Nancy Friday
Nancy Friday | |
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Born | Nancy Colbert Friday August 27, 1933 Female sexuality and liberation |
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Nancy Colbert Friday (August 27, 1933 – November 5, 2017) was an American author who wrote on the topics of
Biography
Nancy Friday was born in
Her first book, published in 1973, was
Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s she was a frequent guest on television and radio programs such as Politically Incorrect, Oprah, Larry King Live, Good Morning America, and NPR's Talk of the Nation. She also created a website in the mid-1990s, to complement the publication of The Power of Beauty. Initially conceived as a forum for the development of new work and interaction with her diverse audience, it was not updated in later years.
Despite the judgment of
Literary motivation
Friday explained how "in the late 1960s I chose to write about women's sexual fantasies because the subject was unbroken ground, a missing piece of the puzzle ... at a time in history when the world was suddenly curious about sex and women's sexuality."[6] The backdrop was a widespread belief that "women do not have sexual fantasies ... are by and large destitute of sexual fantasy."[7]
Friday considered that "more than any other emotion, guilt determined the story lines of the fantasies in My Secret Garden . . . women inventing ploys to get past their fear that wanting to reach orgasm made them Bad Girls."[8] Her later book, My Mother/My Self, 'grew immediately out of My Secret Garden's questioning of the source of women's terrible guilt about sex."[9]
When she returned 20 years later to her original topic of women's fantasies in Women on Top, it was in the belief that "the sexual revolution" had stalled: "it was the greed of the 1980s that dealt the death blow ... the demise of healthy sexual curiosity."[10]
Friday, like other feminists, was especially concerned with the controlling role of the images of "Nice Woman ... Nice Girl"
Criticism
"Critics have labeled Friday's books unscientific, because the author solicited responses",[16] thus potentially biasing the contributor pool.
My Secret Garden was greeted by a "salvo from the media accusing me of inventing the whole book, having made up all the fantasies"; My Mother/My Self was "initially ... violently rejected by both publishers and readers";[9] while Women on Top "was heavily criticized for its graphic and sensational content."[16]
Friday was also criticized for her reaction to the
Personal life
Friday married novelist Bill Manville in 1967, separated from him in 1980, and divorced him in 1986. Her second husband was Norman Pearlstine, formerly the editor in chief of Time Inc. They were married at the Rainbow Room in New York City on July 11, 1988, and divorced in 2005.
In 2011, Friday sold her home in
Nancy Friday died at her home in Manhattan from complications of Alzheimer's disease on November 5, 2017, at the age of 84.[1]
Bibliography
- My Secret Garden: Women's Sexual Fantasies, Simon & Schuster, 1973
- Forbidden Flowers: More Women's Sexual Fantasies, Simon & Schuster, 1975
- My Mother, My Self: The Daughter's Search for Identity, Delacorte Press, 1977
- Men in Love, Men's Sexual Fantasies: The Triumph of Love Over Rage, Dell Publishing, 1980
- Jealousy, M. Evans & Co., 1985
- Women on Top: How Real Life Has Changed Women's Sexual Fantasies, Simon & Schuster, 1991
- The Power of Beauty, HarperCollins Publishers, 1996. Republished as Our Looks, Our Lives: Sex, Beauty, Power and the Need to be Seen, HarperCollins Publishers, 1999
- Beyond My Control: Forbidden Fantasies in an Uncensored Age, Sourcebooks, Inc., 2009
See also
References
- ^ a b Gates, Anita (November 5, 2017). "Nancy Friday, 84, Author On Women's Sexuality, But Not a Feminist, Dies". The New York Times. p. D7. Retrieved November 5, 2017.
- ^ "Jane Colbert Friday to Wed Naval Officer" (PDF). fultonhistory.com. May 21, 1948. Retrieved September 1, 2023.
- ^ Thompson, Bill (February 8, 2009). "Alumna Humphreys to read from work". The Post and Courier. Charleston, South Carolina. Archived from the original on August 7, 2011.
- ^ Rowes, Barbara (June 30, 1980). "Author Nancy Friday explains why men's sexual fantasies are different from women's". People. Time Inc.
- ISBN 9781416567011. Details.
- Quote:
- When I sat down to write this book, I thought the feminists would embrace it. I didn't realize that it was unwelcome at Feminist Headquarters until a former friend turned editor at Ms. magazine, gave me a rap on the knuckles, proclaiming that "Ms. will decide what women's fantasies are." Soon after, a review in that magazine followed with the opening line "...this woman is not a feminist."
- Quote:
- ISBN 9780795335259.
- ^ Allan Fromme, quoted in Friday, Top p. 7
- ^ Friday, Top p. 4-5
- ^ a b Friday, Top p. 8
- ^ Friday, Top p. 11-13
- ^ Friday, Top p. 20-22
- ISBN 9781577664970.
- ^ Paula Gunn Allen, Introduction to Paula Gunn Allen in Readings p. 210
- ^ Bright, p. 382 and p. 379
- ^ Friday, Top p. 21
- ^ ISBN 9780816071494. Retrieved September 1, 2023 – via Google Books.
- ^ Ronson, Jon (April 22, 2016). "Monica Lewinsky: 'The shame sticks to you like tar'". The Guardian.
- Blogspot. [self-published source]
- ^ "About the Participants, "The Memoir", January 13-16, 2000, Nancy Friday". keywestliteraryseminar.org. Key West Literary Seminar. Archived from the original on August 11, 2007.