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‘Whom to marry and when will it happen – these two questions define every woman’s existence.’
So begins Spinster, a revelatory look at the pleasures, problems and possibilities of living independently in the 21st century, reconsidering what it means – what it could mean – for women to ‘have it all’.
‘I wish I could give this wise and subtle book to my thirty-year-old self; she would have taken heart . . . Bold and intelligent’ Rebecca Mead, author of My Life in Middlemarch
‘A triumph’ Malcolm Gladwell
‘Women of the world listen here: drop whatever you’re doing and read Kate Bolick’s marvelous meditation on what it means to be female at the dawn of the 21st century’ Joanna Rakoff, author of My Salinger Year
‘Moving, insightful and important’ Elif Batuman, author of The Possessed
So begins Spinster, a revelatory look at the pleasures, problems and possibilities of living independently in the 21st century, reconsidering what it means – what it could mean – for women to ‘have it all’.
‘I wish I could give this wise and subtle book to my thirty-year-old self; she would have taken heart . . . Bold and intelligent’ Rebecca Mead, author of My Life in Middlemarch
‘A triumph’ Malcolm Gladwell
‘Women of the world listen here: drop whatever you’re doing and read Kate Bolick’s marvelous meditation on what it means to be female at the dawn of the 21st century’ Joanna Rakoff, author of My Salinger Year
‘Moving, insightful and important’ Elif Batuman, author of The Possessed
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Reviews
Kate Bolick's Spinster will take your breath away. Writing with a bold vision and in incandescent prose, Bolick gives us a user's guide to going solo - and a gorgeous work of cultural criticism.
Kate Bolick brings a bracing feminist consciousness to bear on the lives of five unconventional women of the past and on her own young life in the twenty-first century. She writes about the dilemmas of love and work - then and now - with rare perspicacity and poignancy.
Kate Bolick's Spinster will take your breath away. Writing with a bold vision and in incandescent prose, Bolick gives us a user's guide to going solo - and a gorgeous work of cultural criticism.
What happens when you don't get married? Setting out to answer this question, Kate Bolick has written a moving, insightful, and important inquiry into how women's lives are narrated - not just in poems, novels, biographies, and memoirs, but also in our own heads, every day, as we make the constant stream of decisions that constitute a human life. Ambitious in the best way, Spinster made me think differently about everything from novelistic plot to the meaning of furniture.
Women of the world, listen here: Drop whatever you're doing and read Kate Bolick's marvelous meditation on what it means to be female at the dawn of the 21st century. Part self-investigation, part social history, this utterly singular book reminded me, in its warmth and wit, of Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat Pray Love and Rebecca Mead's My Life in Middlemarch, but ultimately Bolick's restless, razor-like intelligence calls to mind none other than Betty Friedan. And like The Feminine Mystique, Spinster will make you re-think your entire life, if not radically change it.
Kate Bolick brings a bracing feminist consciousness to bear on the lives of five unconventional women of the past and on her own young life in the twenty-first century. She writes about the dilemmas of love and work - then and now - with rare perspicacity and poignancy.
In Spinster, her wise and subtle memoir, Kate Bolick explores that freighted term-and the often-maligned woman to whom it is attached - and deftly, persuasively reclaims it. In telling the stories of her literary 'awakeners' - five vividly conjured women who escaped the conventional ties of marriage and family-and in elegantly weaving cultural history into her own personal progress to maturity, Bolick shows by argument and example that the single life is not a predicament to be escaped, but a distinctive, demanding, rewarding form of freedom. I wish I could give this book to my thirty-year-old self; she would have taken heart and inspiration from Bolick's bold and intelligent self-examination - not necessarily to follow her path, but to be tenderly reminded of this simple but easily neglected truth: that there is another way to want to be.
[A] powerful memoir...Bolick's intense and moving combination of personal, historical, and cultural narratives will inspire readers-especially women-to think about what they want their own lives to be, and how close they are to their goals.
[A] powerful memoir...Bolick's intense and moving combination of personal, historical, and cultural narratives will inspire readers-especially women-to think about what they want their own lives to be, and how close they are to their goals.
What happens when you don't get married? Setting out to answer this question, Kate Bolick has written a moving, insightful, and important inquiry into how women's lives are narrated - not just in poems, novels, biographies, and memoirs, but also in our own heads, every day, as we make the constant stream of decisions that constitute a human life. Ambitious in the best way, Spinster made me think differently about everything from novelistic plot to the meaning of furniture.
[A] powerful memoir...Bolick's intense and moving combination of personal, historical, and cultural narratives will inspire readers-especially women-to think about what they want their own lives to be, and how close they are to their goals.
Refreshingly bold and incisive... As Bolick traces her evolution into a woman unapologetic for her choices and unafraid of her own personal freedom, she also reclaims the derogatory word 'spinster' for all females, married or not... A sexy, eloquent, well-written study/memoir.
What happens when you don't get married? Setting out to answer this question, Kate Bolick has written a moving, insightful, and important inquiry into how women's lives are narrated - not just in poems, novels, biographies, and memoirs, but also in our own heads, every day, as we make the constant stream of decisions that constitute a human life. Ambitious in the best way, Spinster made me think differently about everything from novelistic plot to the meaning of furniture.
Kate Bolick's Spinster will take your breath away. Writing with a bold vision and in incandescent prose, Bolick gives us a user's guide to going solo - and a gorgeous work of cultural criticism.
Spinster is a triumph, a provocative and moving exploration of what it means for a woman to chart her own course.
Refreshingly bold and incisive... As Bolick traces her evolution into a woman unapologetic for her choices and unafraid of her own personal freedom, she also reclaims the derogatory word 'spinster' for all females, married or not... A sexy, eloquent, well-written study/memoir.
Women of the world, listen here: Drop whatever you're doing and read Kate Bolick's marvelous meditation on what it means to be female at the dawn of the 21st century. Part self-investigation, part social history, this utterly singular book reminded me, in its warmth and wit, of Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat Pray Love and Rebecca Mead's My Life in Middlemarch, but ultimately Bolick's restless, razor-like intelligence calls to mind none other than Betty Friedan. And like The Feminine Mystique, Spinster will make you re-think your entire life, if not radically change it.
In Spinster, her wise and subtle memoir, Kate Bolick explores that freighted term-and the often-maligned woman to whom it is attached - and deftly, persuasively reclaims it. In telling the stories of her literary 'awakeners' - five vividly conjured women who escaped the conventional ties of marriage and family-and in elegantly weaving cultural history into her own personal progress to maturity, Bolick shows by argument and example that the single life is not a predicament to be escaped, but a distinctive, demanding, rewarding form of freedom. I wish I could give this book to my thirty-year-old self; she would have taken heart and inspiration from Bolick's bold and intelligent self-examination - not necessarily to follow her path, but to be tenderly reminded of this simple but easily neglected truth: that there is another way to want to be.
In Spinster, her wise and subtle memoir, Kate Bolick explores that freighted term-and the often-maligned woman to whom it is attached - and deftly, persuasively reclaims it. In telling the stories of her literary 'awakeners' - five vividly conjured women who escaped the conventional ties of marriage and family-and in elegantly weaving cultural history into her own personal progress to maturity, Bolick shows by argument and example that the single life is not a predicament to be escaped, but a distinctive, demanding, rewarding form of freedom. I wish I could give this book to my thirty-year-old self; she would have taken heart and inspiration from Bolick's bold and intelligent self-examination - not necessarily to follow her path, but to be tenderly reminded of this simple but easily neglected truth: that there is another way to want to be.
Spinster is a triumph, a provocative and moving exploration of what it means for a woman to chart her own course.
Refreshingly bold and incisive... As Bolick traces her evolution into a woman unapologetic for her choices and unafraid of her own personal freedom, she also reclaims the derogatory word 'spinster' for all females, married or not... A sexy, eloquent, well-written study/memoir.
Women of the world, listen here: Drop whatever you're doing and read Kate Bolick's marvelous meditation on what it means to be female at the dawn of the 21st century. Part self-investigation, part social history, this utterly singular book reminded me, in its warmth and wit, of Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat Pray Love and Rebecca Mead's My Life in Middlemarch, but ultimately Bolick's restless, razor-like intelligence calls to mind none other than Betty Friedan. And like The Feminine Mystique, Spinster will make you re-think your entire life, if not radically change it.
Spinster is a triumph, a provocative and moving exploration of what it means for a woman to chart her own course.
Kate Bolick brings a bracing feminist consciousness to bear on the lives of five unconventional women of the past and on her own young life in the twenty-first century. She writes about the dilemmas of love and work - then and now - with rare perspicacity and poignancy.