One of Bolick's goals is to inspire women and men to find their own awakeners. In your own life, who would your awakeners be?

Edith Wharton coined the term awakeners, "to describe the books and thinkers who'd guided her intellectual studies." One of Bolick's goals is to inspire women and men to find their own awakeners. In your own life, who would your awakeners be?

Two books I read when I was very young influenced me. I read The Feminine Mystique by Betty Frieden and The Cinderella Complex by Colette Dowling. I also liked Having it All by Helen Gurley Brown. Those books and their authors influenced me.

I love this idea and am inspired by it. I am working now on who my awakeners will be!

Since I am in my seventies, I guess it would be a little late to find my awakeners. I would have to say that they were the people that I met along my journey who inspired me not neccessarily famous authors. I hope that I am now an awakener to some of the younger students I may have influenced.

My earliest awakeners were The Diary of Anne Frank and Harriet from the book Harriet the Spy (1964) by Louise Fitzhugh. I read these books in elementary school many years ago but I still remember how I felt reading them and how I identified with the girls in the books. I was less intrigued with Harriet's spying and more excited with the idea that Harriet keep a secret notebook that she would use to write things down as clues or to come back to later. Reading these books and identifying with Anne's desire to write about and explain her feelings and Harriet's efforts at solving mysteries awakened in me the desire to write in order to discover and express myself in the process.

Under another topic, I wrote that as a youth qnd well into my teens I had an aunt who was my awakener. When I was a baby she worked in Turkey and Egypt for several years before moving back home and I was in awe of her life. But she returned home to live with her parents and seldom worked again. We were very close and spent a lot of time together. Her lifestyle didn't strike me as odd until I got older and she moved away, withdrawing from our family, and dying alone in her 50's. She has remained an awakener as, over the years, even as I realized that she was unable live her life the way I had perceived it. Yet, she is the one who introduced me to good books, classical music, and instilled the desire in me to live my life to the fullest. I would not be who I am without her in my life. Now in my 60's, Bolick's book has made me think about others who had that effect on me. Nancy Drew was a big one. Louisa May Alcott. Elizabeth Palmer Peabody. Frances Perkins. Etc. I too grew up in Massachusetts where there were a lot of strong women to admire. There are also women in my personal life who have been awakeners to me.

I agree with Reene. I have been an avid reader since I was a child and have been influenced by what I have read BUT my biggest awakener was a young Presbyterian minister who took an interest in a troubled girl and turned her life around. Since then there have been many awakeners in my life but I prefer to call them angels.

Beautifully said, dianaps. You have to love those angels.

I am so glad that I read renee's response because I too am seventy. Throughout the book I kept thinking that maybe I was too old for this book. I had a difficult time with Bolick's spinster wish. Perhaps it was the term itself. Spinster brought to mind my elementary teachers all whose first names began with Miss, who wore black laced comfortable teacher shoes, and who ran a tight ship. Thanks to renee's approach and to dianaps, who referred to them as angels, I realized that those who inspire come at all times in one's life, and when they appear it doesn't have tone an Aha moment. I also realized that mine were all male. First and foremost, my husband who is the most optimistic and adventurous person I have ever known. Second, my college Shakespeare professor whose demeanor, without knowing it, demanded I did not enter his classroom or anything unprepared. Third, the man who delivered milk to my childhood home and every other day asked, "And what did you learn yesterday?" He always listened to me. For a child, that makes all the difference. Fourth, a New York immigrant who my daughter tutored as he prepared for his citizenship test. Obstacles meant nothing to him.

We all have awakeners, angels, goddesses who spark us to create and be the person we are. I am grateful for this book because it forced me to remember my goddesses...my Nana who showed me women can work and be loving mothers, my mother who taught me I am strong and funny, and my daughter whose kindness inspires me every day..and the ones I never met,like Florence Nightingale, business owners like Mary Crowley, artists like Okeefe, and Susan Murray. If you give a woman a chance, its likely that she will awaken some spot of gold within. Its also interesting that Bolick's awakeners are all writers...it feels a bit narrow to me.

Like others here I think this is the best part of the book, the most inspirational. It's fascinating to read about how others have become awakened to new ideas and attitudes via the lives of role models. My awakeners were modest women and men, no famous authors or states people. My childhood neighbor Rose who wakened me to the zen of the kitchen. A (Roman Catholic) high school religion teacher whose life radiated a moral compass unrelated to religion and religious dogma. My father's sister Mary who seemed to float through life with a calm resolve despite her marriage to a difficult, ignorant man and other hardships. Her happiness was within herself, independent of what others said or did. He example inspires me to be more attentive to my own internal happiness, especially when all my plans begin to unravel. I try never to forget that I must be entertaining and creative for my own benefit, regardless of what's going on around me.

I think throughout my life I have read a number of books that influenced me. I also had teachers and professors that had a great influence. Now, soon to be 70, I am greatly influenced by people 10 years my senior that exercise daily to keep in shape and play bridge, read, attend plays etc, to keep their minds sharp

pennyp - well said. I am at the same place.

She needs to stop trying to encourage others to find their awakeners, and start asking what are her goals in life. She needs to know herself first before she can encourage others.

I have had many awake ears some inspired by books, and the arts, and some by family, teachers, and fabulous women who I have encountered. Dorothea Lange, Eudora Welty, Edith Wharton, Frances Perkins and Emma Goldman fall in this category along with my Gaga (great grandmother) and some college professors. I hope I have awakeners throughout my life.

I have been fortunate to have wonderful teachers and professors, friends and colleagues who have improved me and especially my parents who taught me the value of education, working hard, and setting high goals without restriction. I have been fortunate to have always been surrounded with very educated and accomplished people so finding an awakener was matter of opening up my eyes and mind, absorbing what others offered.
I have a great-aunt who became a medical doctor at the turn of the 20th century. And yes, she was married with three children.
Just get busy!