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'Feminist Reader' Shows More Progress Needed

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By KAREN HAYMON LONG, The Tampa Tribune

Published: October 7, 2007

It's mystifying why the United States still doesn't have an Equal Rights Amendment, or a female president.

Those facts seem all the more shocking when you read 'The Essential Feminist Reader' (Modern Library Paperbacks, $17.95).

Some chapters, dealing with the inequality issue, were written back in the 1600s. One, called 'The Book of the City of Ladies,' was written in 1405.

Some of the most interesting chapters are the most famous. That's certainly true of Betty Friedan's 'The Feminine Mystique,' written in 1963. In it, she talks about the legions of bright, capable women in the 1950s and early '60s who devoted themselves not to careers, but to their children and husbands.

She longs for the day when society encourages women to work outside the house and have children and husbands, if that's what the women want for themselves.

Another thoughtful essay, written in 1919 by W.E. B. Du Bois, who helped start the NAACP in 1909, talks about the horrible treatment of black women by society. He laments that American culture puts more value on white men and women than it does on black women.

'I have always felt like bowing myself before them in all abasement, searching to bring some tribute to these long-suffering victims, these burdened sisters of mine, whom the world, the wise, white world, loves to affront and ridicule and wantonly to insult,' he wrote.

Not long before I read this passage, I had heard news reports about a young black woman who authorities say was raped, beaten and tortured by six white suspects in West Virginia. Du Bois' words seemed as if they were written yesterday and not nearly 100 years ago.

Another new book, 'The Ideal of Cuba,' by Alex Harris (University of New Mexico Press, $50), offers snatches of life in Cuba today in photos and text. It should interest readers in Tampa, where so many have roots in Cuba.

The photos are the highlight, especially those taken of Havana scenes by a photographer through windshields of 1960s cars. The capital's crumbling landmarks seem even more compelling when seen from the inside of the old cars so common in Cuba today.

The coffee-table-style book also features many photos of statues in Cuba of Jose Marti, the freedom fighter and poet who visited Ybor City in the 1800s. Ybor City has its own statue of Marti, in Jose Marti Park, at 1303 Eighth Ave.

Also just out: A special 60th anniversary edition of Marjory Stoneman Douglas' 'The Everglades - River of Grass,' (Pineapple Press, $19.95). Over the years, some readers have been pleasantly surprised that Douglas was such a good writer. They knew she knew her stuff about her River of Grass; after all, she gave the national treasure its nickname.

Her writing still holds up. And to make this edition even more valuable, Time magazine senior correspondent Michael Grunwald wrote an afterward updating the many changes since Douglas' book was published in 1947.

Grunwald was the perfect person to do that, since he wrote the acclaimed book 'The Swamp: The Everglades, Florida and the Politics of Paradise.'

Karen Haymon Long is the Tribune's book editor.

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