lower east side librarian

The Encyclopedia of Doris is more than the sum of its Dorises. I'm often not crazy about zine collections because zines read better individually. They're complete unto themselves and are particular to the moment they're published. With the Encyclopedia Cindy edited together nine years of Doris content, plus articles and interviews from other zines and magazines, and so it reads like a complete work, rather than awkwardly connected episodes.

I have one serious complaint about Bossypants, and that is that its Cataloging-in-Publication data completely misses that its a book about feminism. I’d like to see one or more of the following:
Sex role on television
Sex discrimination against women
Feminists
Women on television
Women comedians
Women television producers and directors
Feminism and television (doesn’t exist, pattern Feminism and motion pictures)
Feminism and comedy (doesn’t exist)

Content-wise, Bossypants is a kick-ass book that I was sorry to see end. And I laughed out loud while reading it. On a New Jersey Transit train. Ask Eric if you don’t believe me. I made him read passages at least three times.

Rivington Street starts out in pogrom ridden Russia and follows one family to the early twentieth century Lower East Side, with its pushcarts and Yiddish socialism. It is to some extent a tale of two sisters, one a garment factory union organizer and the other an aspiring clothing designer, a boss. The other strong women characters are the daughter of a selfish and sexist rabbi, a gentile suffragist, and Hannah, the old world mother of the two sisters, Sarah and Ruby Levy. I've read it a bunch of times, and it never disappoints me. I love entering the world of my grandfather's Lower East Side and the early struggles of the women's labor and suffrage movements.