Non Fiction Authors From The United States

"From the horror of dead and wounded that I saw in just my little corner of war work, my mind is constantly seeking to escape. Again I see the sad, appealing eyes of the terribly disfigured men in the face and jaw hospital in Paris. Again I hear the call: 'Clear the way for the blind!' and see our sightless boys slowly making their way down the gangplank to their homeward-bound ships at Brest. And the armless ones and legless ones! And the insane! How many thousands of such has this war made!"

"Our time will be remembered as one of reconciliation for the great European enemies during the World War. Statesmen of France, Germany, Poland, Czecho-Slovakia, Italy, and Great Britain realized that nations were interdependent and that what was disastrous to one would be disastrous to all."

"The pupils should retell the stories, thus enriching their vocabulary and learning to express thought clearly, easily, consecutively, and confidently,– a power so much needed and so valuable to citizens of a republic."

"Museums, theatres, and concert halls are all around us, but what use are they unless you can get the child into the way of having sympathy for the art and the artist, of seeing and hearing the thing itself and talking about it?"

"According to Jewish Law, this book is written by people who do not exist. I assure you, it's all very logical: we're not proscribed because we don't exist. If we existed, believe me, they'd be against us."

"I feel I was very lucky, though, because when I came out, which was in 1973, New York was just hopping. It was exploding. It was after Stonewall. Lesbians started getting organized. I belonged to a group of lesbian writers. There were four of us who decided to start Conditions magazine, for example, and before that we had a group called Di Vilde Chayas [the wild animals], which was a group that had Adrienne Rich, Melanie Kaye/Kantrowitz, Gloria Greenfield, and Evelyn Beck, who did Nice Jewish Girls."

"Evelyn Torton Beck's Nice Jewish Girls: A Lesbian Anthology, published in April 1982, sold ten thousand copies over the next ten months and made an enormous impact on the women's community."

"despite the consciousness-raising efforts of such scholars as Evelyn Torton Beck, women's studies has neglected to fully integrate Jewish women's ethnic identity into its theoretical frameworks."

"What I hope is that this book will also open a dialogue with the rabbonim. Well, maybe not the rabbonim, but with members of the Jewish community-at-large. I'd like them to shep naches from our contributions to Jewish life. I'd like to hear them say "mazel tov" instead of "oy gevald" when they see we've made a book of our own."

"I want the radicalism of the very outrageous, very outspoken, very political lesbian-feminists, Maxine Feldman, Robin Tyler, Alix Dobkin, and Linda Shear to be recognized as part of the Jewish radical-activist tradition in Eastern Europe. As comics, Feldman and Tyler follow the tradition of Jewish storytellers and wedding jesters (who warned the brides against marriage), whose job it was to keep the community laughing and crying, revealing it to itself: “Jewish women within the movement have often been the ones to change their names. . . . My last name is obviously very Jewish. Someone once asked me why I hadn't changed my name. I said to them, "I think you better check your anti-Semitism. Why haven't you asked Meg Christian?" (Maxine Feldman)"

"Probably the single most insistent theme in this book, repeated with variation and from many different angles and perspectives, directed at both non-Jewish lesbians and non-lesbian Jews, is the desire of the contributors to be "all of who we are.""

"For many Jews, the question of Israel is the most complex and confusing aspect of identifying as a Jew today. Israel is undoubtedly a patriarchy and theocracy hostile to women and lesbians; there are also serious problems with its foreign policy and its treatment of Palestinians. Jews of color who live in Israel experience racism, classism, and the elitism of Ashkenazi Jews. This situation becomes even more complex when we realize the strong Sephardic backing of the present Begin administration."

"The degree of public and private hatred unleashed onto Israel seems far out of proportion to what Israel has actually done (in comparison to other countries, such as England, France, Belgium, and the Soviet Union-whose right to existence is not questioned)."

"Evelyn Beck for her groundbreaking work on Jewish issues in the feminist and lesbian movement, and for Nice Jewish Girls: A Lesbian Anthology, where so much began."

"Jewish lesbian-feminists cannot help but feel critical toward the present Israeli government. Yet, Israel mirrors the pluralism behind the initial Zionist impulse. Israel was to be all things to all Jews. Instead, it became simply a nation among nations, nothing more and nothing less. Let us understand its limitations and work to change it to be a place that we can comfortably call a Jewish homeland."

"In response to an upsetting confrontation between Jewish women and women of color in a New England regional Women's Studies Conference,** Cherríe Moraga (et al.) wrote in Gay Community News, "We don't have to be the same to have a movement, but we do have to be accountable for our ignorance. In the end, finally, we must refuse to give up on each other.""

"We have come to understand that white women must work on their racism with each other, that such education is not the burden of women of color."

"Isn't it vital for us to make connections between oppressions? To see in what ways anti-Semitism, racism, and other forms of oppression are different and alike?"

"Why is it often difficult to see parallels? Do we resist seeing them? Need one oppression cancel out another? Would the recognition that it is not either/or but both/and be too overwhelming? What would happen if we admitted that oppressed groups can themselves be oppressive? In the face of this complexity, a few facts remain clear: oppression is never less oppressive simply because it takes a different form."

"For many of us, unexpectedly, the experience of coming out as lesbians was a crucial step toward our coming out as Jews. The experience of being outside the bounds of society as a lesbian makes a woman more willing to acknowledge other ways in which she stands outside. It becomes increasingly harder to ignore the signals of outsiderhood. And soon one doesn't want to."

"To be born a Jew is to be part of a unified culture that is also extremely diverse."

"I had managed to rationalize my shock and dismay when I found the narrator of Ruby fruit Jungle (by Rita Mae Brown) describing the fat Jewish girl Barbara Spangenthau as someone who "always had her hand in her pants playing with herself, and worse, she stank. Until I was fifteen I thought that being Jewish meant you walked around with your hand in your pants." In 1974, as an emerging lesbian, I didn't want to admit that the movement's leading fiction writer was basing her humor on age-old anti-Semitic stereotypes. I simply couldn't afford to take it in. So I kept silent. In those early years of struggle it seemed unworthy to make a fuss. And worse-it seemed divisive. I could not yet claim my anger. I wanted too much to belong...Bertha Harris' novel lover shocked me by its reliance on Jewish stereotypes, associating Jews with violence, sex and money. Jewish physical characteristics are consistently seen as exotic and dangerous...while there are quite a number of Jewish characters in Jan Clausen's short story collection Mother, Sister, Daughter, Lover, not one of them has any positive attributes."

"Historically, Jews have been proud of our non-homogeneous thinking and our skills in seeing complexity. "Three Jews, four opinions," is a maxim quoted with pride."

"I began to understand the limits that the dominant culture places on "otherness." You could be a Jew and people would recognize that as a religious or ethnic affiliation or you could be a lesbian and some people would recognize that as an "alternative lifestyle" or "sexual preference," but if you tried to claim both identities-publicly and politically-you were exceeding the limits of what was permitted to the marginal. You were in danger of being perceived as ridiculous and threatening."

"In Vienna in 1938, when I was five years old and Hitler came to power, visibility was not safe. Schools were closed to me, as were parks, stores, restaurants. Once I was sent to buy butter because I was blonde and did not look Jewish. Men came and took my father away."

"That virtually no reviews of these highly-praised and widely-read authors mention anti-Semitism is a symptom of how little consciousness there is of this issue. Fortunately, excellent guidelines that would help raise consciousness are available. Paul E. Grosser and Edwin G. Halperin in Anti-Semitism: The Causes and Effects of a Prejudice, include an extended discussion of how to analyze anti-Semitism in works of literature while keeping in mind the integrity and responsibility of the artist."

"Is it not anti-Semitic for women to refuse to work with Israeli feminists solely because of their nationality, especially since many of these Israeli women are courageously taking stances against their government?"

"I started this project in a spirit of optimism, rooted in my pleasure (and relief) at finally having found a sense of congruence for the pieces of my life. I have since become increasingly sobered by the ramifications of what it can mean to want to say: I am a Jewish lesbian. The truth is that it is extremely difficult to identify oneself as a Jew outside the long shadow of anti-Semitism. It is like trying to imagine what it would feel like to be a lesbian in a non-homophobic world. So this book has become the exploration of complexities, as well as a celebration of our survival."

"My family history is a series of gaps, leaving questions to mark the spaces: What happened to my father while he was gone? Who took us in after the Nazis evicted us from our apartment? How did we get by after they confiscated the small business my father had painstakingly built up over the years? How did my father get out of the camps? My parents talked about those years, selectively. And not often."

"I was born in 1933 in Vienna, Austria, the year Hitler came to power; his shadow shadowed me." So Evelyn Torton Beck began the narrative of her life as a Jewish lesbian feminist at the NYU "Women's Liberation and Jewish Identity" conference...Beck described the difficulty of including Jewish themes in feminist discourse. "First, there is the fear of attack that produces a protective silence; second, is the fear of being perceived as too 'demanding: 'pushy, or 'politically incorrect. Third, and possibly more than any other factor, the fear of being excluded keeps Jewish women silent. Speaking and writing about explicitly Jewish themes (or even including them substantially) raises the worry that the work will be perceived as marginal, and therefore not as widely read and discussed." With Jews invisible and excluded, the "benign' anti-Semitism of indifference and insensitivity took over. Feminists categorized Jews with a radical "otherness" that was denied at the very moment it was created. "If Jews do not fit in, Beck worried, "it is quite likely that other groups may not fit into the conceptual framework we have constructed." Yet Beck maintained her optimism. "Across the U.S. and in many other parts of the world, Jewish lesbian-feminist communities were in the process of coming together; their very existence was exhilarating and inspired hope that by organizing around our differences, would come unity, and that our feminist projects, in all their complexity, would succeed."

"In reading Evelyn Torton Beck's lesbian anthology, Nice Jewish Girls, in the summer of 1982 I was catapulted into a maze of strong emotion and a recognition of so many of the patterns and experiences I shared with the contributors. In her introduction, Beck had written a line that brought me right to attention. Actually it was a footnote. It said: "One wonders how anyone can wholeheartedly fight the oppression of another group when, in order to do so, she finds it necessary to denigrate and deny her own oppression." In reading this I recognized much about myself."

"In the majority of Egyptian tombs most of the representations record the normal and repeated activities of daily life, as been clearly pointed out by . These processes may involve some consecutive actions, but they are not studies concerning individulas. Rather the tomb owner quiescently observes the different phases of agriculture and crafts or receives his dues. Himself rarely active, when the tomb owner does hunt or spear fish it is not a specific occasion, but a standardized activity typifying a nobleman, which is repeated in tomb after tomb. ... Similary, in temples there are endlessly repeated rituals and heraldic diagrams of the victories and exploits characteristic by definition for the king."

"We have seen that the greatest expansion of Cretan trade occurred in the MM II period, when its wares were carried around the shores of the Mediterranean. Minoan connections with the East apparently continued into the MM III period. A stone vase lid from Knossos inscribed with the name of the king is part of the evidence that has been interpreted as an indications of the ephemeral Hyksos empire ranging from Crete to Egypt, and East toward Babylonia."

"Since Homer celebrated the artistic skill of the s the western world has looked to the coastal areas of Syria and Palestine as centers of applied art. We now know that many crafts flourished there not only in the Phoenician period (ca. ninth to fifth centuries ) but also in the preceding era, particularly in the sixteenth to thirteenth centuries when great Syrian and Palestinian cities were centers for the international trade and politics of the Late Bronze period."

"There were indeed human hazards in this country—but not to go there at all because of the possibility of encountering them? Unthinkable! It has become ever more clear to me that if I had spent my life avoiding any and all potential risks, I would have missed doing most of the things that have comprised of the best years of my life."

"Of course, as my husband points out, this game never really ends. It’s simply a matter of perspective; as I see it, one of the wonderful aspects of birding is that it is endless. There’s always, as long as one lives, some new place to go, some exciting new thing to find. No one knowledgeable will ever say, “I’ve done it all – now what?”"

"Phoebe was a legend among the professional bird guides who guided her around the world. A non-birder may imagine that high-level birding is just like regular birding except more expensive. In reality, birding at Phoebe’s level requires an Olympian’s level of concentration, dedication, and effort, along with a level of risk-taking that no non-birder could ever understand. She had some horrific experiences along the way, but the non-fatal ones never stopped her."

"Emotion and personal desire really do reign in all passionate endeavors, not objectivity and reason. And sometimes we’re just plain lucky enough to get away with it."

"Black-necked Cranes on the Tibetan plateau were my last of this family and left me with some unexpectedly ambivalent feelings—triumph at having finally seen them all, yet sadness that there were now no more left to look for."

"Chances are, if I can feel a lump, there has already been some spread to internal organs, in which case my time of health is probably limited to a few months. Now may well be my final opportunity to go birding on a foreign trip, and I can’t just throw that away. If it’s my last trip, so be it—but I’m going to make it a good one and go down binoculars in hand!"

"Phoebe did not hesitate for a second as she plunged off the trail and down into the thick undergrowth that filled the steep ravine. I hustled after her, and we swiftly picked our way into the darkness and unknown. In the end, the bird did not call again, and the fog was too thick, so the partridge eluded Phoebe that night. Regardless, I will never forget the wonderful time we shared. The sight of her disappearing down the ravine after the Long-billed Partridge sums up Phoebe for me—committed, fearless, and never looking back."

"I hadn’t done much traveling in Arab countries, and it’s certainly not my favorite culture (a common enough viewpoint among emancipated western women), but both geographically and ornithologically I found it fascinating."

"The triggers for turning points in one’s life are mysterious things. A whole spectrum of different factors with complex physical, intellectual, and emotional overtones is involved, and all of them have to merge in the same place and time to form the blinding white light that urges one along a new path. Sheer chance plays an enormous role, unless one is programmed to believe (as I do not) that it was all meant to be."

"“How can they ever get food into those fuzzy chicks without stabbing them to death with their bills?” Watching those creatures do what they had been doing successfully for millions of years, without any help from us, finally let me learn not to judge everything by human standards."

"Phoebe’s legacy in the world of birding is larger than life. She possessed a hard-earned, near encyclopedic knowledge of the world’s birds. Her drive to observe, and observe well, as much of the world’s avifauna as possible, with a special emphasis on its diversity, is well-known, clear from her writing, and, in some circles, the stuff of legends."

"I desperately wanted to continue running my own life, because I was healthy and, physically, felt just fine. I accepted the fact that my life wasn’t going to last long, but I very quickly came to the conclusion that I preferred a short span of quality living under my control, followed by a quick death, to a longer life protracted by various all-consuming medical treatments and their effects, probably followed by a lingering death."

"Today's mic-hogging, fast-talking, contentious young (and old) lefties continue to hawk little books and pamphlets on revolution, always with choice words or documents from Marx, Mao, even Malcolm. But I've never seen a broadside with "A Black Feminist Statement or even the writings of Angela Davis or June Jordan or Barbara Omolade or Flo Kennedy or Audre Lorde or bell hooks or Michelle Wallace, at least not from the groups who call themselves leftist. These women's collective wisdom has provided the richest insights into American radicalism's most fundamental questions: How can we build a multiracial movement? Who are the working class and what do they desire? How do we resolve the Negro Question and the Woman Question? What is freedom?"

"Robin Kelley is the preeminent historian of black popular culture writing today."

"keep in mind is that we have conservatives who call themselves Christians, who don’t know the Bible, because in Jubilee, you know, debt cancellation is part of the biblical injunction. You’re supposed to cancel debts, you know, periodically. That is part of it. And I just wish the right would read their Bible, because, you know, maybe they would support this as a biblical move. I mean, I’m an atheist, but still, I read my Bible."

"disability justice. It’s a framework that embraces abolition. And that is to say, it demands nothing less than the overthrow of all forms of ableism, you know, and the structures that support it. So, the difference between disability justice and disability rights is that disability justice says, you know, we’ve got to deal with racism, sexism, heteropatriarchy, capitalism, that these are the forms of oppression that make even disability differential. And so, if you think about the way that we responded to the COVID-19 crisis, for example, and to this day how we’re still responding to it, that disabled people who are Black and Brown and poor, undocumented, Indigenous, queer, gender nonconforming, they’re the ones that end up getting differential care, sometimes less care, sometimes inhumane care. They’re the ones who end up incarcerated, end up homeless, end up jobless, housing insecure. And that’s what disability justice tells us. And for me, I was forced to really come to terms with it by a number of folks who really were involved in the disability justice movement, who really forced me to think deeper about, like, what is a radical freedom dream, you know? Aurora Levins Morales, for example, is one who’s a really important disability justice activist who really kind of pulled my coattails on this."