Katie Roiphe

This book explores and illuminates the unconventional, and occasionally bizarre, marital arrangements and affairs of the heart of such literary lights as H. G. Wells, Katherine Mansfield, Vera Brittain, and Vanessa Bell. It isn't the least bit salacious, but there would be an uncomfortable element of voyeurism in reading it if not for the fact that so much of what is known about these relationships comes from the parties themselves, who wrote voluminously about the intimacies (and lack show more thereof) of their personal lives in letters, memoirs and autobiographies, to say nothing of the fictional versions they created. "Freedom" and "rationality" were the common themes in the alternative lifestyles documented here. Women who wanted to be free from the constraints of traditional marriage...free to pursue their own careers, to avoid male domination while enjoying male companionship, free to express love in multiple (often Platonic or nearly so) ways; men who wanted the comfort and security of a devoted wife who was "rational" enough to realize she might not satisfy all his needs; men and women who felt no one could maintain, with a single person, the high level of romantic interest necessary for emotional sustenance over time; men and women who were attracted in various ways to individuals of both sexes. It's fascinating stuff, but ultimately none of these arrangements seemed to work any better for everyone involved than more traditional unions. Because, after all, humans aren't all that rational when it comes to their passions and longings, and most experiments that attempt to impose rationality onto essentially emotional situations are bound to be no more than partially successful in the long run. In almost every instance related here, someone was ultimately exploited or shortchanged in some way. show less

I guess I missed the point.

Isn't historical fiction supposed to be about what actually happened, only trying to guess and fill in the details we don't know? As opposed to "making up vile statements out of whole cloth," which is generally referred to as "slander"?

I probably am not the target market for this book -- after all, I know some actual facts about Charles Dodgson, plus I am autistic (as Dodgson probably was), and I don't really understand the point of fiction when one could write a show more real biography. Others may not suffer those handicaps.

But still -- it's so wrong! Flat-out factually wrong. Let's clarify: The plot of this book is about the (documented and seemingly correct) estrangement between Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) and the family of Dean Liddell, including Alice Liddell, the "real Alice in Wonderland." The real reason for this estrangement -- which was real but not as extreme as described in this volume -- is unknown. Author Roiphe suggests that the reason was that Dodgson took nude photographs of Alice.

There is good reason to think that Dodgson was not, in fact, a paedophile -- that his strange behaviors (and they certainly were strange!) came about because, as a person with autism, he had developed better social skills for dealing with children than adults. But that's only hypothesis. Perhaps he did lust after little girls.

That still doesn't cure the errors in the book. Far too many. A smattering of examples:

Page 3: At Christ Church, where Dodgson taught, a "student" was not "one who studies"; a studentship was a fellowship, entitling the holder to certain rights at the college.

Page 10: When Dodgson met Alice, she was not yet four -- yet here she is playing croquet and asking about being lectured. (This, I'll admit, may be my error. At times Roiphe jumps around in time and perspective in a way I found hard to follow.)

Page 36: Dodgson was not stooped; he was noteworthy for his extremely stiff posture. One of those who testified to this was Alice Hargreaves (the former Alice Liddell) herself.

Page 52 quotes Dodgson as telling "The Walrus and the Carpenter" to Alice. Not possible. Dodgson hadn't even decided it was a "Carpenter" at that time -- he didn't decide on a carpenter (as opposed to a couple of other things) until Tenniel told him which would be easier to illustrate, more than half a decade after the break-up with the Liddells.

Page 60: Dodgson "the only man in Oxford who didn't like the Dean"? Most of Christ Church was aghast at his appointment -- he was a reformer, and they didn't want to be reformed.

Page 155: This is a story about how Dodgson came to use the name "Lewis Carroll" on the Alice books. But Dodgson had already used "Lewis Carroll" before that, and the story of how he picked the name is well known, and this isn't it.

Page 166: Dodgson's diaries show that his faith in God was fervent and lifelong -- his heartfelt appeals to God in his diary show that. He lost his belief in eternal punishment, not his belief in God.

Page 168: He was not a mediocre mathematician; his works on logic, voting theory, and determinants were all original and noteworthy. And he wrote useful notes on Euclid, although he refused to go beyond what Euclid taught. This was his one real weakness as a mathematician. He was not great as Euler or Gauss were great, but he would have been an asset to any mathematical research department. As for Lorina Liddell's snarl on p. 217, "What has he ever produced," this is both wrong (his list of publications shows that he did produce) and wrong-headed (Dodgson lived before "publish or perish").

Page 176: We know from Dodgson's diaries that he did not take his first nude photograph until after his break with the Liddells. Nor did he take any without the parents' consent (although he sometimes angled hard for that consent). For one thing, it was too hard. His photographs weren't snapshots, which were not possible in that era; Victorian photographs needed good light, and a cooperative model, and a long time.

Page 194: "Respectable children did not pose for naked portraits." That's not history; that's modern opinion. In Victorian times, children often did -- there is reason to think that many of Dodgson's nude pictures were taken at the request of the parents. It was adults -- sinful, fallen adults -- who were not photographed naked. Go ahead, start looking at Victorian poetry books, and see how many of them feature illustrations of naked children.

I'm going on and on -- a trait I share with Dodgson. The point is, this book is false. The hypothesis doesn't hold water, and the supporting "data" didn't happen. Maybe it happened to someone else. But would you care if the people involved weren't "Lewis Carroll" and "Alice"? Problem is, they aren't Lewis Carroll and Alice. Whatever is the answer to the "Liddell Riddle," the greatest question in Dodgson scholarship, this is not it. show less

This is my first experience with Katie Roiphe. I've not read any of her previous works, but I am aware she has ruffled some feathers with her previous books and articles. But I don't care. The subject of this memoir is what captured my attention. The Power Notebooks is a series of essays in which the author is trying to learn more about herself. The whys of her actions.She dissects her life as well as the lives of famous writers. She explores how some women in their writing seems so powerful show more as well as in public, but in their private lives they long to be subjugated. Which begs the question: Should women show vulnerability?

I found the whole content of this book to be incredibly interesting. Roiphe lays herself bare sharing intimate details of her life. And listening to The Power Notebooks as an audiobook made Roiphe seem even more vulnerable. Roiphe is a gifted writer who makes you think about women and their choices. Why we do the things we do. Why we want the things we want. It takes courage to let people into your life. And even more courage to put it out there on paper for the world to see. Roiphe is not perfect. She doesn't claim to be superwoman or have all the answers. It's as if this book was saying: This is me. This is who I am.

I don't agree with all her insights into the authors she writes about, and I cringed when she talked about an affair she had when she was fifteen with a 30-something year old rabbi. But it was interesting to hear her point of view nonetheless. I am so glad I picked this book up. It not only introduced me to Roiphe herself, but a few other authors I haven't had the pleasure of reading yet. And I've added more books to my wish list because of it.

*My thanks to S&S for providing me with a review copy of this book. All opinions are my own. show less

This book idealizes the sexual liberation of the 60s whilst berating the safe-sex culture of the 80s. The "sexual liberation" of the 60s was fraught with problems for women, problems she chooses to cheerfully ignore. She thinks that her mother's and aunt's positive experiences of the 60s mean that the 60s were wonderful and that her negative experience of the 80s and 90s mean that the sexual attitudes of her decades suck, taking anecdotal evidence to be the end-all be-all in arguments. The show more author is resentful of the fact that all colleges promote condom use -- it's not much of a "personal choice" when AIDS and cervical cancer are at stake, FYI. She also completely misinterprets Take Back the Night, which is about empowering and giving a voice to women, not victimizing them. She thinks that because rape and sexual harassment are talked about negatively, sex is given a bad rap. If she thinks that non-consensual attention and sexual assault are in the same boat as consensual sensual acts, then she is welcome to hold those views, but they seem pretty confused to me. No means no, but yes also means yes! Outmoded at best and poorly-researched and pro-rape at worst, this book can be summed up this way: "I don't like condoms, believe my mother's accounts of the fun of the 60s as demonstrative of everyone's experiences of that time, and think that sexual harassment is a compliment, so you other feminists better stop whining about rape and sexual harassment lest I get even more pissed off at you and blame you for making sex's reputation worse!" show less