'The Feminine Mystique' Review, from the nytimes, April 7, 1963

After reading the first chapter of 'The Feminine Mystique', how can one not have sympathy for the women afflicted by 'the problem'? Is it real? I am inclined to think that it was. I especially like her observation that the maladies associated with the housewife (sores, depression, feeling anxious and exhausted all day) have little to do with economic or social status: "part of the strange newness of the problem is that it cannot be understood in terms of the age-old material problems of man: poverty, sickness, hunger, cold", and that "it may not even be felt by women preoccupied with desperate problems of hunger, poverty or illness. And women who think it will be solved by more money, a bigger house, a second car, moving to a better suburb, often discover it gets worse". I think that several decades of observation and research have at least shown that 'the problem' was/is indeed real.

Not everyone agreed, however. Below is a New York Times review of 'The Feminine Mystique', also written by a woman, Lucy Freeman, that was published the same year as 'The Feminine Mystique':

Millions of American women stand victim of "the feminine mystique," a philosophy that has convinced them that their only commitment is the fulfillment of a femininity found in "sexual passivity, male domination and nurturing maternal love." They are dangerous in that, unable to find their real selves, they feed emotionally on their children -- thus crippling them -- and are unable to satisfy their husbands because they cannot enjoy sex for sex's sake. They try to relieve their feelings of depression and emptiness by seeking "strained glamor." They have won the battle for suffrage but little else. This is the damning indictment levelled by Betty Friedan in her highly readable, provocative book.

The core of her thesis is that woman's problem today is not sexual but a problem of identity. "Our culture does not permit women to accept or gratify their basic need to grow and fulfill their potentialities as human beings, a need which is not solely defined by their sexual role."

Sweeping generalities, in which this book necessarily abounds, may hold a certain amount of truth but often obscure the deeper issues. It is superficial to blame the "culture" and its handmaidens, the women's magazines, as she does. What is to stop a woman who is interested in national and international affairs from reading magazines that deal with those subjects? To paraphrase a famous line, "The fault, dear Mrs. Friedan, is not in our culture, but in ourselves."

Having read only a couple chapters out of the book, it would be impossible for me to agree with or to refute what the reviewer has to say. However, I will say that after reading chapter 12, I found myself in disagreement with quite a number of the assertions made by Mrs. Friedan, which I'll save for class.