While I prepare my posts on where I went on spring vacation, I have decided to drop this post about the last two books I read…continuing on with feminist literature.
“White Teeth,” Zadie Smith
Smith’s debut novel is stunningly complex and follows the friendship and subsequent lives of two men, one British (who marries a Jamaican) and the other Bengali, who met in World War II and continued on to have families, whose children grow up together. Its rich layers of details include Jehovah’s Witnesses, eugenics, Muslims, lapsed Catholics, and colonialism, and ends with a literal (and metaphorical) brown rat who was genetically modified to turn albino escaping from his white creator. The narration is taken in turns by each of the characters and provides a profound view of life as the other.
“We Should All Be Feminists,” Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Adichie’s essay, based on her extremely popular TedTalk (which you can watch here on Youtube https://youtu.be/hg3umXU_qWc), is a basically a treatise explaining why feminism is not only important, but why both men and women are needed in the conversation and struggle that will result in changing the damaging gender norms that we have in place. I watched the TedTalk months ago, and recently reread the essay. They are one and the same, so don’t feel guilty for only watching the video. 😉