Donne di Tipo 1 - Roberta Casasole

 

Picked this book because of its cover. A staunch feminist colleague of mine (who has taught me a couple of valuable lessons) uses a picture by the same artist as her avatar, so I just assumed this book would have been at least insightful. 

Instead, this was without a doubt the worst book I've read this year. 

Obviously, you don't need to like a book's main character in order to like the book, but you have to find him/her at the very least remotely interesting. Instead, the book's protagonist is a selfish entitled brat with misguided ideas about her academic value. Still, I can find a way to live with that.  

What I can't live with is the constant feeling that the author finds her creation (and herself, by default?) hilarious. It's just irritating. 

Also: what kind of supposed feminist spends her time talking about how hot someone is?!?

The World According to Garp - John Irving

 

What a book! 

The World According to Garp is a beautifully written (and at times laugh out loud funny) book about, well, the world: sex (consensual and not) and sexuality are the obvious themes, but in the epic family history there is so much space for love (often misplaced, misunderstood and misguided, but still love) and loss (the chapter after the car accident, where at the end the readers realize that their attention was fully devoted to the survivors without feeling the absence of one voice, contains some of the most hauntingly dramatic passages I've ever read). 

Despite the fact that my main literary advisor - yes, my mum... - told me to read pretty much every John Irving book straight away, I'll try to pace myself with him in the upcoming months as I don't want to overdo it and forget how much I loved this novel. 

A Room of One's Own - Virginia Woolf

  

I actually read an Italian edition of this book, left behind by a neighbour in London. Its cover page didn't have the moody blue tones of this Penguin Modern Classic. Instead, it was all very pink and flowery. How very fitting. 

Having previously read (or, more appropriately, struggled to read) To the Lighthouse, my expectations were suitably low, not out of dislike for Woolf, but rather out of my own problems following her prose. I'm happy to report that said low expectations were widely exceeded, chiefly because in this essay Woolf appears more accessible, self-aware and still relevant to today's contest than what I would have ever imagined.

The Woman Destroyed – Simone De Beauvoir

Maybe this is just the exception to the rule, maybe I’m inclined to like this book more than other feminist works because of my walks through De Beauvoir Town (North London) on my way to basketball practice, maybe I liked it because she was the best at her trade, maybe because it’s a series of short stories and, because of that, it’s less daunting than it could have been, or maybe I simply read this book at a time when I was more open to a different kind of literature from the one I normally enjoy.

Or probably it’s just that the final monologue is simply so, so beautifully written.

Una Donna – Sibilla Aleramo

 

I have already mentioned my great limits when it comes to the appreciation of much feminine literature, but early feminist literature is just beyond me. I understand that this book was groundbreaking and a key step in the process of emancipation of women, in particular in Italy, but I simply found it unreadable.

It’s a short book, a very short one, yet one that I struggled so very much with. I found the prose incredibly heavy and convoluted and, while the plot is clearly interesting and touching, I would have probably preferred it coming from an omniscient third person objective narrator and, I’m afraid, a male one. Sympathetic and empathetic to the feminist cause, but a male one. There. I said. Does that make me an awful human being? Maybe...