Appetites: Why Women Want
by Caroline Knapp
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Book Summary Information
Author: Caroline KnappEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2004-03-24
ISBN: 1582432260
Number of pages: 224
Publisher: Counterpoint
Book Reviews of Appetites: Why Women Want
Book Review: Appeties:Why Women Want
Summary: 4 Stars
The book Appetites: Why Women Want, written by the late author Caroline Knapp, is an antidote to our culture's obsession with beauty and women's body-image. It is hard to believe that such a book, published in 2003 has only recently been written. The book contains simple but necessary ideas concerning women and the obsessions we are prone to face: material possessions, relationships, and eating disorders. Though the book definitely has an intended audience of women, it cannot be categorized as a feministic book. There is no lecture. Knapp speaks to her audience simply and slowly, allowing her ideas to get across thoroughly to the reader.
The memoir recalls of Knapp's childhood, growing up a perfectionist who got straight A's and her difficult relationship with her parents which all lead to her eventual eating disorder, anorexia, that she formed in college. Knapp watched her mother be an ideal late-fifties housewife-"she did all the grocery shopping, all the laundry, all the cleaning and cooking", yet "at the same time, she was one of the most intelligent and well-informed women I've ever known". Then, later on in life, she talks of her father having an affair, her own affair with a teacher, and then watching her boyfriend move across the country. It is a common and realistic story in people's lives, a story any reader can relate to in one form or the other. The fact that this is all true allows the reader, the woman, to find their story. Caroline Knapp says things without really explaining them, referring to examples that allow the reader to apply the book to their life more easily-"Obsessions-even mild ones, even the run-of-the-mill, mundane daily obsessions that can pepper a woman's thoughts (Do these jeans make my butt look too big? Should I go to the gym?)-have such extraordinary deflective power." Knapp explores familiar people in her life--"the woman who insisted that weight is `not really an issue', for instance, also noted that she only allows herself to eat dessert, or second helpings at dinner, if she's gone to the gym that day." These are women that any reader can share with, and what Knapp is pointing out is the complete bombardment with self-image, with weight, with pleasure, with denying-"What liberates a person enough to indulge appetite, to take pleasure in the world, to enjoy being alive? Within that question lies the true holy grail, the heart of a woman's hunger."
The book is important and special because the idea Knapp talks of pertains to every woman's life. As a female, we all have friends or mothers or siblings who think they are too fat or too skinny or are too promiscuous or constantly compare themselves to others. Our culture and media is saturated with the ideal body type, a body type which hardly any women can relate to. Knapp is getting to the heart of this situation-why we must do so or be so-always wanting to be someone else or achieve something "better". In a world filled with fashion magazines and diet books, Appetites: What Women Want is brilliant and revolutionary.
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