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The Secret History of Wonder Woman

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The Secret History of Wonder Woman

Written by: Jill Lepore
Narrated by: Jill Lepore
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About this listen

 A riveting work of historical detection revealing that the origin of one of the world’s most iconic superheroes hides within it a fascinating family story—and a crucial history of twentieth-century feminism

Wonder Woman, created in 1941, is the most popular female superhero of all time. Aside from Superman and Batman, no superhero has lasted as long or commanded so vast and wildly passionate a following. Like every other superhero, Wonder Woman has a secret identity. Unlike every other superhero, she has also has a secret history.

Harvard historian and New Yorker staff writer Jill Lepore has uncovered an astonishing trove of documents, including the never-before-seen private papers of William Moulton Marston, Wonder Woman’s creator. Beginning in his undergraduate years at Harvard, Marston was influenced by early suffragists and feminists, starting with Emmeline Pankhurst, who was banned from speaking on campus in 1911, when Marston was a freshman. In the 1920s, Marston and his wife, Sadie Elizabeth Holloway, brought into their home Olive Byrne, the niece of Margaret Sanger, one of the most influential feminists of the twentieth century. The Marston family story is a tale of drama, intrigue, and irony. In the 1930s, Marston and Byrne wrote a regular column for Family Circle celebrating conventional family life, even as they themselves pursued lives of extraordinary nonconformity. Marston, internationally known as an expert on truth—he invented the lie detector test—lived a life of secrets, only to spill them on the pages of Wonder Woman.

The Secret History of Wonder Woman is a tour de force of intellectual and cultural history. Wonder Woman, Lepore argues, is the missing link in the history of the struggle for women’s rights—a chain of events that begins with the women’s suffrage campaigns of the early 1900s and ends with the troubled place of feminism a century later. Americas Art & Literature Authors Fantasy Gender Studies Popular Culture Social Sciences United States Superhero Fiction Suffrage

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I have not been a long time super-hero lover and was not overly familiar with Wonder Woman or her conception before this book. In Jill Lepore's The Secret History of Wonder Woman, we don't only get to meet the lasso-wielding heroine of justice, but we get to see the context of why and how she exists. In this thoroughly researched, highly entertaining account of Wonder Woman's conception, we get to experience the two waves of feminism in the 20th century and how they shaped one another.

I would highly recommend this read even to those who have never been invested in Supers as this is a fantastic account of two fascinating worlds colliding to help change the world.

On the downside, Jill Lepore can be difficult to listen to. While her delivery and understanding of her own text are evident (and one must give her credit for how much passion she puts into the narration), her performance can be a strain on the ears to listen to for long periods of time.

"Feminism is not a prejudice, it is a principle."

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