I had to read this for one of my book clubs, but it was a real disappointment. It provides a back story to Jane Eyre, and boasts a weird and sometimes confusing shift in perspective that has a sort of Rashomon effect. I hated the stereotypes and essentializing, and even the prose, though sometimes beautiful, felt self-indulgent. Not a fan.
2023 Reading Challenge: The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin
One of my favorite books of all time, I just reread it for my class on Anarchism and I can see the influence of Godwin, Goldman, Bakunin, and Kropotkin everywhere. So much to discuss with this book, and I am so excited for teaching my class today. There are days where I just really love my job.
My short but wonderful Bulgaria trip
I’ve just returned from a quick dash to Sofia to do some research in the National Library, celebrate my ex-mother-in-law’s 85th birthday, and write a little about how the country still celebrates 8 March as International Women’s Day. It was a very busy and over scheduled trip, with visits to three history museums, but I am always happy to be back in Bulgaria, even if only for such a short while.
A short interview in Publishers Weekly for Everyday Utopia →
This was such a fun conversation to have. Tara Saunders asked such thoughtful questions.
On NPR's Morning Edition for International Women's Day! →
What a wonderful opportunity to speak about International Women’s Day on National Public Radio’s morning edition.
Honored to win the 2022 SEEJ Award for Best Article →
The Editorial Board of the Slavic & East European Journal (SEEJ) has awarded my article on Bulgarian typewriters its 2022 best article of the year award. A very nice recognition for someone in my academic field.
Airport working with white wine
The beginning of my spring break…
My first batch of homemade kombucha
One of my students noticed that I was always drinking kombucha in class, and he gifted me a scoby from his family’s home kombucha brewing. So I have started my very first batch of homemade kombucha. This first fermentation phase will last for 10 days, and then I will see about a secondary fermentation. I’m so excited for this to work.
A starred review from Publishers Weekly →
I am just so happy. This is the first time I’ve gotten one of these precious little starred reviews!
Everyday Utopia: What 2,000 Years of Wild Experiments Can Teach Us About the Good Life
Kristen R. Ghodsee. Simon & Schuster, $29.99 (352p) ISBN 978-1-982190-21-7
Ghodsee (Red Valkyries), a professor of Russian and Eastern European studies at the University of Pennsylvania, offers a spirited and thought-provoking survey of “social dreaming” and the thinkers and movements that have tried to reenvision home life to promote greater harmony and happiness. Focusing particularly on utopian experiments that treated women as equals and shared property among community members, Ghodsee examines the long history of non-family groups living together, from ancient Buddhist and medieval Christian monastics to contemporary communes in Maine and Denmark; income and property sharing models proposed and practiced by John Stuart Mill, Karl Marx, and the Hutterite, Shaker, and Bruderhof Christian enclaves of North America; and the centralized childcare arrangements of Israeli kibbutzim. In the book’s most moving sections, Ghodsee buttresses her argument that the nuclear family has historically divided women from their own familial care networks and made them and their children more vulnerable to intimate violence with the story of how her high school English teacher took her in for a crucial period after her parents’ abusive marriage split up. Clear-eyed yet exuberant, wide-ranging yet intimate, this is an inspiring call for imagining a better future. Agent: Melissa Flashman, Janklow & Nesbit Assoc. (May)
The first review of Everyday Utopia from Kirkus →
2023 Reading Challenge: God and the State
Okay, so I am technically rereading this one, but the last time I read it all the way through was back in 2004, so this definitely feels new. And I am reading it for my class, but I think it still counts toward my reading challenge because I did reread the whole book. It’s scattered and bombastic, like Bakunin was scattered and bombastic, but there’s a lot to chew on in this short tract. I’m actually looking forward to my lecture tomorrow.
Me as a guest of the Expanding Economics podcast →
It was a pleasure to have this conversation with a student in Canada about the way that classical economics is deeply sexist.
2023 Reading Challenge: The Overstory by Richard Powers
So I need to limit the number of 500-page books that I read if I am ever going to make my reading goal for the year, but I’ve been meaning to get through this one for a while.
Trees. Trees. Tress. All I can see now is trees.
2023 Reading Challenge: Klara and the Sun
Such a beautifully-written and thoughtful book.
2023 Reading Challenge: Left is Not Woke
This is an advanced galley of a book that is coming out in March. It’s a slim little volume, but it packs a powerful punch. Here’s the full blurb I wrote for it:
“Susan Neiman’s provocative book is an impassioned and accessible defense against the corrosive particularisms that have eroded solidarity and cooperation on the left. To face the many challenges of the 21st century, she argues that we must reclaim those strategic universalisms that historically helped to forge diverse coalitions of activists in shared struggles for social progress. To build a more just, equitable, and sustainable world, we need to acknowledge the victories of our past, recognize the contingent malleability of our present, and embrace a radical politics of hope for our future.”
2023 Reading Challenge: Red Star
I wasn’t sure if I was going to include books that I am reading for my class this semester or books that I am rereading, but I so much enjoyed revisiting Bogdanov’s Red Star that I am going to count it toward my reading goals anyway. This amazing novella was written in 1908 and offers a fascinating perspective on what socialism might have looked like in the 20th century had Bolsheviks like Bogdanov prevailed. I particularly love the discussion of Martian love and marriage included in this text since Bogdanov and Alexandra Kollontai were comrades and friends.
The full jacket proof
Still a few corrections to be made, but this is what it will look like. I’m so excited for this design and for the sun on the spine.
Edward Hopper's New York at the Whitney →
A wonderful exhibition at the Whitney in Manhattan.
preorder sale at Barnes & Noble – January 25-27, 2023 →
Three days only in the USA! Pre-order Everyday Utopia at Barnes & Noble and save 25%: use code PREORDER25
Some ink in 34th Street
Just in time for Valentine’s Day, I shared a lovely conversation with Norah Rami for this piece.
