For Most of History, Anonymous Was a Woman

Books, history, and culture — rediscovering the women history forgot.

I don’t remember exactly when I first read the quotation, “For most of history, Anonymous was a woman,” but I do remember my visceral reaction: my heart dropping like it had been pushed off a cliff with a two-ton anvil strapped to it.

The original line–not the commercialized paraphrase found on Etsy t-shirts–is from Virginia Woolf’s 1929 A Room of One’s Own:

“I would venture to guess that Anon, who wrote so many poems without signing them, was often a woman.”

It was devastating for someone like me–someone equally passionate about history and literature–to realize how many unnamed, unacknowledged “herstories” had been lost. That realization became an unconscious battle cry, and I made it my mission to read as many fictional, biographical, and autobiographical stories about women as I could. If I couldn’t change the past, I could at least bear witness to the women silenced and forgotten.

This commitment shaped what I studied as an English and history major, and it continues to shape the books I seek out and love: stories about women, often by women.

Why Vox Femina?

Vox Femina (“Women’s Voice”) is about celebrating the stories and perspectives of women in books, both fiction and nonfiction. It’s an extension of my Booktube channel, Literarily Smitten, and the “Herstoryathon” readathon I cofounded, held each March for Women’s History Month.

Here, I’ll share curated book lists, reviews, spotlights on women writers and lesser-known historical figures, and essays on feminism, literature, culture, and whatever else tickles my fancy.

I know there are some people out there who might think that Vox Femina Books is some kind of man-hating gobbledygook. To them, I quote the incomparable Carly Simon:

“You’re so vain. I’ll bet you think this song is about you, don’t you?”

It’s not.

I’m not disparaging men by creating a space meant to empower women. And while Michale Ondaatje’s The English Patient and Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina are two of my favorite books, they’re not likely to be the focus here.

If you love books by and about women, if you enjoy history and feminism, or if you just want to read the ramblings of a well-read (how humble of me) woman, I hope you’ll subscribe.

And if you do, please say hi in the comments — I'd love to know what you’re currently reading.

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Wishing you the company of a good book,

Brittany

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