The Book, Cat, & Cat Book Lovers Almanac

of historical trivia regarding books, cats, and other animals. Actually this blog has evolved so that it is described better as a blog about cats in history and culture. And we take as a theme the advice of Aldous Huxley: If you want to be a writer, get some cats. Don't forget to see the archived articles linked at the bottom of the page.

June 9, 2014

June 9, 1939

Letty Cottin Pogrebin (June 9, 1939) has been in the forefront of feminism for our lives. Her writing is a major tool. From How to Make it in a Man's World 1970 to How To Be a Friend To a Friend Who's Sick (2013), her focus has been in forging a path to greater freedom for all.

Her return to Judaism is therefore an important episode for us all. Here are some details regarding her faith from Hadassah Magazine where she is quoted and elucidated:

"We should not be silenced. Judaism is us. All of us.”...Her nonfiction books fuse memoir with research and reporting. Deborah, Golda, and Me: Being Female and Jewish in America... reconciles her “feminist head” with her “Jewish heart”; Getting Over Getting Older: An Intimate Journey ...offers an introspective look at the aging process...[Her final message may be] " Zakhor, I say. Remember.”

And recently this article Pogrebin published in Huffington Post, (April 16, 2009) and we excerpt, is a nice example of her writing:

Given its nearly eight million hits thus far, you've probably seen her, the matronly lady all decked out in that mother-of-the-bride cocktail dress and matching open-toed pumps, hair by some neighborhood beauty shop, eyebrows John L. Lewis. In the opening scene, while awaiting her turn on the British version of American Idol, she breezily confides that she is unemployed, lives alone with a cat named Pebbles, and has never been married or kissed.

Once on stage, her interrogator, Simon Cowell, asks about her dream. To be a professional singer, she says, and as successful as Elaine Page -- a statement that elicits great hilarity and hyperactive camera close-ups of the judges' bemused disbelief and the snickering, eye-rolling audience. Clearly, everyone is thinking, Elaine Paige!? Are you actually comparing yourself to the First Lady of the British Musical Theater, the singer whose recording of the
Cats anthem, "Memory," topped the charts for months,...You've got to be kidding.

The title of the article is "Why Susan Boyle Makes Us Cry."

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