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The Secret History of Wonder Woman

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The Secret History of Wonder Woman

By: Jill Lepore
Narrated by: Jill Lepore
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About this listen

 A riveting work of historical detection revealing that the origin of one of the world’s most iconic superheroes hides within it a fascinating family story—and a crucial history of twentieth-century feminism

Wonder Woman, created in 1941, is the most popular female superhero of all time. Aside from Superman and Batman, no superhero has lasted as long or commanded so vast and wildly passionate a following. Like every other superhero, Wonder Woman has a secret identity. Unlike every other superhero, she has also has a secret history.

Harvard historian and New Yorker staff writer Jill Lepore has uncovered an astonishing trove of documents, including the never-before-seen private papers of William Moulton Marston, Wonder Woman’s creator. Beginning in his undergraduate years at Harvard, Marston was influenced by early suffragists and feminists, starting with Emmeline Pankhurst, who was banned from speaking on campus in 1911, when Marston was a freshman. In the 1920s, Marston and his wife, Sadie Elizabeth Holloway, brought into their home Olive Byrne, the niece of Margaret Sanger, one of the most influential feminists of the twentieth century. The Marston family story is a tale of drama, intrigue, and irony. In the 1930s, Marston and Byrne wrote a regular column for Family Circle celebrating conventional family life, even as they themselves pursued lives of extraordinary nonconformity. Marston, internationally known as an expert on truth—he invented the lie detector test—lived a life of secrets, only to spill them on the pages of Wonder Woman.

The Secret History of Wonder Woman is a tour de force of intellectual and cultural history. Wonder Woman, Lepore argues, is the missing link in the history of the struggle for women’s rights—a chain of events that begins with the women’s suffrage campaigns of the early 1900s and ends with the troubled place of feminism a century later. Americas Art & Literature Authors Fantasy Gender Studies Literary History & Criticism Social Sciences United States Superhero Fiction Suffrage
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This book bring to light the secret history of a family and the icon of Wonder Woman. Lepore provides depth and insight on the creation of the feminist icon. Her ability to write a story is matched by her ability to read it. A must listen for all. Simply fantastic.

Brilliant

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I kind of knew a little about this story so I started the book with the idea that I was just going to get a little more detail, boy was I wrong. There is so much more to this story it's unbelievable. Jill Lepore dug deep and presented us with absolutely everything there is to know! It was fascinating to read about the people who came up with WW, how they came up with WW, where their inspiration came from and the context in which it all happened. I'm crazy about history and have read quite a few books on the subject but this one is honestly my favorite so far. It's not just the history of Wonder Woman, this is a history of feminism.

the history you want to know! trust me

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I chose this because I'd heard Jill Lepore's excellent BBC radio 4 documentary about Elon Musk (The Evening Rocket) and was absolutely blown away by it's depth, insight and well-contextualised subject matter.
This was also a very in-depth book. Interesting insights into William Molton Marsden, although the tone was so frequently despairing of the guy that after a while I felt a little more sympathy for him than he probably deserved. The historical context of his life and the wonderwoman character is interesting although there are quite a lot of names and details that, as a British listener, were probably less familiar to me than U.S. listeners will find. I felt a bit bogged down by the detail, as I listen while driving so prefer a lighter spoken text. The bigotry of the time was as I'd imagined. Though this can get depressing, it is perhaps something for younger women and men than me to be aware of....the reality of those regressive attitudes in recent history. I like Lepore but she also often barks quotes from characters in a way that came to feel somewhat officious and unfair on them. Still, it's a lively, well researched and contextualised book.

Thoroughly researched, interesting

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The insight into an important input into women history and the characters is fascinating - can highly recommend!

Overall bloody interesting story!

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Wonder Woman's story she be the required reading, for anyone who wants to look at the lost potential of the America comics industry, from the golden age through to the bronze age.

The loss of history and truth.

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