Wednesday, October 01, 2008

Fascinating Womanhood?


For years I've been advocating a mass-market paperback called Fascinating Womanhood, by Helen Andelin, to all and sundry who would put up with it. But over the weekend I learned of an even older source - a charming little book published in the 1920s, from which Andelin gets most of her ideas, and, I'm very sorry to say, most of her content - unattributed.

Like Andelin's book, it is called Fascinating Womanhood. The author is anonymous, which intrigues me a bit.

You have to make some allowances for the period in which this was written - the writing style itself is simplistic to the point of feeling patronizing - but there's a lot of quality there, too. Human nature, after all, doesn't change.

Do, please, check it out.

And a special thinks to Penelope for introducing me to this booklet.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oy, Laura! When I was first married my mother-in-law gave me a copy of this book. She used the "techniques" on all the men in her life--including my husband. But, I found the book very disturbing--to do things like tell a guy he looks like some movie star--sounds like manipulative lying. The book seems so dis-honest, manipulating men with your feminity, I think it's kinda not nice :( And I would hate a man manipulating me with his masculinity.

Elisabeth said...

Tara, I don't remember manipulations of the nature you describe. To me, the great value of the book is that it taught basic psychology for understanding men - their need for acceptance, appreciation and admiration - and also affirmation - and for pointing out the distinctives between masculine and feminine, which we certainly have lost in this progressive feminist-dominated age.

Anonymous said...

Hello Laura :-)

Yes, that is a wonderful book with some timeless wisdom.

Love Melina xx

Anonymous said...

Thnaks, Laura, I saved it and am going to print it out and read it when I get a chance..