Oct 22

Oct 22 Tell Me What You’re Reading #7: conversation with Payton Turner of Girls At Library - Women’s anger and, sometimes, rage

Our guest for Episode #7 is Payton Cosell Turner. Payton hails from a family of communicators. Her mother is a writer, her brother is a musician and her grandfather was the legendary sports broadcaster Howard Cosell.

Payton is the co-founder, CEO and head designer of the design studio Flat Vernacular She is also the co-founder and the Editor-in-Chief of Girls At Library an online journal that features engaging literary interviews with and book recommendations from remarkable, diverse women who share a passion for reading. We referred in our Episode # 3 to the terrific Girls at Library interview with our Episode #3 guest, Emma Holland.

It’s no surprise that when I asked Payton what she was reading and what she wanted to talk about, Payton chose two books about women. These books are about women filled with anger, and sometimes, rage in response to the unique challenges they face.

There has been a spate of books and articles recently about women’s anger.

In the current New Republic, Rebecca Solnit writes about three books that are a part of the growing literature in essays and now books about female anger, what she refers to as “a phenomenon in transition”. All the Rage: What a literature that embraces female anger can achieve by Rebecca Solnit in The New Republic

The October 8 New Yorker “Annals of Art” section by Claudia Roth Pierpont, reported, under the title, “The Canvas Ceiling”, on New York’s postwar female painters and the obstacles they faced. How New York’s Postwar Female Painters Battled for Recognition
The women of the historic Ninth Street Show had a will of iron and an intense need for their talent to be expressed, no matter the cost.
By Claudia Roth Pierpont in The New Yorker

. . . And the October 15 New Yorker, in an article by Casey Cep, reviewed four books, under the title “Fighting Mad - Reconsidering the political power of women’s anger”, which discuss the power of woman’s anger and rage. The Perils and Possibilities of Anger: After centuries of censure, women reconsider the political power of female rage. By Casey Cep in The New Yorker

All of these books are listed below.