Heartbreakers: Women and Violence in Contemporary Culture and Literature

by J. Hendin

Overview

From Medea to Goneril to Sharon Stone's ice-pick murderer to Susan Smith, the image of the violent woman has fascinated readers and audiences in a way that other figures have not. Jo Hendin looks at the figure of the violent woman in her latest book where she argues that a violent woman is a grenade pitched towards both conservative and liberal views of women. Peopled with some of the most fascinating women in history, both real and imagined, Heartbreakers is a thought-provoking read.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781403971326
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan US
Publication date:	03/01/2006
Edition description:	2004
Pages:	312
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.50(h) x (d)

About the Author

JOSEPHINE HENDIN is Professor of English and Tiro A Segno Professor of Italian American Studies at New York University. Her novel, The Right Thing To Do, won an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation in 1988-1989 and was reprinted by The Feminist Press in 1999. She is the author of The World of Flannery O'Connor and Vulnerable People: A View of American Fiction Since 1945. She has received a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship and the Elena Lucrezia Cornaro Award as a leading Italian American scholar. Her literary essays have appeared in The New Republic, Harper's Magazine, American Literary History, and other publications.

Table of Contents

The Medea Effect Mother Love on the Rocks Love on the Knife Edge and Lethal Families The Lady is a Terrorist Violence Light: Entertaining Aggression Patterns

Editorial Reviews

'The same as reading a very edgy novel; you want to do it with the lights on and the doors locked. Recommended for all academic libraries.' - Marka Kochis, California State University Library, in The Library Journal

From the Publisher

Hendin offers an intriguing and comprehensive study of violent women, their motivations, the conditions that provoke them and the feelings of fear, anger and erotic desire they can inspire in others. Though wordy, hyper-detailed prose and an overflow of academic theory on political, social and gender studies slow the book's pace in sections, the author persuasively argues that violent women "highlight and dramatize the pressures on women who are not violent and on a culture still absorbing their changing roles." A professor of English and Italian-American studies at New York University, Hendin is at her best when analyzing specific cases-from mythology, film, fiction, poetry and contemporary society-and when discussing how these women can make both conservatives and liberals uneasy. From the Lorena Bobbitts and Susan Smiths who maim or kill their lovers or relatives to the Bonnie Parkers and Lynette Frommes who wreak terror on strangers, the dangerous dames that populate this book use violence for numerous and often contradictory reasons. Motivated by egotism, rage, sorrow or self-hatred, they may try to show their strength by killing off their weaker-and more traditionally feminine-characteristics, like vulnerability and passivity, or they may rebel against a patriarchal society in which the subjugation and abuse of women seems to be condoned. With her background in literature, Hendin brings more insight to her analyses of books and poetry than she does to her coverage of films and news media. Highlights include her appraisals of Toni Morrison's Beloved, Janet Fitch's White Oleander and Diana Trilling's Mrs. Harris, a hypercritical book about convicted Scarsdale diet doctor killer Jean Harris. (Jan.) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

Hendin (English, NYU) keenly depicts the relationship between violent women acting in real life and violent women portrayed in literature. Novelists don't simply absorb the stories of violent women incidentally through their casual exposure to the media, she argues. Instead, they often seek it out, going so far as to attend trials in person to gather ideas for their latest thrillers. The inspiration and adaptation of real-life events make the novels Hendin references more compelling than not; the reader will be driven to delve into these works of fiction, which range from classics like Medea to contemporary best sellers like Janet Fitch's White Oleander. The expressions of violence Hendin here captures redefine women in ways that break with both traditional and progressive expectations of women. Most of them are chilling examples, casting women in extreme lights. The effect is nearly the same as reading a very edgy novel; you want to do it with the lights on and the doors locked. Recommended for all academic libraries.-Maria Kochis, California State Univ. Lib., Sacramento Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal