Alix Kates Shulman
Encyclopedia
Alix Kates Shulman is an American writer of fiction, memoirs, and essays, as well as one of the early radical feminist activists of feminism's Second Wave. She is best known for her bestselling debut, Memoirs of an Ex-Prom Queen (Knopf, 1972), "one of the first novels to emerge from the Women's Liberation Movement" (Oxford Companion to Women's Writing).
, where she discovered her interest in philosophy. She then moved to New York City
in 1953 to study philosophy at the Columbia University
Graduate School.
Three years later, Shulman published first novel, Memoirs of an Ex-Prom Queen (Knopf, 1972), which examineed the contradictions and pressures on a young woman of the 1940s, '50s, and '60s through the story of Sasha Davis from childhood through marriage and motherhood. Almost continually in print, it was reissued in a 25th anniversary edition in 1997 by Penguin and in a 35th anniversary "Feminist Classics" edition in 2007 by Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
Her second novel, Burning Questions (Knopf, 1978), recreates the rise of WLM and sets it in a historical context. Her third novel, On the Stroll [Knopf, 1981], takes on the themes of homelessness and abuse through the story of a shopping-bag lady and a teenage runaway who is preyed upon by a pimp over the course of one summer. Her fourth novel, In Every Woman's Life... [Knopf, 1987]), explores marriage, children, and singleness in a contemporary comedy of manners. After that, in her next three books, she turned to memoirs: Drinking the Rain [FSG, 1995], about her experience of living alone on an island without electricity, road, or phone, as she undergoes a midlife change; A Good Enough Daughter [Schocken, 1997], about her life as a daughter to loving parents whom she sees through their deaths; and To Love What Is [FSG, 2008], an account of caring for her husband following a 2004 accident that left him seriously brain-impaired. In addition, she has written two books on anarchist-feminist Emma Goldman
(To The Barricades [T.Y.Crowell, 1971], Red Emma Speaks: An Emma Goldman Reader [Random House 1972]), and three children's books (Bosley on the Number Line [McKay, 1970], Finders Keepers [Bradbury Press, 1971], Awake or Asleep [Addison Wesley, 1971]).
Shulman has taught writing and women's literature widely in the U.S., including at the University of Hawaii at Manoa (Honolulu), where she held the Citizens Chair in 1991-2; also at the University of Maine, the University of Colorado at Boulder, and Yale. She received an honorary doctorate of humane letters from Case Western Reserve University in 2001.
(CORE). She named the theater arts chapter "7-Arts CORE" prior to the group's attending the 1963 March on Washington.
She became opposed to the Vietnam War
, counseling draftees on their rights at the Quaker Meeting House and the Washington Square Methodist Episcopal Church
, both in Manhattan.
In 1967 Shulman first became involved in the Women's Liberation Movement (WLM) in New York City
by participating in the monthly discussion group, New York Radical Women; she subsequently joined several small consciousness raising
women's groups (Redstockings
, WITCH, New York Radical Feminists
), and feminist political action groups (CARASA, No More Nice Girls, Feminist Futures, Take Back the Future). She was one of the planners of the first national demonstration of WLM, which catapulted WLM to national attention, the August 1968 Miss America protest
in Atlantic City, a demonstration against oppressive beauty standards, which was a major theme of Memoirs of an Ex-Prom Queen.
Shulman's activisim included participation, beginning in 1969 and continuing to the present day, in a number of public speak-outs and conferences on such feminist issues as beauty standards, rape, violence against women, reproductive choice, marriage, and motherhood
.
The goal of the speak-out was to initiate a public dialogue on experiences that at the time were widely considered taboo subjects of speech. In the film Speak Out: I Had an Abortion, Shulman and other subjects testify to having had multiple abortions. Shulman said that "not one was the result of carelessness" but rather were due to the failure of the birth control devices she used.
In 1992, as a Visiting Professor at the University of Hawaii, she was a founder of a Pacific chapter of the group No More Nice Girls. The Pacific chapter organized demonstrations, held a speak-out, and put on street theater in Honolulu. In the 1990s she was active on the board of THEA (The House of Elder Artists), an organization attempting to establish a new kind of retirement community in Manhattan for politically and artistically active seniors.
Her son, Theodore Shulman, is a pro-choice
activist; he was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation
in February 2011, reportedly on charges of making interstate threats to anti-abortion advocates. Her daughter, Polly Shulman, is an author.
Early life and education
Shulman was born in Cleveland, Ohio, and attended Case Western Reserve UniversityCase Western Reserve University
Case Western Reserve University is a private research university located in Cleveland, Ohio, USA...
, where she discovered her interest in philosophy. She then moved to New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
in 1953 to study philosophy at the Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
Graduate School.
Writing
Shulman first emerged as the author of the controversial "A Marriage Agreement," which proposes that men and women split childcare and housework equally and details a method for doing so. Originally published in the feminist journal Up From Under in 1969, it was widely reproduced in magazines (Life, Redbook, Ms., New York) and anthologies, including a Harvard textbook on contract law. It continues to be debated, for instance in January 2007 in a Washington Post Blog.Three years later, Shulman published first novel, Memoirs of an Ex-Prom Queen (Knopf, 1972), which examineed the contradictions and pressures on a young woman of the 1940s, '50s, and '60s through the story of Sasha Davis from childhood through marriage and motherhood. Almost continually in print, it was reissued in a 25th anniversary edition in 1997 by Penguin and in a 35th anniversary "Feminist Classics" edition in 2007 by Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
Her second novel, Burning Questions (Knopf, 1978), recreates the rise of WLM and sets it in a historical context. Her third novel, On the Stroll [Knopf, 1981], takes on the themes of homelessness and abuse through the story of a shopping-bag lady and a teenage runaway who is preyed upon by a pimp over the course of one summer. Her fourth novel, In Every Woman's Life... [Knopf, 1987]), explores marriage, children, and singleness in a contemporary comedy of manners. After that, in her next three books, she turned to memoirs: Drinking the Rain [FSG, 1995], about her experience of living alone on an island without electricity, road, or phone, as she undergoes a midlife change; A Good Enough Daughter [Schocken, 1997], about her life as a daughter to loving parents whom she sees through their deaths; and To Love What Is [FSG, 2008], an account of caring for her husband following a 2004 accident that left him seriously brain-impaired. In addition, she has written two books on anarchist-feminist Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman
Emma Goldman was an anarchist known for her political activism, writing and speeches. She played a pivotal role in the development of anarchist political philosophy in North America and Europe in the first half of the twentieth century....
(To The Barricades [T.Y.Crowell, 1971], Red Emma Speaks: An Emma Goldman Reader [Random House 1972]), and three children's books (Bosley on the Number Line [McKay, 1970], Finders Keepers [Bradbury Press, 1971], Awake or Asleep [Addison Wesley, 1971]).
Shulman has taught writing and women's literature widely in the U.S., including at the University of Hawaii at Manoa (Honolulu), where she held the Citizens Chair in 1991-2; also at the University of Maine, the University of Colorado at Boulder, and Yale. She received an honorary doctorate of humane letters from Case Western Reserve University in 2001.
Political Activism
In the early 1960s Shulman was active in the Congress of Racial EqualityCongress of Racial Equality
The Congress of Racial Equality or CORE was a U.S. civil rights organization that originally played a pivotal role for African-Americans in the Civil Rights Movement...
(CORE). She named the theater arts chapter "7-Arts CORE" prior to the group's attending the 1963 March on Washington.
She became opposed to the Vietnam War
Opposition to the Vietnam War
The movement against US involvment in the in Vietnam War began in the United States with demonstrations in 1964 and grew in strength in later years. The US became polarized between those who advocated continued involvement in Vietnam, and those who wanted peace. Peace movements consisted largely of...
, counseling draftees on their rights at the Quaker Meeting House and the Washington Square Methodist Episcopal Church
Washington Square Methodist Episcopal Church
Washington Square Methodist Episcopal Church was a former Methodist church located at 135 West Fourth Street, Greenwich Village, Manhattan, New York. It was built in 1860, became a United Methodist church and closed in 2004 when its diminished congregation rented space in Trinity Chapel, New York...
, both in Manhattan.
In 1967 Shulman first became involved in the Women's Liberation Movement (WLM) in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
by participating in the monthly discussion group, New York Radical Women; she subsequently joined several small consciousness raising
Consciousness raising
Consciousness raising is a form of political activism, pioneered by United States feminists in the late 1960s...
women's groups (Redstockings
Redstockings
Redstockings, also known as Redstockings of the Women's Liberation Movement, is a radical feminist group that was founded in January of 1969...
, WITCH, New York Radical Feminists
New York Radical Feminists
New York Radical Feminists was a radical feminist group founded by Shulamith Firestone and Anne Koedt in 1969, after they had left Redstockings and The Feminists, respectively. Firestone's and Koedt's desire to start this new group was aided by Vivian Gornick's 1969 Village Voice article, "The...
), and feminist political action groups (CARASA, No More Nice Girls, Feminist Futures, Take Back the Future). She was one of the planners of the first national demonstration of WLM, which catapulted WLM to national attention, the August 1968 Miss America protest
Miss America protest
The September 1968 protest by feminists outside of the Miss America Pageant in Atlantic City, New Jersey was largely responsible for bringing the term "Women's Liberation" into the American national consciousness...
in Atlantic City, a demonstration against oppressive beauty standards, which was a major theme of Memoirs of an Ex-Prom Queen.
Shulman's activisim included participation, beginning in 1969 and continuing to the present day, in a number of public speak-outs and conferences on such feminist issues as beauty standards, rape, violence against women, reproductive choice, marriage, and motherhood
.
The goal of the speak-out was to initiate a public dialogue on experiences that at the time were widely considered taboo subjects of speech. In the film Speak Out: I Had an Abortion, Shulman and other subjects testify to having had multiple abortions. Shulman said that "not one was the result of carelessness" but rather were due to the failure of the birth control devices she used.
In 1992, as a Visiting Professor at the University of Hawaii, she was a founder of a Pacific chapter of the group No More Nice Girls. The Pacific chapter organized demonstrations, held a speak-out, and put on street theater in Honolulu. In the 1990s she was active on the board of THEA (The House of Elder Artists), an organization attempting to establish a new kind of retirement community in Manhattan for politically and artistically active seniors.
Personal life
Shulman was married for a short time to a graduate student in the English department at Columbia. In 1959 she married her second husband, Martin Shulman, with whom she had two children. In 1989 she married Scott York. Following his 2004 traumatic brain injury, through her writing she became an advocate of the elderly and disabled.Her son, Theodore Shulman, is a pro-choice
Pro-choice
Support for the legalization of abortion is centered around the pro-choice movement, a sociopolitical movement supporting the ethical view that a woman should have the legal right to elective abortion, meaning the right to terminate her pregnancy....
activist; he was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
in February 2011, reportedly on charges of making interstate threats to anti-abortion advocates. Her daughter, Polly Shulman, is an author.