INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY // READING RECOMMENDATIONS

The 8th of March is International Women's Day! A day when we appreciate the generally undervalued half of the human race, and everything they do for the world, both on the micro scale, within the home and the family, right up to the macro, kicking-ass in government and taking bold leaps in the scientific, artistic and political spheres.

  Women have provided some of my most formative reading over the years, and so I'm offering a few recommendations of books written by women, about women, that I have not only loved, but that have fundamentally changed the way I think about gender and female-ness. Enjoy!


MARGARET ATWOOD . THE HANDMAID'S TALE 

  So I first encountered Margaret Atwood when I stole The Handmaid's Tale from the office of my GCSE English teacher. Nearly ten years later this iconic text is still one of my most beloved books. My original copy has been read countless times and is so battered, scribbled in and worn out that is barely readable, but my lovely friend Kieran kindly sent me this beautiful hardback copy for my birthday.
    The success of the HULU show means that we're all familiar with the basic premise of THT, but the book is so haunting, and depicts the ways in which Offred clings to her identity in small acts of defiance and ownership of her body, in ways that the screen can't quite capture. In a saturated market of dystopian heroines, Offred is the still waters that run deep, and a different kind of revolutionary hero.

CASEY PLETT . A SAFE GIRL TO LOVE

   I'm a little ashamed to admit that I've read very little fiction by trans authors. I've certainly read biographies and articles by trans writers, but I believe that experiencing the art made by someone in a particular group is just as important as seeking education about that group. A Safe Girl to Love is a beautiful collection of funny, witty, modern short stories each focusing on the lives of young trans women.
   Some deal directly with the character as trans, and facing the difficulties that trans people experience in daily life, whereas others don't really touch on the topic at all, instead defining their character in excess of being transgender, and showing so clearly how important it is that people be recognised both in terms of and outside of an othering identity. I really recommend this for beautiful bittersweet reading about love, friendship and finding your way. (ps if you'd like to read more fiction by trans authors Charlie Jane Anders is amazing and I discuss her debut novel here!)

EIMEAR MCBRIDE . A GIRL IS A HALF FORMED THING 

   So I won't lie, this isn't an easy read. Both in terms of it's subject matter and it's writing style, this book can be a tough endeavour, but I found that once I committed myself, it was so rewarding. McBride's debut novel tells the story of a young girl growing up in Ireland and is what I can only describe as a grotty and quietly devastating coming of age story.
   It is written in a style that seems to imitate the liminal space before thought becomes speech, and because of this all the things our protagonist experiences are narrated in way that is both uncomfortably intimate but still strangely distant. It's hard to describe this novel, I can only really say that I don't think I'll ever forget how much it affected me.

TONI MORRISON . THE BLUEST EYE 

   Sticking with the short and the miserable, if you've never read Toni Morrison you are missing out. The woman is a master of her craft and her debut novel might actually be my favourite of them all. Morrison lets a camera roll on the tragic life of the Breedloves, a poor black family living in America in the 1940s. The novel focuses a lot on Percola, the nine year old daughter, who is black, ugly and wishes with all her heart that she had pretty blue eyes like the blonde babydoll toys she sees in shops.
   The novel is narrated partly from the perspective of Claudia, another young black girl living with her sister in the same neighbourhood. The Bluest Eye focuses on how white supremacist standards taint every aspect of these little girls lives, as well as the black males and/or adults they encounter, and how this huge overarching power system can distil down and destroy the life of one innocent little girl who deserved so much better. This book made me angry, but that was entirely the point.

MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT . MARIA OR 'THE WRONGS OF WOMEN' 
   Onto some classics - Mary Wollstonecraft wrote many things, a lot of them about how ladies are treated like crap, most notably A Vindication of the Rights of Women, but I wanted to talk about a little-known and unfinished novella that I read in my undergraduate years called Maria. Written from a first person perspective, it tells the story of Maria, a woman who has been locked away in a Gothic insane asylum and had her baby taken away from her by her tyrannical husband.
   In under a hundred pages Wollstonecraft creates a damning insight into how women suffer in a society that forces them into dependence on men and, radically for her time, gives both a story and a voice to a lower class woman who shows how this tragic injustice crosses class lines and affects women at every level. The ending is fragmented, as Mary never fully finalised it, BUT without wanting to spoil it, eighteenth century cross-class same-sex parenting anyone?

DAPHNE DU MAURIER . FRENCHMAN'S CREEK

  Finishing on something a little more light hearted. Du Maurier is well known for writing Rebecca and Jamaica Inn, two beautiful and gothic dramas, but she also wrote Frenchman's Creek, effectively a trashy period romance. The heroine of this novel, Dona, is tired of being a bored regency era socialite and runs away to Cornwall, where she begins a love affair with the sexy French pirate hiding out in the caves near her new home.
   This is an actual delight. You have to give it just a little leeway for some potentially problematic romantic elements (published in 1941 so y'know) but frankly compared to some of the nonsense we get told is 'romance' today it's totally fine. I read this coming out of quite a heavy period in my life and it just made me smile the whole way through, and started a love affair with my girl Daffers.


Have a great International Women's Day! Remember to tell an awesome lady in your life just how cool she is!

Thank you for reading.