Diva Julia: The Public Romance and Private Agony of Julia Ward Howe

by Valarie H. Ziegler

The author tells the remarkable story of Julia's life, the creative theological notions of gender she explored, and the complicated ways in which her family attempted to sanitize her public image.

Genres: Biography

240 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 2003

Reviews

[Lorraine Tosiello · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a well researched investigation of the family life of Julia Ward Howe. And what a family! And what resources the author digested to put all this into a composite view of Howe's famous husband, her fractured marriage, her prolific children and their own foibles! The author states their agenda is to "..(tell) the whole story-public and private of JWH's extraordinary life." And this is where the book fails. By concentrating on the familial relationships, the public magnitude of Howe's achievements are not given adequate discussion. It takes until page 148/168 for the list of Howe's achievements to be listed. There is not one name of another suffragist or club woman who Howe worked with (except one line about co-editing the Women's Journal with Lucy Stone.) There is no historical context given. It's as if the author assumes we know the back stories of Samuel Gridley Howe, Laura Bridgman, and others who are not put into context for us.

The footnotes have more substance than the book itself, a testament to the remarkable research that went into this work. I found myself wanting the footnotes as the story, to learn more about what these people were achieving in the world and less about how they were squabbling at home.

But, this book did inspire some enthusiasm to read more about the Howes. Imagine a woman so large in her time that she became a BELOVED Suffragist! Remarkable!

[Melinda · Rating 5 out of 5]

"It is right that she should be venerated; for she was in the truest sense a liberator and a reformer; she pleaded for the rights of womanhood with audacity and eloquence."
I spent the majority of this book torn between hate for Samuel Gridley Howe and hope for Julia to have autonomy from her truly disgusting husband and her misguided children. She was a hero who fought her entire life to break away from injustice done to her. I truly believe in the end she had the last say.
The book was also well written and a great read.

"Julia maintained that both men and women had equal capacities; if women deemed themselves men's inferiors in American culture, that understanding was the product of social custom and conditioning, NOT a reflection of innate qualities."

[Jeanie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Here is a book with a great deal of interesting source materials. The author does not handle them well, and the book ends up being a series of chronological factoids, lacking dramatic punch.