Jenna Mead

Jenna Mead reviews 'Greer, Untamed Shrew' by Christine Wallace

December 1997–January 1998, no. 197 • 27 October 2021

Christine Wallace’s book, in twelve chapters, is actually two books. Chapters 1-7 deal with Greer’s childhood and family, secondary and university education including MA and PhD theses, her sexual history and engagement with the counterculture in Britain which pivots around writing for Oz, her career as a groupie and membership of the Suck editorial team. Events are arranged chronologically bu ... (read more)

Jenna Mead reviews 'Getting Equal: The history of Australian feminism' by Marilyn Lake

December 1999–January 2000, no. 217 • 01 December 1999

Getting Equal: The History of Australian Feminism sets out to cover the history of feminism in Australia during the period between 1877, when Charlotte Elizabeth McNeilly unsuccessfully petitioned the Sydney court for a divorce from her abusive husband, and now when Helen Osland is currently serving a gaol sentence for the murder of her husband after a married life of brutal abuse. This history i ... (read more)

Jenna Mead reviews 'The Whole Woman' by Germaine Greer

May 1999, no. 210 • 01 May 1999

‘Though I disagreed with some of the strategies and was as troubled as I should have been by some of the more fundamental conflicts [of feminism], it was not until feminists of my own generation began to assert with apparent seriousness that feminists had gone too far that the fire flared up in my belly.’ Thus, Germaine Greer on the origin of her latest book. For Australian readers, this stat ... (read more)

Jenna Mead reviews 'Circles of Faces' by Mary Dadswell and 'Self Possession' by Marion Halligan

July 1987, no. 92 • 01 July 1987

In her autobiographical sketch One Writer’s Beginnings, Eudora Welty wrote of her mother: ‘But I think she was relieved when I chose to be a writer of stories, for she thought writing was safe.’ Can you just imagine the shock on Chestina Welty’s face when she read, as she must have, this sentence tucked away into the middle of one of her daughter’s first stories: ‘When he finally looke ... (read more)

Jenna Mead reviews 'The Glass Whittler' by Stephanie Johnson

April 1989, no. 109 • 01 April 1989

Stephanie Johnson writes short stories and writes mainly about women. It’s as though there’s a specific genre in current writing that ties together these two kinds of writing, for women writing about other women in short prose pieces make up a distinct category that includes almost all of the familiar names of women writing in Australia now. These women writers include migrants who have made t ... (read more)