MARCH
IS WOMEN'S HISTORY MONTH
A British publication surveyed 400 women with the question, "which books have made a difference in your life?" Here are some of the life-changing books with comments from the respondents.
| Rebecca
by Daphne du Maurier "the most powerful character in the book is dead." |
| Frankenstein
by Mary Shelley "more concerned with asking the question than giving the answer." |
| Oranges
Are Not the Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson "I can love 'whoever' and not be stuck with the obvious pressures of heterosexuality." |
| I
Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou "it's about being a writer." |
| Mill
on the Floss by George Eliot "wrings my heart and I bump into elements of it all my life." |
| Little
Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett "taught me that words alone could make me both cry and laugh." |
| Golden
Notebook by Doris Lessing "opened complexity...urged freedom and showed the difficulty of freedom." |
| Gone
With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell "the ultimate blockbuster and a novel to get completely lost in." |
| Secret
History by Donna Tartt "like a master class in novel writing." |
| Hitchhiker's
Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams "so full of futility, (but) somehow so uplifting...about the absurdity of life" |
| Passion
by Jeanette Winterson It simply moved me. ...use of language, the way she plays with time." |
| Handmaid's
Tale by Margaret Atwood "what feminism might mean..." |
| Wuthering
Heights by Emily Bronte "physical, visceral emotion you get in reading is like standing on a cliff...getting the wind whipping through." |
| Great
Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald "about someone's wishes and desires and where they end up" |
| Ulysses
by James Joyce "a book that has absolutely changed my life." |
| Grass
is Singing by Doris Lessing "Feminine sensibility and perception...hope and a sense of reality" |
| Pride
and Prejudice by Jane Austen "fanned the flames of my interest in books as a young teenager" |
| Heart
of Darkness by Joseph Conrad "adventure, the sense of the unknown, the lone traveler" |
| Corrections
by Jonathan Franzen "made me think of the interconnections of family and memories...the loss of the signs of things that make you 'yourself'" |
| One
Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez "socially and politically engaged while in an imaginative world" |
| Catcher
in the Rye by J. D. Salinger "someone jumped out of the page and felt like my friend." |
| Lord
of the Rings by JRR Tolkien "realizing the power of losing oneself in a fabulous imaginary world" |
| Persuasion
by Jane Austen "about identity and how you're going to survive" |
| Stranger
by Albert Camus "pared-down use of language to express the unpalatable...the ultimate journalist's novel" |
| Madame
Bovary by Gustave Flaubert "master class in intellect, passion, landscape, imprisonment and individuality" |
| House
of Mirth by Edith Wharton "gets right inside people's heads" |
| Little
Women by Louisa May Alcott "Jo March was someone I could identify with...a kind of freedom I wanted in my own existence." |
| Jane
Eyre by Charlotte Bronte "I read it and said, 'this is me' in some deep way" |
| Catch
22 by Joseph Heller "about how your mind tries to rise above your body letting you down" |
| To
Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee "powerful...racism described through the eyes of a child" |
| Trumpet
by Jackie Kay "you really can't help who you fall in love with-no one can" |
| Remembrance
of Things Past by Marcel Proust "a book for middle age...it's made me think less fearfully about time passing" |
| Anna
Karenina by Leo Tolstoy "great passion, great tragedy, great happiness...makes you explore what you feel and think about life" |
| Mrs.
Dalloway by Virginia Woolf "all the events of history and society are brought to bear on one day" |
 |
Marta Campbell, Head of Collection Management |  |
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| Tel: 203-291-4842 | E-mail: mcampbell@westportlibrary.org | |||
Last updated 3/2/05
dcelia@westportlibrary.org