Item #140939812 The Feminine Mystique. Betty Friedan.
The Feminine Mystique
The Feminine Mystique
The Feminine Mystique
The Feminine Mystique
The Feminine Mystique

The Feminine Mystique

New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1963.

First edition, first printing. Signed and inscribed "For a liberated man" by Betty Friedan on the front free endpaper just above a former owner's bookplate. Bound in publisher's gray paper-covered boards over blue cloth spine lettered in gilt. Fine, in a Very Good unclipped dust jacket, with some light shelf wear, minor sunning and light creasing. A fantastic copy.

Fifteen years after graduating from Smith College, Friedan was tasked with surveying her fellow all-female alumni. Curiously, she found that despite having children and enjoying material comforts, many of the women she spoke to were unhappy in their role as housewives. She coined the phrase "feminine mystique" to highlight the prevalent assumption that a "feminine" woman would be completely fulfilled by domestic life and not seek anything more, such as education, work, or even have political opinions. Shining a floodlight on women's previously-hidden problems, Friedan takes aim at society's structural sexism and urges women to find fulfillment outside of the domestic realm that engages their full mental capacity. The Feminine Mystique is credited with sparking the second wave of feminism in the United States, and is considered one of the most influential nonfiction books of the 20th century. Item #140939812

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