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Review
Odd Girls reverberates with the powerful voices of people speaking for themselves... Faderman empowers her subject; instead of allowing lesbian lifestyles to be defined from the outside, her voice and those of other women transcend destructive stereotypes and misconceptions. Odd Girls offers a lucidly written and moving narrative of lesbian culture and community during its formative years. The Village Voice Fascinating... poignant and moving... Odd Girls is full of facts and wonderful details that readers may not have encountered, things that are a pleasure to learn and that seem valuable to know. Los Angeles Times Book Review One has to respect the tenacity of Lillian Faderman for making sense of the evolution of lesbian life in twentieth-century America... This is a remarkable social history... Her study attains the depth and evenhandedness of a scholarly classic. -- Susan Brownmiller The Washington Post Book World An important and challenging work for lesbians and heterosexuals alike... Odd Girls is a key work, the point of reference which all subsequent studies of twentieth-century lesbian life in the United States will begin. San Francisco Examiner Faderman's sweeping, mesmerizing prose accentuates the magnificent scholarship in this definitive account of lesbian life in the past 100 years... Faderman has combined her talent and experience to accomplish this wonder. -- Barbara Grier Lambda Book Report Nothing odd about Odd Girls - it combines clear prose with meticulous research. This book is an important contribution to understanding America and its people in our time. -- Rita Mae Brown, author of Rubyfruit Jungle A grand narrative synthesis of the cultural, social, and political history of lesbian life since the late nineteenth century... Engaging and deeply moving stories. New York Times Book Review A splendid, uplifting achievement. The Independent
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Traces the evolution of lesbian identity and subcultures from the early years of the century to the diversity of today's lifestyles. Faderman uses journals, unpublished manuscripts, songs, new accounts, novels, medical literature and over 186 personal interviews with lesbians of all races, ages and classes to uncover and relate this often surprising narrative of lesbian life in America. Lesbian identity could emerge, Faderman maintains, only during this century with the sexual freedom of the 1920s and the 1960s, as well as the social freedom made possible by World War II, the education of women and the civil rights and women's movements. The term "lesbian" did not become current until the late 19th century, when European sexologists began to explore female same-sex loving. Sexologists stigmatized same-sex loving where once it had been accepted. This book tells how women who accepted the label "lesbian" altered the sexologists' definitions, creating identities and ideologies for themselves.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
If you want to read a synthetic history of lesbianism in the United States, this is the book. Faderman is a fine historian, not just a gay one. She creates a clear and readable outline of lesbian identity during the 20th century.
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Ever have those nights when you feel like a freak? This is a fabulous book that will not only keep you company, but it'll remind you that we charming and lovely freaks have been around a LONG time, and we're not going anywhere. Well written, very interesting, and fun. Do it. Then do it again.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
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8 reviews
22 of 24 people found the following review helpful
Faderman Does It And Does...
15 Dec 1999
Format:Paperback
...it and does it again! Here the groundbreaking lesbian historian -- who not only shook up staid academia by legitimizing lesbianism as a valid and important aspect of life deserving of serious study, but who can actually WRITE WELL about it -- presents yet another tour de force.
The woman who has spoken in interviews about her working-class Jewish roots and the fact that as a stripper she worked her way through college to a PhD from Berkeley at the age of 26 (not too shabby a feat in itself) and has three anthologies, four other books on lesbian history *and* a new book on the Hmong immigrant population in America notched into her no doubt still-lissome belt, now takes a keen look at the history of butch/femme emergence, struggle, culture and identity, and the actual *value* of butch/femme to lesbianism.
Faderman -- as would be expected of one with her background, her intellect, and her ongoing literary accomplishments -- is never afraid to tackle any subject, and do it not only with honesty but with a deft, sure touch, a style that has an unusual and very refreshing ability to make the academic not only accessible but enjoyable reading, and an even more unusual ability to empathize and yet remain objective. Never artificial and never superficial, neither apologetic nor smug, Faderman proves that butch/femme was and is just as difficult, wildly funny, complicated, fulfilling, ugly, beautiful, heart-breaking, and filled with both fear and its own gritty courage as is any other lifestyle -- lesbian or not.
I finished `Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers' with a real sense of loss. With this book, I've caught up on my reading of Lillian Faderman's works. (I'd recently read her astonishing new book on the Hmong experience in America: `I Begin My Life All Over', Beacon Press, another not-to-be-missed book!) Am I gushing over Faderman's books? You bet! Though she's a writer whose works you want to read and re-read I'm just sorry I can't connect with amazon.com and order something new by her tomorrow...
I only hope she continues to write and write and write. Her work is of tremendous literary and historical value to lesbians...and to everyone else as well.
14 of 15 people found the following review helpful
Empowering and Engaging
24 April 2002
Format:Paperback
Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers is a fascinating work that traces the cultural history of lesbianism in the United States -- providing a broad and thorough overview of lesbianism's diversity, its relationship to feminism, and its evolving forms of resistance in relationship to the oppressions of the dominant culture. Perhaps what is most impressive about this book is that while it is an impressively researched and intellectually stimulating piece of scholarship, it is also an extremely engaging read. Faderman draws the reader into lesbian cultural history in a way that is never clinical, but compellingly human--under her treatment, the lesbian subculture emerges in all of its varied complexity, its celebratory subversiveness, as a fascinatingly rich and vibrant culture of historical, political, and sexual significance. This book is a marvelous introduction to lesbian culture and history . . . it is entertaining, empowering, and utterly engaging.
10 of 11 people found the following review helpful
An important work
8 April 2001
Format:Paperback
Lillian Faderman has written some of the best works on the lesbian experience throughout the ages, and "Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers" is no exception. She covers every facet of the subculture from the turn of the 20th century to the present day with impeccable scholarship, and her writing is engaging and highly readable. She examines everything from 1950's butch/femme, 70's lesbian feminism, and the resurgence of trendy "lipstick lesbians" with equal attention. This book is a must-have for every queer library, and is an important contribution to the cause of lesbian visiblity.
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