Jo Freeman Reviews - The Book of Gutsy Women by Hillary Rodham Clinton and Chelsea Clinton

Hillary Rodham Clinton and Chelsea Clinton

The Book of Gutsy Women: Favorite Stories of Courage and Resilience

Published by New York: Simon & Schuster, 2019

450 pages. Lots of photographs

When I was going to school in the 1950s, it was rare to find a woman in my textbooks. When I looked for a job as a journalist in the late 1960s, I was told that women weren’t hired because they couldn’t cover riots. When the women’s liberation movement began to hit the media in the 1970s, a common retort was that women hadn’t done much of anything. "There are no great women artists" we were told.

In the 1980s and 1990s, when I read women’s history on my own, I realized that there were important and prominent women in every decade, but they disappeared when the history books were written. Women were like sand castles; men were like rocks. The waters of time washed over both and wiped out the women.

The Clintons — mother and daughter — are helping to remedy that. By telling the stories of 103 Gutsy women, they want to raise the sand from the beaches and fuse the particles into solid quartz.

Traditionally, what defined a woman as worthy of note was her beauty. To the Clintons, it’s their pushiness — their willingness to defy the status quo, their ability to get things done, their resilience. They tell stories of women who were courageous and determined.

The book is organized as a conversation between mother and daughter. In the first section, each talks about women they knew, or read about, who were important to them. In subsequent sections they tell us about more and more women who have stood up for themselves and others. These descriptions of strong women defy the popular belief that women are the "weaker sex."

Spread throughout the world, these women have worked in many fields, from explorers to athletes to writers to politicians. They are young and old, of every race and ethnicity. They go back at least three centuries.

The Clinton’s have different perspectives, reflecting their generational difference. Much had changed by the time Chelsea was in school. She learned about important women who were absent from her mother’s early education. She grew up at a time when both of her parents held important positions and was able to watch her mother elevate women and the study of women. Indeed, if Chelsea had been the sole author of this book, Hillary would have headed her list of Gutsy women.

This is a book that every young woman needs to read. If I had known about Margaret Bourke-White when I was told that "women can’t cover riots," I could have responded with a story about a photo-journalist who covered wars.

Older women will also benefit. When Hillary declared her candidacy for president in 2008, how many knew that over fifty women had already placed their names on a primary or general election ballot as candidates for President?

It’s a beautifully designed book, with lots of color photographs. It will go viral. Get it while you can.

Jo Freeman has published 11 books and hundreds of articles and book reviews. She is trying to finish her next book: Tell It Like It Is: Living History in the Southern Civil Rights Movement, 1965-66.

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Jo Freeman Reviews - The Book of Gutsy Women by Hillary Rodham Clinton and Chelsea Clinton

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