The Women's Room — Marilyn French

Feminist author Marilyn French's iconic and influential novel exploring the lives of women set in the rapidly changing world of the 1940s to the 1960s.

“Mira was hiding in the ladies' room. She called it that, even though someone had scratched out the word ladies' in the sign on the door, and written women's underneath…” So begins the famous feminist novel that follows the transformation of Mira Ward and her circle as the women's movement begins to have an impact on their lives.

The story follows Mira as she grows from a young girl in the 1940s to a woman of the 1960s. As she experiences marriage, motherhood, and friendship as a woman of the 1950s, she grows increasingly lonely and unfulfilled. When she looks to the women in the neighborhood she has befriended, she realizes that they are suffering, too.

But after Mira is faced with divorce and a near-tragedy, she begins a new chapter in her life that coincides with the Women's Liberation Movement in the 1960s. Although her life improves slightly as she gains more independence and discover's her life's purpose, she still finds that women around her are still suffering as they navigate the ever-changing landscape of womanhood.

Written with unwavering conviction and powerful prose, the themes in The Women's Room are still all too relevant today, and provide an essential jumping-off point for conversations still to come.