de Beauvoir

Translated by: Sheila Malovany-Chevallier & Constance Borde

  • Year Published: 1949
  • Storygraph Categories: nonfiction, classics, feminism, philosophy, challenging, informative, reflective, slow-paced
  • Importance:
    Groundbreaking work of feminist philosophy

Simone de Beauvoir is a famous philosopher who was part of the existentialist movement in France.

The Second Sex is a feminist philosophical work that discusses the treatment of women both now and throughout history. The book had a huge impact on the second wave of feminism and inspired The Feminine Mystique among other feminist texts.

Simone de Beauvoir was one of the first to identify the sex-gender divide, meaning the difference between biological sex and the societal/social construct of gender.

Simone de Beauvoir was bisexual and had an open relationship with fellow philosopher Jean Paul Sartre. She had many lovers throughout her life. However, her relationships with young women, many of whom were her students, are questionable, with some sexual abuse allegations.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Newly translated and unabridged in English for the first time, Simone de Beauvoir’s masterwork is a powerful analysis of the Western notion of “woman,” and a groundbreaking exploration of inequality and otherness. This long-awaited new edition reinstates significant portions of the original French text that were cut in the first English translation. Vital and groundbreaking, Beauvoir’s pioneering and impressive text remains as pertinent today as it was back then, and will continue to provoke and inspire generations of men and women to come.

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4. The Feminine Mystique (1963)

by Betty Friedan

  • Year Published: 1963
  • Storygraph Categories: nonfiction, feminism, challenging, informative, slow-paced
  • Importance: Credited with sparking second-wave feminism in the USA

The Feminine Mystique is considered to be one of the most influential nonfiction books of the 20th century. It is also commonly associated with sparking the second wave of feminism in the US.

Betty Friedan was asked to conduct a survey of her former classmates only to find that many were unhappy with their lives as housewives. This inspired her to began researching what would ultimately become this book.

In this book, Friedan challenges the concept that women could only be fulfilled as a “housewife-mother.” Rather she showed that many felt unfulfilled in this role.

The book was a best seller, and sold over a million copies. It drew many women to the feminist cause, specifically white, middle class women.

Despite its huge influence and significance, the message is clearly aimed at a specific demographic: the white suburban housewife. I think it’s important to both acknowledge its influence and its limitations.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Landmark, groundbreaking, classic—these adjectives barely do justice to the pioneering vision and lasting impact of The Feminine Mystique. Published in 1963, it gave a pitch-perfect description of “the problem that has no name”: the insidious beliefs and institutions that undermined women’s confidence in their intellectual capabilities and kept them in the home. Writing in a time when the average woman first married in her teens and 60 percent of women students dropped out of college to marry, Betty Friedan captured the frustrations and thwarted ambitions of a generation and showed women how they could reclaim their lives. Part social chronicle, part manifesto, The Feminine Mystique is filled with fascinating anecdotes and interviews as well as insights that continue to inspire. This 50th–anniversary edition features an afterword by best-selling author Anna Quindlen as well as a new introduction by Gail Collins.

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5. The Female Eunuch (1970)

by Germaine Greer

  • Year Published: 1970
  • Storygraph Categories:
    nonfiction, feminism, gender, philosophy, adventurous, reflective, slow-paced
  • Importance:
    Made shockwaves within the feminist movement

The Female Eunuch made shockwaves within the feminist movement in 1970 as it focused on how women are taught to repress their sexuality.

Greer’s focus of the book is to show that a “traditional” (read as white), suburban nuclear family sexually represses women, which also devitalizes them and turns them into eunuchs.

I am looking forward to reading this book, as I think it will have interesting points to make. However, I also expect this to have limited applicability because women who aren’t white tend to either be overly sexualized or exoticized, which are just different ways to control women’s sexuality.

Summary (from Goodreads):

The clarion call to change that galvanized a generation.

When Germaine Greer’s “The Female Eunuch” was first published it created a shock wave of recognition in women, one that could be felt around the world. It went on to become an international bestseller, translated into more than twelve languages, and a landmark in the history of the women’s movement. Positing that sexual liberation is the key to women’s liberation, Greer looks at the inherent and unalterable biological differences between men and women as well as at the profound psychological differences that result from social conditioning. Drawing on history, literature, biology, and popular culture, Greer’s searing examination of women’s oppression is a vital, passionately argued social commentary that is both an important historical record of where we’ve been and a shockingly relevant treatise on what still remains to be achieved.

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Final thoughts

I know these books are all by white women authors and their limitations may make them less appealing. However, I do know these books were still hugely influential and affected the course of history.

Personally, I think it’s worthwhile to read these landmark books to understand how they affected society and see how things have changed over the years. I know it can be frustrating to read some of these books from a 21st century perspective as the intersectionality gaps seem huge.

Nevertheless, there is still useful information and arguments in these books that can help us understand the evolution of women’s movements and where we need to go in the future.

History can be a great teacher, as we can learn from our past mistakes and move towards a better future. Looking back, it’s not surprising to see how limited the audiences were for some of these books, but we can also make sure we don’t regress back to that state.

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Five modern classics: Nonfiction feminist texts from the 1980’s and 90’s

As April is Women’s History Month, I’ll be sharing book lists with a focus on books considered classic feminist texts and other books by women authors.

Are you interested in learning more about the history of women’s movements and gaining tools to think critically about how society is shaped by the patriarchy?

Here are five nonfiction books considered classic feminist texts from the 80’s and 90’s. They each had a considerable impact on the women’s movement and continued to be both relevant and heavily studied. I’ve listed them in order of when they were published.

It’s important to note that these books are primarily focused on the women’s movements in Western societies (including North America and the UK).

Also, I’m always looking to diversify my reading. If you have any suggestions that discuss women’s rights and movements from other parts of the world, please share them below!

Photo by Jason Leung on Unsplash

Five modern classics: Feminist nonfiction

Here’s a list of five modern classic books with a focus on feminist nonfiction.

  1. Women, Race & Class by Angela Davis (1981)
  2. Ain’t I a Woman by bell hooks (1981)
  3. Sister Outsider by Audre Lorde (1984)
  4. The Beauty Myth by Naomi Wolf (1990)
  5. Backlash by Susan Faludi (1991)

Keep reading to find out more about each one.

1. Women, Race & Class (1981)

by Angela Y. Class

  • Year Published: 1981
  • Storygraph Categories:
    nonfiction, feminism, history, politics, race, sociology, challenging, informative, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    One of the first intersectional analyses of gender, race and class

This book discusses the interaction of gender, race and class, with an emphasis on the experiences of Black Women.

It clarifies aspects of US history that you may not have heard about, spanning the time period from the slave trade to modern women’s rights movements.

This book radically shifted how I understood the history of the women’s movements, especially the suffragette movement. I feel like it gave me so much more nuance to the history.

Summary (from Goodreads):

From one of our most important scholars and civil rights activist icon, a powerful study of the women’s liberation movement and the tangled knot of oppression facing Black women.

“Angela Davis is herself a woman of undeniable courage. She should be heard.” —The New York Times

Angela Davis provides a powerful history of the social and political influence of whiteness and elitism in feminism, from abolitionist days to the present, and demonstrates how the racist and classist biases of its leaders inevitably hampered any collective ambitions. While Black women were aided by some activists like Sarah and Angelina Grimke and the suffrage cause found unwavering support in Frederick Douglass, many women played on the fears of white supremacists for political gain rather than take an intersectional approach to liberation. Here, Davis not only contextualizes the legacy and pitfalls of civil and women’s rights activists, but also discusses Communist women, the murder of Emmitt Till, and Margaret Sanger’s racism. Davis shows readers how the inequalities between Black and white women influence the contemporary issues of rape, reproductive freedom, housework and child care in this bold and indispensable work.

Links:

2. Ain’t I A Woman: Black Women and Feminism (1981)

by bell hooks

  • Year Published: 1981
  • Storygraph Categories:
    nonfiction, feminism, history, race, challenging, informative, inspiring, slow-paced
  • Importance:
    Highly influential in feminist theory

In this book, bell hooks discusses how stereotypes from slavery are still very influential in today’s world.

bell hooks is considered a feminist theory scholar, and this book has been considered groundbreaking in feminist theory as it discussed the longterm impacts from slavery that are still felt today.

This book has no footnotes in it. bell hooks said it was to make it more accessible and less scholarly, but it has also been criticized for not sharing her sources.

Summary (from Goodreads):

A groundbreaking work of feminist history and theory analyzing the complex relations between various forms of oppression. Ain’t I a Woman  examines the impact of sexism on black women during slavery, the historic devaluation of black womanhood, black male sexism, racism within the recent women’s movement, and black women’s involvement with feminism.

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3. Sister Outsider (1984)

by Audre Lorde

  • Year Published: 1984
  • Storygraph Categories:
    nonfiction, essays, feminism, lgbtqia+, sociology, challenging, informative, reflective, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    A groundbreaking impact on contemporary feminist theories, including intersectionality

This is a collection of essays, with “The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House” likely being the most well known.

The essays showcase Lorde’s philosophical thought and reasoning, especially highlighting oppressions as both complex and interconnected. Her essays are considered a significant contribution to critical social theory.

Summary (from Goodreads):

A collection of fifteen essays written between 1976 and 1984 gives clear voice to Audre Lorde’s literary and philosophical personae. These essays explore and illuminate the roots of Lorde’s intellectual development and her deep-seated and longstanding concerns about ways of increasing empowerment among minority women writers and the absolute necessity to explicate the concept of difference—difference according to sex, race, and economic status. The title Sister Outsider finds its source in her poetry collection The Black Unicorn (1978). These poems and the essays in Sister Outsider stress Lorde’s oft-stated theme of continuity, particularly of the geographical and intellectual link between Dahomey, Africa, and her emerging self.

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4. The Beauty Myth (1990)

by Naomi Wolf

  • Year Published: 1990
  • Storygraph Categories:
    nonfiction, feminism, informative, reflective, slow-paced
  • Importance:
    Redefined the relationship between beauty and female identity

The Beauty Myth focuses on how beauty is used as a distraction and continues the subjugation of women.

As women’s power in society has increased, so has the pressure from media to achieve unrealistic beauty standards.

Beauty is both a way to distract women from their desire for equal rights, while simultaneously providing a way for everyone (men and women) to judge women on their personal appearance.

Summary (from Goodreads):

The bestselling classic that redefined our view of the relationship between beauty and female identity. In today’s world, women have more power, legal recognition, and professional success than ever before. Alongside the evident progress of the women’s movement, however, writer and journalist Naomi Wolf is troubled by a different kind of social control, which, she argues, may prove just as restrictive as the traditional image of homemaker and wife. It’s the beauty myth, an obsession with physical perfection that traps the modern woman in an endless spiral of hope, self-consciousness, and self-hatred as she tries to fulfill society’s impossible definition of “the flawless beauty.”

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5. Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women (1991)

by Susan Faludi

  • Year Published: 1991
  • Storygraph Categories: nonfiction, feminism, history, politics, informative, reflective, slow-paced
  • Importance:
    Disputed many commonly held myths

This book originated as an article that Faludi wrote in response to a 1986 Newsweek cover story about the so-called “man shortage” and the “statistic” that women over 30 were more likely to be killed by a terrorist than marry.

Newsweek reported that the “statistic” came from a Harvard-Yale marriage study. It got tremendous coverage and was widely believed to be true. You’ll even see it referenced (as a joke) in the movie Sleepless in Seattle! But the statistic didn’t hold up to be true and the Harvard-Yale team later retracted the statistics.

You can hear Susan Faludi talk more about it in an interview here.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Skillfully Probing the Attack on Women’s Rights

“Opting-out,” “security moms,” “desperate housewives,” “the new baby fever”—the trend stories of 2006 leave no doubt that American women are still being barraged by the same backlash messages that Susan Faludi brilliantly exposed in her 1991 bestselling book of revelations. Now, the book that reignited the feminist movement is back in a fifteenth anniversary edition, with a new preface by the author that brings backlash consciousness up to date.

When it was first published, Backlash made headlines for puncturing such favorite media myths as the “infertility epidemic” and the “man shortage,” myths that defied statistical realities. These willfully fictitious media campaigns added up to an antifeminist backlash. Whatever progress feminism has recently made, Faludi’s words today seem prophetic. The media still love stories about stay-at-home moms and the “dangers” of women’s career ambitions; the glass ceiling is still low; women are still punished for wanting to succeed; basic reproductive rights are still hanging by a thread. The backlash clearly exists.

With passion and precision, Faludi shows in her new preface how the creators of commercial culture distort feminist concepts to sell products while selling women downstream, how the feminist ethic of economic independence is twisted into the consumer ethic of buying power, and how the feminist quest for self-determination is warped into a self-centered quest for self-improvement.

Backlash is a classic of feminism, an alarm bell for women of every generation, reminding us of the dangers that we still face.

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Final thoughts

Personally, I think these most, if not, all of these books are life changing. They can provide significant perspective shifts and can help you think more critically about your experiences.

You may not agree with everything in the books, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t gain something from them. For instance, Angela Davis was an ardent supporter of the communist party in the 80’s and part of the book focuses heavily on communism. Whatever your feelings about communism (and people tend to feel quite strongly about it – thanks Cold War!), that shouldn’t negate or affect what you can learn from the rest of the book.

If you’ve read any of these, I would love to know what you think of them! Please feel free to share a comment below with your thoughts.

If you have suggestions for books that focus on women’s movements from elsewhere around the world, please let me know in a comment below!

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Five Modern Classics Written by Black Americans

Are you hoping to read more classics this year? Here are some suggestions for Black History month!

I wanted to highlight classics that we don’t hear about as much so that you can read from diverse perspectives. Some of these may be new to you, and some might not.

These five classics are from Black Americans from a variety of genres. All of these are more modern classics, having been written between the years of 1920-1960.

Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash

Five books from Black Americans

Here’s a list of five books with Black American authors, for more Black History Month reading suggestions.

Modern Classics

  1. Cane by Jean Toomer (1923)
  2. Passing by Nella Larson (1929)
  3. Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston (1937)
  4. The Street by Ann Petry (1946)
  5. A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry (1959)

Keep reading to find out more about each one.

1. Cane

by Jean Toomer

  • Year Published: 1923
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, classics, poetry, short stories, challenging, reflective, slow-paced
  • 100 years since it’s been published!
  • Importance:
    From the Harlem Renaissance

Summary (from Goodreads):

A literary masterpiece of the Harlem Renaissance, Cane is a powerful work of innovative fiction evoking black life in the South. The sketches, poems, and stories of black rural and urban life that make up Cane  are rich in imagery. Visions of smoke, sugarcane, dusk, and flame permeate the Southern landscape: the Northern world is pictured as a harsher reality of asphalt streets. Impressionistic, sometimes surrealistic, the pieces are redolent of nature and Africa, with sensuous appeals to eye and ear.

Links:

2. Passing

by Nella Larson

  • Year Published: 1929
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, classics, literary, emotional, reflective, tense, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    Focuses on mixed-race individuals and racial passing (such as passing as white)

Summary (edited from Goodreads):

Nella Larsen’s fascinating exploration of race and identity.

Irene Redfield is a Black woman living an affluent, comfortable life with her husband and children in the thriving neighborhood of Harlem in the 1920s. When she reconnects with her childhood friend Clare Kendry, who is similarly light-skinned, Irene discovers that Clare has been passing for a white woman after severing ties to her past–even hiding the truth from her racist husband.

Clare finds herself drawn to Irene’s sense of ease and security with her Black identity and longs for the community (and, increasingly, the woman) she lost. Irene is both riveted and repulsed by Clare and her dangerous secret, as Clare begins to insert herself–and her deception–into every part of Irene’s stable existence. First published in 1929, Larsen’s brilliant examination of the various ways in which we all seek to “pass,” is as timely as ever.

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3. Their Eyes Were Watching God

by Zora Neale Hurston

  • Year Published: 1937
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, classics, historical, literary, emotional, reflective, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    A classic of the Harlem Renaissance

Summary (from Goodreads):

Fair and long-legged, independent and articulate, Janie Crawford sets out to be her own person—no mean feat for a black woman in the ’30s. Janie’s quest for identity takes her through three marriages and into a journey back to her roots.

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4. The Street

by Ann Petry

  • Year Published: 1946
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, literary, challenging, reflective, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    The first novel by an Black American woman to sell more than a million copies

Summary (from Goodreads):

The Street tells the poignant, often heartbreaking story of Lutie Johnson, a young black woman, and her spirited struggle to raise her son amid the violence, poverty, and racial dissonance of Harlem in the late 1940s. Originally published in 1946 and hailed by critics as a masterwork, The Street was Ann Petry’s first novel, a beloved bestseller with more than a million copies in print. Its haunting tale still resonates today.

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5. A Raisin in the Sun

by Lorraine Hansberry

  • Year Published: 1959
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, classics, play, emotional, reflective, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    The first play written by a black woman to be produced on Broadway and won the New York Drama Critics Circle Award

Summary (from Storygraph):

First produced in 1959, A Raisin in the Sun was awarded the New York Drama Critics Circle Award and hailed as a watershed in American drama. Not only a pioneering work by an African-American playwright—Lorraine Hansberry’s play was also a radically new representation of black life, resolutely authentic, fiercely unsentimental, and unflinching in its vision of what happens to people whose dreams are constantly deferred.

In her portrait of an embattled Chicago family, Hansberry anticipated issues that range from generational clashes to the civil rights and women’s movements. She also posed the essential questions—about identity, justice, and moral responsibility—at the heart of these great struggles. The result is an American classic.

You can read an excerpt from the play here.

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Final thoughts

As cliche as it may be, Black History is not only for the month of February. I would encourage you to intentionally seek out authors from diverse backgrounds, including Black Americans and other Black individuals from around the world.

This is just a small list, but as you intentionally pursue a diverse reading list, you’ll find more and more books to read. Sometimes it can be overwhelming, so just start small by picking out a few books to incorporate throughout the year.

Personally, I think the most important part is to be intentional about who and what you’re reading. Take time to notice what you’ve read recently and see who the authors and characters are. Then start to incorporate other perspectives to broaden your reading experience.

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Five Classic Books Written by Black American Women

Are you hoping to read more classics this year? Here are some suggestions for Black History month, specifically from women!

I wanted to highlight classics that we don’t hear about as much so that you can read from diverse perspectives. I think it’s important to read from a variety of sources.

These five classics are from Black American women and cover various genres, from memoirs/autobiographies to poetry and fiction. All of these are older classics, having been written before the year 1900.

Photo by Thomas Kelley on Unsplash

Five classic books from Black American Women

This is a list of five older classics from Black American authors to read for Black History Month:

  1. Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral by Phillis Wheatley (1773)
    First professional Black American woman poet in America
  2. The Bondwoman’s Narrative by Hannah Crafts (written around 1853-1861)
    Only novel by a fugitive slave woman, however the manuscript was not published until 2002
  3. Our Nig: Sketches from the Life of a Free Black by Harriet E. Wilson (1859)
    This was long considered the first novel published by a Black American woman in North America, but The Bondwoman’s Narrative may have been written a few years earlier.
  4. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs (1861)
    Autobiography of a fugitive slave
  5. Iola Leroy by Frances Watkins Harper (1892)
    One of the first novels published by a Black American woman

I’ve listed them started from the oldest to the most recent. Keep reading to find out more about each one.

1. Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral

by Phillis Wheatley

  • Year Published: 1773
  • Language: English
  • Storygraph Categories:
    nonfiction, classics, poetry, challenging, emotional, reflective, slow-paced
  • Importance:
    First professional Black American woman poet in America

Phillis Wheatley was born in West Africa, but was kidnapped and sold to the Wheatley family in Boston when she was seven or eight. In addition to her domestic obligations, the Wheatley family did provide her with an extensive education and encouraged her to pursue writing. However, she was not emancipated/manumitted (set free) from the family until after she published her book of poetry.

Phillis Wheatley was the first Black American woman to publish poetry, and considered the first to make a living from her writing. Despite having to be interviewed by 18 prominent men in Boston to prove that she wrote her own poetry, no one in the Americas was willing to publish her poetry. She was finally able to publish this collection of poetry in London in 1773.

Despite international recognition, she was unable to find anyone to publish any further volumes of poetry. She was able to publish some poetry in pamphlets and newspapers, but only in limited amounts. Unfortunately, she ended up dying in abject poverty, with many of her poems lost to history.

Read more about Phillis Wheatley here.

Summary (from Goodreads):

This moving collection of poems by Phillis Wheatley is intended to inspire Christians and tribute various believers who had recently been deceased. Published in 1773, this collection brings together many of Wheatley’s finest writings addressed to figures of the day. She writes evocative verse to academic establishments, military officers and even the King of England, with other verses discussing various subjects in verse form, offering condolences and verse commemorating recent events, or the death of a recent loved one.

Recognized as one of the first black poets to be widely appreciated in the Western world, Phillis Wheatley was a devoted Christian whose talent with the English language impressed and awed her peers. Wheatley took plenty of influence from past works of poetry, such as Ovid’s Metamorphosis. Several of the poems in this collection mention or allude to such masterpieces, the voracious absorption of which helped Phillis Wheatley to learn and hone her creative abilities.

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2. The Bondwoman’s Narrative

by Hannah Crafts

  • Written around 1853-1861
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, historical, reflective, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    Only novel by a fugitive slave woman, however the manuscript was not published until 2002

The Bondwoman’s Narrative wasn’t published until 2002. The manuscript was bought by Henry Louis Gates Jr. in 2001, who then researched, verified, and authenticated the source of the manuscript. Based on his research, he was able to confirm it was written by a Black woman (and fugitive slave) before 1861.

In order to identify the author of this manuscript, extensive efforts were needed by historians. They were finally able to identify Hannah Bond (Hannah Craft was her pen name) as the author. She was enslaved by the Wheeler family in North Carolina until she was able to escape in 1857 and settle in New Jersey.

Summary (from Storygraph):

Possibly the first novel written by a black woman slave, this work is both a historically important literary event and a gripping autobiographical story in its own right.

When her master is betrothed to a woman who conceals a tragic secret, Hannah Crafts, a young slave on a wealthy North Carolina plantation, runs away in a bid for her freedom up North. Pursued by slave hunters, imprisoned by a mysterious and cruel captor, held by sympathetic strangers, and forced to serve a demanding new mistress, she finally makes her way to freedom in New Jersey. Her compelling story provides a fascinating view of American life in the mid-1800s and the literary conventions of the time. Written in the 1850’s by a runaway slave, THE BONDSWOMAN’S NARRATIVE is a provocative literary landmark and a significant historical event that will captivate a diverse audience.

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3. Our Nig: Sketches from the Life of a Free Black

by Harriet E. Wilson (1859)

  • Year Published: 1859
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, classics, historical, dark, emotional, hopeful, slow-paced
  • Importance:
    This was long considered the first novel published by a Black American woman in North America, but The Bondwoman’s Narrative may have been written a few years earlier.

An autobiographical novel written by a free person of colour in New Hampshire.

Harriet E. Wilson was the first Black American to publish a novel on the North American continent. It was published anonymously in Boston, Massachusetts in 1859.

Harriet was orphaned as a young child, and forced into indentured servitude until the age of 18. Indentured servitude was a common way to deal with orphans, as they were provided necessities (food, boarding, etc.) in return for their labour. After she turned 18, she worked as a seamstress, housekeeper, and even a lecturer for the Spiritualist circles. She often struggled to make a living, and there’s no evidence she wrote anything else for publication.

Some scholars believe that this novel didn’t get much support from abolitionists because it didn’t follow the typical slave narrative and showed that even in the free north Blacks were still oppressed and suffered from racism.

Summary (from Goodreads):

Our Nig is the tale of a mixed-race girl, Frado, abandoned by her white mother after the death of the child’s black father. Frado becomes the servant of the Bellmonts, a lower-middle-class white family in the free North, while slavery is still legal in the South, and suffers numerous abuses in their household. Frado’s story is a tragic one; having left the Bellmonts, she eventually marries a black fugitive slave, who later abandons her.

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4. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl

by Harriet Jacobs

  • Year Published: 1861
  • Storygraph Categories:
    nonfiction, classics, gender, history, memoir, race, dark, emotional, sad, medium-paced
  • Importance:
    Autobiography of a fugitive slave

An autobiography by Harriet Jacobs, who was both a mother and a fugitive slave. Harriet published the autobiography under the pseudonym Linda Brent.

The book covers Harriet’s life both as a slave and how she gained freedom for herself and her children. Harriet discusses gender-related issues for women slaves, as they faced sexual abuse and tremendous obstacles when taking care of their children, including the constant threat of them being sold away.

Harriet also directly appealed to white women to truly comprehend the horrors of slavery and support all women based on a uniting sisterhood. The book is considered a feminist text as it highlights the sexual abuse that was used as a tool of the white patriarchy, shows women supporting other women despite a difference in race and class, and brought the topic of sexual abuse of slaves into public discussions of slavery.

Summary (from Storygraph & Goodreads):

The true story of an individual’s struggle for self-identity, self-preservation, and freedom, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl remains among the few extant slave narratives written by a woman. This autobiographical account chronicles the remarkable odyssey of Harriet Jacobs (1813-1897) whose dauntless spirit and faith carried her from a life of servitude and degradation in North Carolina to liberty and reunion with her children in the North.

Written and published in 1861 after Jacobs’ harrowing escape from a vile and predatory master, the memoir delivers a powerful and unflinching portrayal of the abuses and hypocrisy of the master-slave relationship. Jacobs writes frankly of the horrors she suffered as a slave, her eventual escape after several unsuccessful attempts, and her seven years in self-imposed exile, hiding in a coffin-like “garret” attached to her grandmother’s porch.

A rare firsthand account of a courageous woman’s determination and endurance, this inspirational story also represents a valuable historical record of the continuing battle for freedom and the preservation of family.

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5. Iola Leroy (Or, Shadows Uplifted)

by Frances Watkins Harper

  • Year Published: 1892
  • Storygraph Categories:
    fiction, classics, historical, emotional, reflective, slow-paced
  • Importance:
    One of the first novels published by an Black American woman

Frances Watkins Harper was one of the first Black woman to publish a book in the USA. She also had significant literary success. Her second book of poems, “Poems on Miscellaneous Subjects” in 1854, was considered a commercial success. She also published a short story, “The Two Offers”, in the The Anglo-African Newspaper, making history as the first short story published by a Black woman.

She was born free in Baltimore, Maryland in 1825 when Maryland was still a slave state. Both her parents died when she was three, and she was raised by her maternal aunt and uncle. Her uncle was a civil rights activist and abolitionist, having a huge impact on Frances’ life and work.

In addition to her writing, Frances was an American abolitionist, suffragist, activist, and public lecturer. She took an intersectional approach to her activism, looking at both African American civil rights and women’s rights.

Iola Leroy was published in 1892 when Frances was 67. In the novel, Frances dealt with many of the serious social issues of the time, including women’s education, passing as a mixed-race individual, reconstruction, abolition and more.

Summary (from Goodreads):

A landmark account of the African American experience during the Civil War and its aftermath.

First published in 1892, this stirring novel by the great writer and activist Frances Harper tells the story of the young daughter of a wealthy Mississippi planter who travels to the North to attend school, only to be sold into slavery in the South when it is discovered that she has Negro blood. After she is freed by the Union army, she works to reunify her family and embrace her heritage, committing herself to improving the conditions for blacks in America.

Through her fascinating characters-including Iola’s brother, who fights at the front in a colored regiment-Harper weaves a vibrant and provocative chronicle of the Civil War and its consequences through African American eyes in this critical contribution to the nation’s literature.

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Final thoughts

I personally think it’s important to read from different time periods, just as it’s important to read from different countries. History is part of who we are as the human race, it has shaped us into who we are now.

But too often the literature promoted from those eras are only from certain perspectives (think old white men, and sometimes old white women). It makes sense that those were the individuals valued as literary contributors. They were typically the ones who were respected and resonated with individuals who held socioeconomic and political power (those of similar demographics).

Reading, writing, and literature were considered elite and superfluous for most individuals, and thus access was restricted. But the restricted access makes these works of art from other perspectives so much more valuable. These written works were produced against all odds and have still survived!

It makes me so sad to think of all the incredible works of art that were lost to history because people didn’t have access to time, resources, or education to develop and refine their skills. Or even just those that were written but never shared or preserved due to limited social or literary support, like the many poems of Phillis Wheatley that never got published.

Anyways, all that to say, these perspectives are incredibly valuable and I believe that reading classics should include a wide range of perspectives.

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