Betty Friedan’s Impact on Four Women
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Four women become book club friends – and then dear friends – in a suburb of Washington D.C. in 1963. The reader sees first-hand what life was like for women in that time period. An annoying but not life altering example is that one of the women wanted to open a savings account to set aside money she was earning on her own. The bank was adamant in needing her husband’s signature to open such an account. A more horrific example is the woman who wanted to refill her birth control pills but couldn’t because the husband needed to sign off on that as well.
As we meet the four ladies, the one wanting to open a savings account is Margaret Ryan. She is 33 and married with three children, ages 11, 8, and 6. She is unfulfilled in her life and does a couple of things to remedy the situation. One is to rent a type-writer as she begins to write stories. And the other is to start a book club.
The idea for a book club came about because Margaret wanted to get to know the intriguing Charlotte Gustafson. She is new to town and obviously well to do. Margaret first sees her in line at the pharmacy in an ankle length mink coat. And then she listens in as Charlotte argues with the pharmacist as he tries to dissuade her from filling her prescription for Miltown, a tranquilizer popular at the time.
When Margaret approaches Charlotte about a book club, she suggests A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, which Charlotte pooh-poohs. She agrees to come to the club if they read The Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan instead. Charlotte calls the book “groundbreakingly, earth-shatteringly brilliant.”
Two other women are recruited into the club. The one who could not get the birth control pills is Vivian Buschetti. She is 41 years old and a former Army nurse who – not surprisingly – is now pregnant with her seventh child. The fourth member is Bitsy Cobb. She wanted to be a veterinarian but is married to one instead. He is much older than she is. His name is Kingsley Cobb, King for short.
Thanks to the “truth serum” (vodka stingers) that Charlotte serves at book club meetings and thanks to the nature of the books they read, the women become very close friends.
Most of the book is set in 1963 with a final chapter telling us about the women – the Bettys as they call themselves – forty-plus years later, in 2006.
While The Book Club for Troublesome Women is not a blockbuster as Betty Friedan’s book was, it spoke to me and for me. I was particularly moved when not one but two women got major put-downs from their husbands – one very much in public.
Additionally, there are some terrific quotes that address the forever female problem of life balance. Here is the issue as women in the 1960s faced it:
“Why is marriage and motherhood expected to be our entire existence and North Star, the center of our satisfaction? Didn’t you ever want more? An accomplishment that’s all your own, based on your brains and not just your biology?”
That quote alone will give book clubs a lot to talk about. Especially if the quote is served up with truth serum.
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Click here to learn more about The Book Club for Troublesome Women.
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