The Mutual Admiration Society:

 How Dorothy L. Sayers and Her Oxford Circle Remade the World for Women

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By: Mo Moulton
Narrated by: Lorna Bennett
Length: 14 hrs and 29 mins
Unabridged Audiobook

Publisher's Summary
A group biography of renowned crime novelist Dorothy L. Sayers and the Oxford women who stood at the vanguard of equal rights

Dorothy L. Sayers is now famous for her Lord Peter Wimsey and Harriet Vane detective series, but she was equally well known during her life for an essay asking “Are Women Human?” Women’s rights were expanding rapidly during Sayers’s lifetime; she and her friends were some of the first women to receive degrees from Oxford. Yet, as historian Mo Moulton reveals, it was clear from the many professional and personal obstacles they faced that society was not ready to concede that women were indeed fully human. 

Dubbing themselves the Mutual Admiration Society, Sayers and her classmates remained lifelong friends and collaborators as they fought for a truly democratic culture that acknowledged their equal humanity. A celebration of feminism and female friendship, The Mutual Admiration Society offers crucial insight into Dorothy L. Sayers and her world.

©2019 Mo Moulton (P)2020 Blackstone Publishing

 

How we slowly but surely move the world forward

You have me waxing philosophic this evening.

It is not the headlines that count. It is the slow, drip, drip, drip of incremental change wrought by individuals day after day, year after year that moves us forward -- toward enlightenment, toward societal change, toward whatever it is out there that we are trying to change about the world we live in.

Before there was Gloria Steinem, Bella Abzug, The Feminine Mystique and a whole lot of Playtex going up in smoke, there were Ms. Sayers and her Oxford buddies -- the generation that would have literally given birth to the Bellas, the Glorias and the Bettys. Moulton has put together a very readable biography of a remarkable group of intelligent, motivated women who in their own mostly quiet ways moved us forward.

If you are interested in Sayers and her life story, this is a good place to start. If you can, eyeball the book, because the audiobook narrator's habit of taking a v-e-r-y long paused before every bit of quoted text will drive you crazy -- along with her attempts to give each of the women their own voice, which, to me, in a non-fiction recitation is not necessary.

 

by Katherine Johnson with Joylette Hylick and Katherine Moore (read by Robin Miles)

 

Publisher's Summary

The remarkable woman at heart of the smash New York Times best seller and Oscar-winning film Hidden Figures tells the full story of her life, including what it took to work at NASA, help land the first man on the moon, and live through a century of turmoil and change.

In 2015, at the age of 97, Katherine Johnson became a global celebrity. President Barack Obama awarded her the prestigious Presidential Medal of Freedom - the nation’s highest civilian honor - for her pioneering work as a mathematician on NASA’s first flights into space. Her contributions to America’s space program were celebrated in a blockbuster and Academy-award nominated movie. 

In this memoir, Katherine shares her personal journey from child prodigy in the Allegheny Mountains of West Virginia to NASA human computer. In her life after retirement, she served  as a beacon of light for her family and community alike. Her story is centered around the basic tenets of her life - no one is better than you, education is paramount, and asking questions can break barriers. The memoir captures the many facets of this unique woman: the curious “daddy’s girl”, pioneering professional, and sage elder. 

This multidimensional portrait is also the record of a century of racial history that reveals the influential role educators at segregated schools and Historically Black Colleges and Universities played in nurturing the dreams of trailblazers like Katherine. The author pays homage to her mentor - the African American professor who inspired her to become a research mathematician despite having his own dream crushed by racism. 

Infused with the uplifting wisdom of a woman who handled great fame with genuine humility and great tragedy with enduring hope, My Remarkable Journey ultimately brings into focus a determined woman who navigated tough racial terrain with soft-spoken grace - and the unrelenting grit required to make history and inspire future generations. 

©2021 Katherine Johnson, Joylette Hylick, Katherine Moore (P)2021 HarperCollins Publishers

 

What bothers me is that there aren't enough Katherine Johnsons writing books like this

Katherine G. Johnson's memoir is reminiscent of another memoir written almost 30 years ago, Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters' First 100 Years. Also barrier breakers, Sadie and Bessie Delany were born at the end of the 19th century. They both graduated Columbia University. Both were professionals, one a dentist and the other a teacher. Both scored firsts for black women in the United States. But it wasn't the lists of accomplishments that made me think of the sisters as I read Ms. Johnson's book. It was actually something in the language and the diction that triggered the thought; there was something about the way Ms. Johnson wrote that brought the Delany sisters to mind, because, for whatever reason, they sounded so much alike. Then, there was the message that both books articulated: success in life requires an education and hard work and a successful life includes giving back to the community that raised you in order to raise yet another generation of successful community members. Nothing in life is just given to you. It is a universal message.

I don't usually read memoirs, especially the celebrity memoirs that seem to be the sum total of the memoirs and biographies that turn up in the Audible sale piles. I want to read about good people who have contributed to society and are proud but humble about their accomplishments, not a bunch of self-entitled braggarts or drugged up yahoos. I'm interested in the people who have given to society and worked to make it a better place for everyone. Mrs. Johnson's life story is a life lesson for all of us; we need more of them on our library bookshelves.

In short, go, get this book and spend a few hours with a remarkable woman.

Agatha Christie: A Mysterious Life

 

By Laura Thompson (read by Pearl Hewitt )

Read as part of the Agatha Christie Centenary Celebration and

A 20 for '21 read

 

 

I have been reading Agatha Christie mysteries off and on for at least half a century. I don't know how many I have read at this point and won't even hazard a guess -- and it doesn't really matter because in just 5 years I will be able to say that I have read them all, because for some odd reason, perhaps to read, perhaps for the socialization, I have joined up with a group that is going to read them all. When I heard that people in the reading group were reading and enjoying the recent biography by Laura Thompson, and when I saw that I could get it for free from Audible Plus, I decided that I should give it a whirl. About half way through, I decided that I needed a print copy for note taking.

I'm almost finished listening now and I will say that I have enjoyed going a bit deeper into her life than I get with a Wikipedia article. She was an interesting lady, to say the least.

Thompson book is an interesting combination of historical research and literary criticism -- and it is the literary criticism part that I am having trouble with, and part of the reason that I want a print edition. I am not sure of her methodology. I had a literature professor who went crazy any time someone would try to claim that actions or thought of a character had a direct correlation to what the author thought or believed. Thompson spends a lot of time pointing out which characters and scenes in the books are autobiographical. While it might be interesting to look for these things as I move forward reading the books, I also want to know the basis for these conclusions; I want to see the footnotes and references upon which she basis her opinion.

The early chapters are much more interesting than the later chapters. She covers almost every aspect of Christie's life -- her childhood, her marriages, her travels, her family, her financial affairs, her final years. While it started strong, at the end it just seemed to end abruptly.

Should you read it? Yes, if you are interested in the life and times of Agatha Christie. She was an interesting person who lead a fulfilled life and who didn't waste time crying over spilled milk. She worked hard to get where she was and she did it all on her talent and creativity.

Three and three quarters stars.

The Map That Changed the World

 

William Smith and the Birth of Modern Geology

by Simon Winchester (read by the author)

 

Simon Winchester is another one of my go-to authors. I have learned so much about so many things in reading his books.

This book is about a map that was created over 200 years ago, in the very early 1800s. William Smith wandered all over England mapping the geological strata and then recorded his findings on a single full color map. Winchester gives not only the story of the map but a biography of Smith and insight into what was going on in England at the time -- at least as it pertained to what Smith was doing.

 

I like the way Winchester gives us history that goes beyond what we learned in the classroom. There is so much more to the history of mankind than the wars and politics and the biographies of the rich and the powerful -- and Winchester is doing his part to bring these lesser known but still important stories to the forefront.

Four stars.