“A comprehensive and lucid overview of the ongoing campaign to free women from ‘the tyranny of old notions.’“—Publishers Weekly

"Lillian Faderman’s is a book many of us have been waiting for, the first comprehensive history of American women to capture the rich discoveries that have been made over the last half century, juxtaposing the abstraction of 'woman' with the range, resilience, and resistance of real women."—Ellen Carol DuBois, author of Suffrage: Women’s Long Battle for the Vote

"A rewarding read. Pioneering scholar Lillian Faderman illuminates how concepts of female difference and inferiority stubbornly persist and captures the ongoing struggles of women to free themselves from the idea of 'woman.'"—Kathy Peiss, University of Pennsylvania

"A sweeping history of conceptions of women by themselves and others told through fascinating stories that get the reader to turn the page."—Claudia Goldin, author of Career and Family: Women's Century-Long Journey toward Equity

“A wide-ranging, deeply researched, and very well written survey of how the idea of woman has been deployed over more than three centuries of American history.”—Susan Ware, author of Why They Marched: Untold Stories of the Women Who Fought for the Right to Vote

“With dazzling scholarship and monumental vision Faderman has, with illuminating detail and persuasive argument, brilliantly woven a rich tapestry of how the American ‘woman’ has been created and re-created over centuries.”—Michael Bronski, author of A Queer History of the United States