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A review by lory_enterenchanted
The Woman They Could Not Silence: The Timeless Story of an Outspoken Woman and the Men Who Tried to Make Her Disappear by Kate Moore
informative
tense
medium-paced
2.0
Reviews and more on my blog: Entering the Enchanted Castle
I found this a very frustrating read. Elizabeth Packard's story is clearly important to know, and the issues she dealt with vital and still with us today, but I could not feel that the author was treating her in an unbiased or objective manner. She had a point to make, and she twisted her telling of the facts in accord with that, while an unwanted subtext managed to escape her control. It was a weird reading experience.
The author's goal was to entirely exonerate and vindicate Elizabeth, and so anything she did that was a bit odd, foolish, or in contradiction to her image as a brilliant but misunderstood woman was swept aside or minimized. She had a very strange relationship with her doctor, and even wrote him an effusive love letter, but that was explained away as being a stratagem to get her book published. Periods of such infatuation alternated with periods of hatred and loathing, in a way that actually did seem a bit imbalanced to me. Elizabeth might not have strictly been insane, but I could not see her as entirely well emotionally or psychologically either. However, this was left unexplored, because the book's premise depended on her being unequivocally and entirely sane.
She definitely did stupid things that were at odds with how intelligent Moore tries to paint her, like returning to the husband who had put her in an institution, and threatened to do so again, with the naive hope that they can just live together amicably. Earlier in her story, she seems not to have any clue how irritating and dangerous her going against his preaching is -- as a preacher's wife, she's certainly expected to toe the line. Of course that is not fair or right, but it was the way of the world at the time. If not crazy, Elizabeth is at least terribly naive and foolish to think she can go against it with impunity.
So I"m really not sure what to think of her, or how accurate this portrait truly is. Another thing that bothered me was the author's habit of sprinkling her text liberally with quotes and footnotes, to assert her historical accuracy, but in between sneaking in passages of complete speculation -- "she might have furrowed her brow" "She must have smiled" and so forth. Sometimes she leaves out the conditional -- "He shifted in his seat." If you want to write scenes like this, write a novel! Otherwise, stick to the facts.
The writing style was so flowery and overblown altogether. It was full of padding, so the book could been have reduced by at least a third. And on almost every page I had to roll my eyes at silly, unnecessary metaphors and purple prose: "She would also pull up womanhood with her: a podium full of perfervid princesses, all ready to claim their prize." "Her pen leaping from topic to topic with all the unfettered freedom of the wild rabbits in the grounds outside." "Her thoughts stumbled on a rock as she considered why, but she did not peer too closely at it." Oh please.
There were also a number of grammatical slips that should have been caught by an editor: "Both focused on alleviating the sufferings of others in favor of dwelling on their own" - should be in lieu of, or instead of. "He did not attribute his own behavior to thier animosity" -- should be "he did not attribute their animosity to his own behavior." It was sloppy and also undermined confidence in the mind behind this stuff.
This is NOT my preferred style of nonfiction. So although the story is interesting, I can't recommend this treatment of it. Maybe someday Elizabeth will find a biographer worthy of her -- although I wonder if she'll come off quite so well.
I found this a very frustrating read. Elizabeth Packard's story is clearly important to know, and the issues she dealt with vital and still with us today, but I could not feel that the author was treating her in an unbiased or objective manner. She had a point to make, and she twisted her telling of the facts in accord with that, while an unwanted subtext managed to escape her control. It was a weird reading experience.
The author's goal was to entirely exonerate and vindicate Elizabeth, and so anything she did that was a bit odd, foolish, or in contradiction to her image as a brilliant but misunderstood woman was swept aside or minimized. She had a very strange relationship with her doctor, and even wrote him an effusive love letter, but that was explained away as being a stratagem to get her book published. Periods of such infatuation alternated with periods of hatred and loathing, in a way that actually did seem a bit imbalanced to me. Elizabeth might not have strictly been insane, but I could not see her as entirely well emotionally or psychologically either. However, this was left unexplored, because the book's premise depended on her being unequivocally and entirely sane.
She definitely did stupid things that were at odds with how intelligent Moore tries to paint her, like returning to the husband who had put her in an institution, and threatened to do so again, with the naive hope that they can just live together amicably. Earlier in her story, she seems not to have any clue how irritating and dangerous her going against his preaching is -- as a preacher's wife, she's certainly expected to toe the line. Of course that is not fair or right, but it was the way of the world at the time. If not crazy, Elizabeth is at least terribly naive and foolish to think she can go against it with impunity.
So I"m really not sure what to think of her, or how accurate this portrait truly is. Another thing that bothered me was the author's habit of sprinkling her text liberally with quotes and footnotes, to assert her historical accuracy, but in between sneaking in passages of complete speculation -- "she might have furrowed her brow" "She must have smiled" and so forth. Sometimes she leaves out the conditional -- "He shifted in his seat." If you want to write scenes like this, write a novel! Otherwise, stick to the facts.
The writing style was so flowery and overblown altogether. It was full of padding, so the book could been have reduced by at least a third. And on almost every page I had to roll my eyes at silly, unnecessary metaphors and purple prose: "She would also pull up womanhood with her: a podium full of perfervid princesses, all ready to claim their prize." "Her pen leaping from topic to topic with all the unfettered freedom of the wild rabbits in the grounds outside." "Her thoughts stumbled on a rock as she considered why, but she did not peer too closely at it." Oh please.
There were also a number of grammatical slips that should have been caught by an editor: "Both focused on alleviating the sufferings of others in favor of dwelling on their own" - should be in lieu of, or instead of. "He did not attribute his own behavior to thier animosity" -- should be "he did not attribute their animosity to his own behavior." It was sloppy and also undermined confidence in the mind behind this stuff.
This is NOT my preferred style of nonfiction. So although the story is interesting, I can't recommend this treatment of it. Maybe someday Elizabeth will find a biographer worthy of her -- although I wonder if she'll come off quite so well.