The Book of Old Ladies

Celebrating Women of a Certain Age in Fiction

The Book of Old Ladies
Ruth O Saxton
RRP:
NZ$ 36.99
Our Price:
NZ$ 31.44
Paperback
h216 x 140mm - 304pg
24 Sep 2020 US
International import eta 7-19 days
9781631527975
Out Of Stock
Currently no stock in-store, stock is sourced to your order
This is a book that champions older women' s stories and challenges the limiting outcomes we seem to hold for them. The Book of Old Ladies introduces readers to thirty stories featuring fictional "women of a certain age" who increasingly become their truest selves. Their stories will entertain and provide insight into the stories we tell ourselves about the limits and opportunities of aging. A celebration of women who push back against the limiting stereotypes regarding older women' s possibility, The Book of Old Ladies is a book lover' s guide to approaching old age and dealing with its losses while still embracing beauty, creativity, connection, and wonder.
". . . Saxton' s beautifully fluid prose would be a pleasure to read while relaxing at the beach. A thought-provoking, informative, and valuable literary analysis. " --Kirkus Reviews "Saxton teases out the diverse ways that these aging fictional women have to reimagine and reinvent themselves, just as she did, to cope with the demands of a society that dismisses their contributions and demeans their intelligence. " --Julie A. Chappell, editor at Ink Brush Press "A marvelously curated collection of must-read stories that carve a path forward for women who have come of age--and whose time has finally come. " --Julie Shigekuni, Professor, Department of English Language and Literature, University of New Mexico "Saxton' s work will delight, inform, educate, and enlighten all who read her book. " --Viji Nakka-Cammauf, president of the Alumnae Association of Mills College and founder and president of Little Flock Children' s Homes "In The Book of Old Ladies, Ruth Saxton offers readers, through curated conversation, the opportunity to defy the sweet-as-the-day-is-long stereotype and to examine the more fully developed and--thank goodness--realistic senior woman. " --Jennifer King, director of the Downtown Oakland Senior Center "The Book of Old Ladies is an inspiration for what life can be like in my future. " --Sky Bergman, award-winning filmmaker and professor of photography and video at Cal Poly State University "With an engaging, conversational style and feminist lens, Ruth Saxton guides us through an array of twentieth- and twenty-first-century novels and stories . . . An essential read. " --Eileen Barrett, editor of American Women Writers: Diverse Voices in Prose and professor of English at California State University "The Book of Old Ladies reminds us of the true joy of reading fiction . . . Ruth Saxton is an elegant writer, and this thoughtful book is a gem for anyone who understands the meaning of lifelong connection to literature. " --Yiyun Li, award-winning author of Dear Friend and Kinder Than Solitude ". . . thoughtful and thought-provoking. . . . Her careful deconstruction of plot and character reveal more than a few misogynist literary stereotypes and provoke readers to think more generally about where our ideas and assumptions about aging come from. This can be a powerful jolt. . . . The Book of Old Ladies asks us to consider the sexism that treats old women differently, more-often-than-not painting them as doddering, ineffectual crones. Can we imagine--and then create--something less demeaning? Literature, Saxton suggests, can send us in the right direction, but it is ultimately up to us to change the world. " --The Indypendent
Dr. Ruth O. Saxton is a Professor Emerita of English at Mills College in Oakland, CA. Over the course of her forty-two-year career, she has studied, taught, and published works on fiction by women for decades, focusing on how narratives limit or expand what we imagine to be possible. Dr. Saxton served as the college' s first Dean of Letters, cofounded the Women' s Studies program, and founded the Rhetoric and Composition program. Her scholarly works include The Girl, Constructions of the Girl in Contemporary Fiction by Women; Approaches to Teaching Woolf' s Mrs. Dalloway (with Eileen Barrett); and Woolf and Lessing: Breaking the Mold (with Jean Tobin). She currently resides in Oakland, CA.
Status: No local stock, title imported to order
ISBN-13: 9781631527975
Published: 24 Sep 2020
Published In: United States
Imprint: She Writes Press
Publisher: She Writes Press
Format: Paperback
Height: 216mm
Width: 140mm
Pages: 304

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