Name: Difficult Women
ISBN: 9781784709730

HELEN. LEWIS

** A BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week** ** A Sunday Times bestseller** Well-behaved women don't make history: difficult women do. Strikers in saris. Bomb-throwing suffragettes. The pioneer of the refuge movement who became a men's rights activist. Forget feel-good heroines: meet the feminist trailblazers who have been airbrushed from history for being 'difficult' - and discover how they made a difference. Here are their stories in all their shocking, funny and unvarnished glory. 'This is the antidote to saccharine you-go-girl fluff. Effortlessly erudite and funny' Caroline Criado-Perez 'Compulsive, rigorous, unforgettable, hilarious and devastating' Hadley Freeman

A History of Feminism in 11 Fights

Difficult Women

Helen Lewis

'All the history you need to understand why you're so furious, angry and still hopeful about being a woman now' Caitlin Moran Well-behaved women don't make history: difficult women do. Feminism's success is down to complicated, contradictory, imperfect women, who fought each other as well as fighting for equal rights. Helen Lewis argues that too many of these pioneers have been whitewashed or forgotten in our modern search for feel-good, inspirational heroines. It's time to reclaim the history of feminism as a history of difficult women. In this book, you'll meet the working-class suffragettes who advocated bombings and arson; the princess who discovered why so many women were having bad sex; the 'striker in a sari' who terrified Margaret Thatcher; and the lesbian politician who outraged the country. Taking the story up to the present with the twenty-first-century campaign for abortion services, Helen Lewis reveals the unvarnished - and unfinished - history of women's rights. Drawing on archival research and interviews, Difficult Women is a funny, fearless and sometimes shocking narrative history, which shows why the feminist movement has succeeded - and what it should do next. The battle is difficult, and we must be difficult too. 'This is the antidote to saccharine you-go-girl fluff. Effortlessly erudite and funny' Caroline Criado-Perez 'Compulsive, rigorous, unforgettable, hilarious and devastating' Hadley Freeman **A NEW STATESMAN BOOK TO READ IN 2020 AND OBSERVER NON-FICTION BOOK TO LOOK OUT FOR IN 2020*

Rose Stanley

Bookopolothon: Book the Third
Prompt: History

Oof, this is a difficult one to review. 

Let me start by saying trans readers will probably want to skip the chapter on 'Love' altogether (if they haven't already been put off by the name on the cover - I believe for those who are on Twitter, Ms Lewis' reputation as a...let's say 'gender critical feminist'...precedes her*). 

The chapter on Safety is also difficult reading, as Lewis veers off the topic of domestic violence to complain about being a victim of cancel culture...yes, I'm as confused as you are.

It's a damn shame because I otherwise loved this book. It's generally well written, with the right balance of facts which make you want to tell the patriarchy to eff all the way off (again) and snarky footnotes which make you laugh out loud (I particularly liked the one explaining what a 'spherical bastard' is, a term which will definitely be entering my everyday vocab). It also introduced me to a number of women I hadn't heard of, and gave me more backstory on women I had.

Overall, a good reminder of how far we've come - and how progress rarely happens without a struggle.

*FYI Ms Lewis, if you, like me, identify as the gender you are on your birth certificate, then yes, you are cisgender. Likewise, if others identify as a gender other than the one on their birth certificate, they're transgender. Neither word is a slur unless you make it one. Hope that clears that up?

Well-behaved women don’t make history: difficult women do. Feminism’s success is down to complicated, contradictory, imperfect women, who fought each other as well as fighting for equal rights. Helen Lewis argues that too many of these pioneers have been whitewashed or forgotten in our modern search for feel-good, inspirational heroines. It’s time to reclaim the history of feminism as a history of difficult women. In this book, you’ll meet the working-class suffragettes who advocated bombings and arson; the princess who discovered why so many women were having bad sex; the pioneer of the refuge movement who became a men’s rights activist; the ‘striker in a sari’ who terrified Margaret Thatcher; the wronged Victorian wife who definitely wasn’t sleeping with the prime minister; and the lesbian politician who outraged the country. Taking the story up to the present with the twenty-first-century campaign for abortion services, Helen Lewis reveals the unvarnished – and unfinished – history of women’s rights. Drawing on archival research and interviews, Difficult Women is a funny, fearless and sometimes shocking narrative history, which shows why the feminist movement has succeeded – and what it should do next. The battle is difficult, and we must be difficult too.

Difficult Women A History of Feminism in 11 Fights

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