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A review by hajewil
What Would Boudicca Do?: Everyday Problems Solved by History's Most Remarkable Women by Elizabeth Foley
2.0
This book was giving me "2016 'Relatable' Quirky Hipster who unironically uses #GirlBoss when referring to any Woman in Power (even when she's problematic)" vibes
The curation of this book was incredibly diverse and I applaud the authors for it, but the life lessons which were chosen to be the takeaway were oftentimes weak or even dismissive of the featured journey and life. This would've been a richer read if the authors promoted a lesson that was more indicative of who the figure was/what the figure stood for, rather than opting for a surface-level takeaway. For example:
There are more but these are the top 3 examples
The curation of this book was incredibly diverse and I applaud the authors for it, but the life lessons which were chosen to be the takeaway were oftentimes weak or even dismissive of the featured journey and life. This would've been a richer read if the authors promoted a lesson that was more indicative of who the figure was/what the figure stood for, rather than opting for a surface-level takeaway. For example:
• For Emily Dickinson's feature, the takeaway was that one should want to be like Emily Dickinson because she was a combatant of FOMO due to how she produced many works as a result of her mental illness and grief. I had a problem with this one because there are literally more venerable traits to her than how she defeated FOMO?? This was terribly dismissive of the fact that she likely had no choice but to stay inside and ignore her "FOMO" BECAUSE OF HER MENTAL STATE. So, that's literally not even a viable takeaway without completely ignoring mental illness because FOMO implies that she stayed instead for the purpose of writing -- when in reality (lemme say this louder for the people in the back) SHE WAS HOLED IN HER HOME BECAUSE OF MENTAL ILLNESSSSSS. Maybe I'm being dramatic, but this really irked me.
• For Mekatilili Wa Menza's, the authors mentioned the personal weight of dance as her method of organizing her activist movement and the cultural weight of dance as one of the pillars of community. Even after mentioning how dance was held highly not as entertainment but as a centripetal force in community, the takeaway for Mekatilili Wa Menza's feature wasn't something like "bring people together! Stick to your beliefs! Believe in yourself," but to literally dance like "everyone's watching." It eroded the emphasis on dance from being the pillar of activism for independence and into something done for entertainment.
• Fe del Mundo's rise within a male-dominated industry plus being a pioneer in pediatrics and maternal health was simply written off as a life lesson for acknowledging that womanhood is sisterhood -- not "listen to your heart and persevere" but sisterhood because her late sister was the reason she went on the path for health and medicine.
There are more but these are the top 3 examples