Vagina Warriors [Hardcover]

Eve Ensler (Author), Joyce Tenneson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 2, 2005

DESCRIPTION: VAGINA WARRIORS is a unique collaboration between playwright/activist/V-Day founder Eve Ensler, creator of the international hit The Vagina Monologues, and world-renowned photographer Joyce Tenneson, whose Wise Women changed the way people look at women and aging. The book features Ensler's essays alongside Tenneson's portraits of V-Day activists, many of them well-known celebrities, with powerful statements and quotations from the subjects. Ensler has dubbed these women and men, who are committed to ending violence against women and girls throughout the world, Vagina Warriors. The celebrities featured include Glenn Close, Salma Hayek, Gloria Steinem, Isabella Rossellini, Jane Fonda, and numerous others.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

This collaborative effort between two activist artists is very well-meaning and does have some strong content. It evolved out of Ms. Ensler's conversations with women who approached her after the earliest performances of The Vagina Monologues, women who felt the need to witness to her, to tell their own experiences. However, very little of that detail exists in these many pages, and the effort feels more like an overgown pamphlet than a real book. That is a shame, considering the true excellence of Ensler's and photographer Joyce Tenneson's work, as well as the strength of the "V Day" cause that sales of this work help to raises funds for. In 2004, V Day had grown to 2300 events and had raised 25 million dollars to support women's rights. The Vagina Monologues gets much of its considerable power from the specificity, the viscerality and the humor of the play. Yet all of these elements are missing from this collaboration. The book is laid out rather cheesily, with portraits of "Vagina Warriors" next to very brief statements that speak to the idea of the Vagina Warrior in modern society. In the end, this is a souvenir, not really much of a book. Ensler's text is minimal, and the photographs are not even given full-page treatment, nor are they printed particularly well. But if what you want is a souvenir for a truly amazing movement, it's certainly fine as such. --Mike McGonigal

From Publishers Weekly

As the Obie Award-winning author of The Vagina Monologues defines them, the eponymous warriors are "fierce," "no longer beholden to social customs," "citizens of the world" and "community makers," who "cherish humanity over nationhood" and "work primarily on a grassroots level." And, "like vaginas, warriors are central to human existence, but they still remain largely unvalued and unseen." In this collaboration with photographer Tenneson (Wise Women), the focus is on the women (and sometimes men) involved in V-Day, a movement designed to raise consciousness about and funds for anti-violence organizations across the globe. Tenneson's posed duotone photographs (which vary in clarity and interest) show these warriors against the mottled background of a typical photo studio; facing pages feature quotes from the subjects or snippets from Ensler's introductory essay. Actress Rosie Perez notes how she "became a Vagina Warrior to be part of the healing process and to help those in pain stand tall." Karin Heisecke, a young German woman, describes how she got bakeries to list abuse help-lines on their bread packaging. Personal finance guru Suze Orman grins fiercely but offers no quote about her own position in the brigades. Other warriors featured include Gloria Steinem, Ricki Lake, Jane Fonda and numerous organizers of V-Days throughout the world. It's a great idea that could have made a great book-but this volume's minimal text ensures that it will appeal primarily to those who are already enlisted to the cause.
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Product Details

• Hardcover: 144 pages
• Publisher: Bulfinch (February 2, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0821261835
• ISBN-13: 978-0821261835
• Product Dimensions: 10.1 x 7.9 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,207,472 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Eve Ensler is the author of THE VAGINA MONOLOGUES, a theatrical and publishing sensation that has sold over half a million copies worldwide and has been translated into twenty-seven languages. Winner of a Guggenheim and Obie award, she is co-founder and guiding spirit of V-day, an international movement to fight violence against women (see vday.org). She lives in New York City.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars You Have a Warrior Inside - Waiting to Be Fully Expressed, January 13, 2006

By 

Carmen Matthews "The Serene Samurai" (San Diego, California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Vagina Warriors (Hardcover)

This is a follow up of the "Vagina Monologues," after Eve Ensler met women everywhere who felt and still feel grateful for Ms. Ensler's work to give women and girls an unstoppable voice that congruently communicates:

1. Go the distance, and then some;
2. Disarm the potentially disempowering force coming towards
you;
3. Demonstate that you are here, and that you matter;
4. Your inner power adds potential to men and women; and,
5. Compassion, not punishment is the answer;

The messages from the following people are especially moving:

Hazelle Goodman, an actor from New York, says, "As a Vigina Warrior,I say to endangered women everywhere, 'Let me hold your broken wing while you fly.'"

Carole Black, President and CEO of Lifetime Entertainment Services, shares, "... I am dedicated to using the power of the mediato inform and support wome on the issues most important to them and their families."

And Gloria Steinem's message in this book says, "... look at the world as if women matter[].."

In this book there are over sixty-five profiles of famous and not so famous Vagina Warriors who come from all over the world.

Their world vision is guided by the compassion and determination that moves women and girls, as well as men towards simultaneous autonomy and connection.

Who could ask for more?

5.0 out of 5 stars Yeah!! Vaginas!!, November 30, 2010

By 

BUMWHISTLE "purplecrane" (Oakton, VA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Vagina Warriors (Hardcover)

We love Vaginas!! We love Eve!! Even though vagina is a funny sounding word; Eve is about the first person to make it ok to say it out loud in public. Thanks. The work Eve does is incredible. Thanks again.

3.0 out of 5 stars informative, December 24, 2008

By 

L. Cannici (New Jersey, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

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This review is from: Vagina Warriors (Hardcover)

It was good enough, but after going to some of Eve Ensler's gatherings, so much of it was redundant to me.