Book bans are taking over America. Even Margaret Atwood wrote about her books being banned in schools, remaining confident that young readers would find a way to a copy of The Handmaid’s Tale. It’s never been easier to access books in the history of humanity. But why are books being banned? What do we hope…
Even literature can’t escape capitalism. It’s easy to forget that the world of literature isn’t a ruthless, capitalist enterprise like Facebook or Amazon. How can it be, when it churns out products that help us escape into better worlds and meet better people? Let’s talk about how the Penguin Random House merger with Simon & Schuster could affect readers everywhere.
If you’re a millennial like me, you grew up on happy endings peddled by Disney: Sleeping Beauty, Aladdin, Little Mermaid, Cinderella, Snow White… all stories whose climaxes hinged on the heroics of a Prince Charming who isn’t present for most of the story. I now realize there’s a reason their names aren’t even in the titles. The repercussions of growing up with these narratives became apparent as I aged into heterosexual womanhood: Prince Charmings do not exist.
Yet somehow, romance novels continue to tell us otherwise. I think that does both women and men a great disservice. Here’s why.
Read this book if you’re looking for a contemporary, relatable, but critical lens into the everyday experience of being a woman. I highly recommend this to men.*
Here are my Three Takeaways on Roxane Gay’s Bad Feminist.
I spent the last month digging into some feminist works like Roxane Gay’s Bad Feminist and Rebecca Solnit’s Men Explain Things To Me. Some of these authors’ experiences struck a chord, leaving me to reflect on the representation of feminists in fiction. How did some of my favorite heroines balance both femininity and feminist ideals?
