04-02-1995 Women of Achievement and Herstory

       "What cannot be totally erased must be controlled. 
       "So he made her his object, his thing. He reduced her to her
relation to him, as consort or rib or offspring, as he reduced Athena
from "she who is for herself" to a warrior-goddess daughter sprung
from his brain... 
      "It has taken him all of "civilization's" history to reinforce that
message, day after night, year after decade after century, life after
death after generation.  
      "And she still refuses it.  
      "Bound, hobbled, silenced, battered, raped raw, starved, exhibited,
bought and sold and traded, pedestaled or guttered, derided, trivialized,
dismissed, erased-- *something there is in her that refuses it.*
      "He has told her for eons that she has no self. Even when she
has believed him, she has not stooped to seek that self in his ways of
the hero. She may have sought it in the very churches and temples
which institutionalized her supposed lack of it. 
      "She may have sought it in her children, only to lose it as they
grew away from her. She may have sought it in consciousness raising
groups or with therapists. She may have sought it in the anterooms and
corridors of his palaces and legislatures and corporations, his juntas
and courts and intellectual brothels. 
      "But *something there is in her that knows that she -- in her
poverty of flesh, knowledge, means, at times even spirit -- *has never
lost that self.*
      "... and she has always known that the sum of herself is greater
than genitalia and womb....If she can give life, than he will give death. 
But much as he can conquer her, possess her, own her, kill her - *he
cannot become her*."
      -- Robin Miller in _The Demon Lover_.  New York: W.W. Norton &
Company, 1989 

04-02 Anniversaries ...............................................

      B. 04-02-1860, Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews, author of _The
Pefect Tribute_ (1906) which sold more than 600,000 copies.  It recounts
the fictionalized meeting of Lincoln and a dying Confederate soldier
during which Lincoln finds out the popularity of the Gettysburg
Address. Her son became dean of the College of Law of Syracuse
University.

      B. 04-02-1935, Georgia Geyer, distinguished recipient of many
journalist and writing awards, was even imprisoned at one time for her
reportage. Her autobiography is part of the distinguished Radcliffe
series of outstanding American women.

      B. 04-02-1948, Barbara Caine, feminist scholar, associate professor
University of Sidney, Australia. Authored _Victorian Feminists_, Oxford
University Press, 1992.

      Event 04-02-1985, A. H. Robins sets aside $615 million to settle
claims over Dalkon Shield, contraceptive device.

Quotes du jour ...............................................

      "Be bold. If you're going to make an error, make a doozy, and
don't be afraid to hit the ball."      
            -- Billie Jean King

      "Just go out there and do what you've got to do."
            -- Martina Navratilova


(C) 1995 Irene Stuber, PO Box 6185, Hot Springs National Park, AR 71902,
irenestuber@delphi.com. Distribute verbatim copies freely with copyright
notice for non-profit use. Don't let anyone tell you there weren't notable
and effective women throughout history.  They were always there, but
historians failed to note them in our histories so that each generation of
women has had to reinvent themselves.