![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
How To Be A Woman by Caitlin Moran
Dec. 21st, 2011 11:22 pmThe Blurb On The Back:
1913 – Suffragette throws herself under the King’s horse.
1970 – Feminists storm Miss World.
NOW – Caitlin Moran rewrites The Female Eunuch from a bar stool and demand to know why pants are getting smaller.
There’s never been a better time to be a woman: we have the vote and the Pill, and we haven’t been burnt as witches since 1727. However, a few nagging questions to do remain …
Why are we supposed to get Brazilians? Should we use Botox? Do men secretly hate us? What should you call your vagina? Why does your bra hurt? And why does everyone ask you when you’re going to have a baby?
Part memoir, part rant, Caitlin Moran answers these questions and more in How To Be A Woman - following her from her terrible 13th birthday (“I am 13 stone, have no friends, and boys throw gravel at me when they see me”) through adolescence, the workplace, strip-clubs, love, being fat, abortion, TopShop, motherhood and beyond.
( The Review (Cut For Spoilers): )
The Verdict:
Caitlin Moran’s book is part breezy memoir, part breezier feminist polemic that’s told in a breathy, chatty style, which is accessible but not for you if you’re looking for a serious book on feminism. For me, the best parts are those about Moran’s childhood and her relationship with her family, but the actual feminist sections were more of a mixed bag and although I didn’t agree with everything she said (and found some of it contradictory and lacking in analysis) it did help me to form my own opinions on the same subject. It’s for this reason that the book’s worth a look.
1970 – Feminists storm Miss World.
NOW – Caitlin Moran rewrites The Female Eunuch from a bar stool and demand to know why pants are getting smaller.
There’s never been a better time to be a woman: we have the vote and the Pill, and we haven’t been burnt as witches since 1727. However, a few nagging questions to do remain …
Why are we supposed to get Brazilians? Should we use Botox? Do men secretly hate us? What should you call your vagina? Why does your bra hurt? And why does everyone ask you when you’re going to have a baby?
Part memoir, part rant, Caitlin Moran answers these questions and more in How To Be A Woman - following her from her terrible 13th birthday (“I am 13 stone, have no friends, and boys throw gravel at me when they see me”) through adolescence, the workplace, strip-clubs, love, being fat, abortion, TopShop, motherhood and beyond.
( The Review (Cut For Spoilers): )
The Verdict:
Caitlin Moran’s book is part breezy memoir, part breezier feminist polemic that’s told in a breathy, chatty style, which is accessible but not for you if you’re looking for a serious book on feminism. For me, the best parts are those about Moran’s childhood and her relationship with her family, but the actual feminist sections were more of a mixed bag and although I didn’t agree with everything she said (and found some of it contradictory and lacking in analysis) it did help me to form my own opinions on the same subject. It’s for this reason that the book’s worth a look.
