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She I Dare Not Name
A compelling memoir about the single life and the courage to live alone in a world made for couples and families.
Astonishing. Luminous. A book about being human.
She I Dare Not Name is a compelling collection of fiercely intelligent, deeply intimate, lyrical reflections on the life of a woman who stands on the threshold between two millennia. Both manifesto and confession, this moving memoir explores the meaning and purpose Donna Ward discovered in a life lived entirely without a partner and children.
The book describes what it is like to live on the edge of a world built in the shape of couples and families. Rippling through these pages is the way a spinster - or a bachelor, or any of us for that matter - contends with the prejudice and stigma of being different.
With courage and astounding honesty Donna uncovers the challenge of living with more solitude than anticipated and what it is like to walk the road through midlife and beyond alone. And she reveals how she found home and discovered herself within it.
Funny, sharp, wise and wry, She I Dare Not Name shows how reading saved this spinster's life, and how friends and writing and walking brought a contentment and sense of achievement she never thought possible.
'With a devastatingly clear-eyed honesty, the word Ward dares to name is "spinster", and this meditative collection of essays spin their own spell, making a deep dive into the world of female solitude in all its guises. She lays it out like a calm tarot reading: feminism, courage, silence, loneliness, grief, recovery and the power of the generative idea, as well as all the labels that come with carving out your own path of self-definition and self-determination.' - Cate Kennedy, author of The World Beneath
Astonishing. Luminous. A book about being human.
She I Dare Not Name is a compelling collection of fiercely intelligent, deeply intimate, lyrical reflections on the life of a woman who stands on the threshold between two millennia. Both manifesto and confession, this moving memoir explores the meaning and purpose Donna Ward discovered in a life lived entirely without a partner and children.
The book describes what it is like to live on the edge of a world built in the shape of couples and families. Rippling through these pages is the way a spinster - or a bachelor, or any of us for that matter - contends with the prejudice and stigma of being different.
With courage and astounding honesty Donna uncovers the challenge of living with more solitude than anticipated and what it is like to walk the road through midlife and beyond alone. And she reveals how she found home and discovered herself within it.
Funny, sharp, wise and wry, She I Dare Not Name shows how reading saved this spinster's life, and how friends and writing and walking brought a contentment and sense of achievement she never thought possible.
'With a devastatingly clear-eyed honesty, the word Ward dares to name is "spinster", and this meditative collection of essays spin their own spell, making a deep dive into the world of female solitude in all its guises. She lays it out like a calm tarot reading: feminism, courage, silence, loneliness, grief, recovery and the power of the generative idea, as well as all the labels that come with carving out your own path of self-definition and self-determination.' - Cate Kennedy, author of The World Beneath
336 pages, Paperback
First published March 3, 2020
23 people are currently reading
526 people want to read
About the author
Donna Ward
2 books14 followersDonna Ward is a writer, editor, and publisher. She holds two degrees from the University of Western Australia: a Bachelor of Arts in Classics, Ancient History and Economics, and a Bachelor of Social Work. Throughout the 1980s and into the 1990s she worked in social policy development, welfare program design, implementation and management before she changed careers and set up a psychotherapy practice and management consultancy.
In the late 1990s she turned her talents to creative writing, editing and publishing when she established and edited the literary journal, indigo, the journal of Western Australian creative writing, and later the online poetry magazine, Sotto. Moving to Melbourne in 2011, where she now lives, she founded the nationally respected micro-publishing house Inkerman & Blunt.
Throughout her life she has written reports for significant welfare and educational organizations such as the Brotherhood of St Laurence, Prahran City Mission, RMIT, Catholic Archdiocese of Melbourne, and many community based and small non-government organizations.
Her fiction and personal essays have been awarded internationally, and appeared in literary journals nationally and internationally such as Southerly and Island magazines, as well as the Huffington Post, and The Big Issue. Her memoir will be released by Allen & Unwin early in 2020.
In the late 1990s she turned her talents to creative writing, editing and publishing when she established and edited the literary journal, indigo, the journal of Western Australian creative writing, and later the online poetry magazine, Sotto. Moving to Melbourne in 2011, where she now lives, she founded the nationally respected micro-publishing house Inkerman & Blunt.
Throughout her life she has written reports for significant welfare and educational organizations such as the Brotherhood of St Laurence, Prahran City Mission, RMIT, Catholic Archdiocese of Melbourne, and many community based and small non-government organizations.
Her fiction and personal essays have been awarded internationally, and appeared in literary journals nationally and internationally such as Southerly and Island magazines, as well as the Huffington Post, and The Big Issue. Her memoir will be released by Allen & Unwin early in 2020.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 45 reviews
March 17, 2020
This book! Such an apt title...So much respect.
I have so much I want to say about this book, and yet I am speechless.
I read it slowly, digesting every single word, I didn't want to leave it.
I took copious notes and highlighted quotes; still I am rendered speechless.
The raw confessions and naked honesty within these pages left me humbled to be a chosen audience to a life laid bare.
I had to look away often, I was like a voyeur, eavesdropping on a conversation meant for the ears of a special confidante; until I realised that I was the intended audience, and mine were the ears that were listening. I feel privileged that she [Donna Ward] confided in me...I understand those silences, I’ve experienced such Sundays...
...this story is so fragile, at times ethereal in its candid nakedness.
As a reader I felt the weight and anxiety of a nervous sense of exposure...of its profound honesty; as if it were my own...though I would never be so brave!
I could listen to this author all day!
Labels are what we humans use to categorise each other into predictable pigeonholes, If people were books...if I were a book; I wonder what genre I would be placed under? And I bet everyone I know would shelve me differently.
I think to say any more would be to minimise the importance and value of this story, I could never do it justice.
Anyone who has ever felt alone, read it.
Anyone who has never felt alone, read it.
5⭐️'s +! This is a keeper.
Many thanks to Allen & Unwin for my copy to read and review.
I have so much I want to say about this book, and yet I am speechless.
I read it slowly, digesting every single word, I didn't want to leave it.
I took copious notes and highlighted quotes; still I am rendered speechless.
The raw confessions and naked honesty within these pages left me humbled to be a chosen audience to a life laid bare.
I had to look away often, I was like a voyeur, eavesdropping on a conversation meant for the ears of a special confidante; until I realised that I was the intended audience, and mine were the ears that were listening. I feel privileged that she [Donna Ward] confided in me...I understand those silences, I’ve experienced such Sundays...
...this story is so fragile, at times ethereal in its candid nakedness.
As a reader I felt the weight and anxiety of a nervous sense of exposure...of its profound honesty; as if it were my own...though I would never be so brave!
I could listen to this author all day!
Labels are what we humans use to categorise each other into predictable pigeonholes, If people were books...if I were a book; I wonder what genre I would be placed under? And I bet everyone I know would shelve me differently.
I think to say any more would be to minimise the importance and value of this story, I could never do it justice.
Anyone who has ever felt alone, read it.
Anyone who has never felt alone, read it.
5⭐️'s +! This is a keeper.
Many thanks to Allen & Unwin for my copy to read and review.
May 17, 2020
This was breathtakingly good. The ideas, the writing, the raw honesty about a life lived that’s different from the life Ward intended to live. I have a lot to say about it but Ward herself captured exactly how I feel in a paragraph about reading ARDOR by Roberto Calasso:
‘Something stirs. I can’t take my eyes off the page. It is the feeling you get when you must read every word because you know these words were written for you. Words put down months, maybe years ago, for this moment, here and now, for you to read them. Once you read them, something you never knew you knew, something you have always known, will become perfectly clear. There will be no going back. You will be different in the way you were meant to be the moment the words were written, the moment you bought the book...’
‘Something stirs. I can’t take my eyes off the page. It is the feeling you get when you must read every word because you know these words were written for you. Words put down months, maybe years ago, for this moment, here and now, for you to read them. Once you read them, something you never knew you knew, something you have always known, will become perfectly clear. There will be no going back. You will be different in the way you were meant to be the moment the words were written, the moment you bought the book...’
July 9, 2021
Partway through this book, the author writes of her experience of picking up a book that feels like it was written just for her; that it told her things she didn’t know that she knew. I so wanted She I Dare Not Name to be that book for me. And why wouldn’t I? The author and I share membership in the same rare group — women who have never married, never had children. There really aren’t all that many of us. Our experiences, as Ward correctly points out, are very different from those of women who are single now but were married or cohabiting and of women, married or not, who have had children.
But it turns out that Ward and I have very different attitudes about being spinsters (still a godawful word). For most of her life, she hated it, mourned it, railed against it. I didn’t and don’t. So there were few points of commonality in my reading. And, maybe because my expectations weren’t met, I found myself annoyed by Ward’s writing style so that I was skipping over entire paragraphs of text until I could find something that interested me enough to stop and read. I don’t usually do that with a book. This one just wasn’t for me.
But it turns out that Ward and I have very different attitudes about being spinsters (still a godawful word). For most of her life, she hated it, mourned it, railed against it. I didn’t and don’t. So there were few points of commonality in my reading. And, maybe because my expectations weren’t met, I found myself annoyed by Ward’s writing style so that I was skipping over entire paragraphs of text until I could find something that interested me enough to stop and read. I don’t usually do that with a book. This one just wasn’t for me.
June 16, 2020
Super problematic and probably one to avoid. Some parts were interesting, especially because I just turned 40, and she complained a lot about the grief of turning 40, which I do not feel at all. The weird othering of Aboriginal people (the dreams of them dancing around her, hugging her mother in some kind of saviour-scenario, looking on in silence at the death of her father) seemed downright racist. I went from really enjoying this book to feeling completely resentful towards all the goddamn luck she had. Parents in mining. A bluestone cottage off Brunswick Street. Just a couple of shifts in a sandwich shop and restaurant before her dad gave her a job. But so sad to not have had marriage and a baby. What in the hell? If you need a definition of someone who needs to “check their privilege”, you will absolutely find it in this book.
March 28, 2020
This book had me so enthralled I devoured it in two days. It’s a memoir; a treatise on singledom, spinsterhood and its naming; and a lyrical journey of a life. The writing is mesmerising, decapitating, consoling and metaphorical. The structure and chapter headings read more like a landscape memoir and in many ways, that’s what it is. The river is ever present as a totem companion and symbol of the flow of energy that is life, while the foundational geology gives structure to the enduring metaphor. People, cars and houses take on mythological meaning in this deeply moving and personal work. A chronological history of events it is not. Meticulously researched into the world of politics, social history, philosophy, marriage and community, the author, Donna Ward, has created something that is difficult to categorise. The poignant descriptions of love, loss, friendship, disappointment, rage, hurt and prejudice left me angry and astounded. Donna is reclaiming the word ‘spinster’, one which we have come to detest, its original meaning deeply buried – that of a single independent talented working woman who is respected and adored by society. Let’s hope this work can in some way resurrect the original meaning of the word to give it the respect it, and those who use its moniker, deserve. Highly recommended.
February 28, 2021
A thoroughly thought provoking read. I read it in a trice. Deeply considered and at many times completely unvarnished account of a life spent predominantly single.
I’m perplexed however, by some prior comments about this book. I’m concerned that memoirs like these may be silenced by claims that, specifically here, “women of a certain age, financial position, etc” should “check their privilege”??? In memoir, at least, we can only write to our personal experience; to do otherwise then invites criticism as to appropriation of some kind. If a particular memoir does not speak to you then set it aside ... there’s no need to dissuade others from making up their own minds as to the validity, or otherwise, of a work.
I’m perplexed however, by some prior comments about this book. I’m concerned that memoirs like these may be silenced by claims that, specifically here, “women of a certain age, financial position, etc” should “check their privilege”??? In memoir, at least, we can only write to our personal experience; to do otherwise then invites criticism as to appropriation of some kind. If a particular memoir does not speak to you then set it aside ... there’s no need to dissuade others from making up their own minds as to the validity, or otherwise, of a work.
June 2, 2020
This is a beautiful, confronting book: a searing arc.
Donna writes with complete honesty about the grief and loneliness of living a single life - yes, the life of a spinster - without the comfort of any immediate or extended family. She writes as someone who did not choose singleness, nor enter into it intentionally.
She writes to bear witness to the prejudice against single women that exists in contemporary Australian society. This prejudice expresses itself in everything from the tax system to decisions people make about who to invite to dinner or who to phone back first. This prejudice exists in words - in the casual remarks and judgements people make about women who live alone.
She writes with justified rage about the way so many men have treated her. "How awful" was the most frequent thing I scribbled in the margins, "how awful".
But also, "how beautiful". What poetry as Donna describes the intensity of her experience with music, landscape, and of the human body in solitude. What words she has for silence!
This book had a personal impact. It made me think, more deeply and comprehensively, about how I interact with the single people in my life. Without any explicit instruction, simply by sharing her story, Donna gave me insight into how I can walk with greater sensitivity and care, with my single brothers and sisters. I thank her for this.
Donna writes with complete honesty about the grief and loneliness of living a single life - yes, the life of a spinster - without the comfort of any immediate or extended family. She writes as someone who did not choose singleness, nor enter into it intentionally.
She writes to bear witness to the prejudice against single women that exists in contemporary Australian society. This prejudice expresses itself in everything from the tax system to decisions people make about who to invite to dinner or who to phone back first. This prejudice exists in words - in the casual remarks and judgements people make about women who live alone.
She writes with justified rage about the way so many men have treated her. "How awful" was the most frequent thing I scribbled in the margins, "how awful".
But also, "how beautiful". What poetry as Donna describes the intensity of her experience with music, landscape, and of the human body in solitude. What words she has for silence!
This book had a personal impact. It made me think, more deeply and comprehensively, about how I interact with the single people in my life. Without any explicit instruction, simply by sharing her story, Donna gave me insight into how I can walk with greater sensitivity and care, with my single brothers and sisters. I thank her for this.
March 26, 2020
3.5 Stars
Thank you to Allen and Unwin for my uncorrected proof.
I had mixed feelings about this book.
Firstly, it's relatable as it's set in Australia and some parts, even more relatable as it's set in my home town of Perth. I loved the descriptions of places and how things were decades ago and the author captured this very well.
She describes life as a single person well and how the hardest part seemed to be how others judged her and made it worse by their heartless comments and gifts.
There are a few political sections in the book which I really enjoyed, capturing women's rights and how one politician made so many great changes for women and then another came into power and he and his cabinet stuffed everything up for women.
Some chapters were a bit hard to follow as they seemed to be thoughts mixed in with actual events and I found it hard to understand what was going on.
The author decribes really well loneliness and the emptiness of life without a partner or family.
Overall, it was a good read.
Thank you to Allen and Unwin for my uncorrected proof.
I had mixed feelings about this book.
Firstly, it's relatable as it's set in Australia and some parts, even more relatable as it's set in my home town of Perth. I loved the descriptions of places and how things were decades ago and the author captured this very well.
She describes life as a single person well and how the hardest part seemed to be how others judged her and made it worse by their heartless comments and gifts.
There are a few political sections in the book which I really enjoyed, capturing women's rights and how one politician made so many great changes for women and then another came into power and he and his cabinet stuffed everything up for women.
Some chapters were a bit hard to follow as they seemed to be thoughts mixed in with actual events and I found it hard to understand what was going on.
The author decribes really well loneliness and the emptiness of life without a partner or family.
Overall, it was a good read.
November 3, 2020
In a series of short essays (or meditations), Ward describes what her life has been like un-coupled and without children. I can't remember reading a book that has angered me so much. Part of my problem is her linking (almost) anything vaguely negative in her childhood and beyond, to her current condition of spinster; sometimes she substitutes the word "crone". Her sweeping generalisations are almost magnificent, if they weren't so offensive. Take this: "But past a certain age, an ill-defined and increasingly fluid age, the swinging single became a seriously worrying single, a sad, old, psychologically damaged or sexually deviant single." REALLY? This lack of objectivity, bordering on self-pity, is alarming given Ward is a trained psychotherapist. When asked by a friend how she lives the life of solitude, Ward answers melodramatically, "...my answer was death."
I shall leave you with one final gem. "To lose friends to family-making is to be abandoned, left tainted and wanting in the village square.
Get a life lady.
I shall leave you with one final gem. "To lose friends to family-making is to be abandoned, left tainted and wanting in the village square.
Get a life lady.
March 19, 2020
I would like to thank Donna Ward and Allen and Unwin for the ARC of She I Dare Not Name.
This memoir is beautifully written. I took it with me on holidays and read it with great pleasure. The collection of essays details life without constant companionship. It is at times witty and is written with craft and skill. There is political comment regarding the unfair treatment of women in Australia by conservative politicians. Highly recommend. I intend to read Donna’s past and future books. Great Australian writer.
This memoir is beautifully written. I took it with me on holidays and read it with great pleasure. The collection of essays details life without constant companionship. It is at times witty and is written with craft and skill. There is political comment regarding the unfair treatment of women in Australia by conservative politicians. Highly recommend. I intend to read Donna’s past and future books. Great Australian writer.
February 28, 2021
4.5 ... an original story about a woman approaching 66 years, who finds herself untethered to a partner, children or family; and how society makes certain assumptions of her..and she of herself. It is a really interesting read generally, but at times she packs a punch with her phrasing and her insight in human behaviour that, as a previous reviewer recorded, you find yourself re-reading certain bits.. this is a book that you think about way after you’ve put it down.
February 11, 2024
She I Dare Not Name is a series of essays on life, written by Donna Ward. This memoir addresses the issue of living life alone, uncoupled, and childless. Throughout my adult life there have been times when I have lived alone (although I have children) so I found this book to be relatable. Donna’s personal observations are witty, wise, thought provoking and emotional. It made me contemplate the idea of happiness vs contentment and whether being in a relationship leads to a fulfilling life or if it is easier to spend life single. I really enjoyed She I Dare Not Name and thank the author and A&U for my ARC.
March 26, 2020
10 stars
March 23, 2021
I loved this book. Words cannot express how much. It is honest, uplifting, confronting and exquisitely written. One of those books you are sad to finish.
March 20, 2020
There is a lot to consider in this memoir. You agree, you disagree, you sympathise, you get angry, frustrated, laugh and cry. A busy fulfilled life is what I read, except for one thing. Many people would be pretty pleased with that.
August 20, 2020
Well written with evocative and powerful descriptions of the pain of loneliness. But also self-pitying, self-justifying, arrogant, envious, and self-indulgent. Constantly repeating that she didn’t choose the single life while revealing that she wasn’t willing to compromise - compromise is a choice most of us make in one way or another.
Yes, the tax system isn’t fair to single people but it’s also not fair in allowing the rich to pay virtually no tax or in the way it subsidises a whole range of life choices over others. Despite the terrible tax burden she complains of, she could still afford a bluestone cottage in inner city Melbourne near the river (worth $millions), frequent overseas trips (at least three visits to Paris), frequent meals out, opera tickets, expensive clothes, etc.
And maybe the frequent liaisons with men in relationships was not just unethical but reduced her chance to build a meaningful relationship with a man who was actually available.
Yes, the tax system isn’t fair to single people but it’s also not fair in allowing the rich to pay virtually no tax or in the way it subsidises a whole range of life choices over others. Despite the terrible tax burden she complains of, she could still afford a bluestone cottage in inner city Melbourne near the river (worth $millions), frequent overseas trips (at least three visits to Paris), frequent meals out, opera tickets, expensive clothes, etc.
And maybe the frequent liaisons with men in relationships was not just unethical but reduced her chance to build a meaningful relationship with a man who was actually available.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
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April 12, 2020Beautifully written, brave and insightful.
March 28, 2020
A memoir about being alone, and remaining single, in this coupled world. Read like letters, set out like essays, a book to dip in and out of.
Ruminations via Egyptian and Greek mythology help explore themes of hero and villian, survival and resilience.
Donna examines the history of singledom for women, the stigma, the cruel and barbed comments, the loneliness and fear, the expectations of society and friends that you'll find someone. The lack of written perspectives. The politics and feminist lens of living alone, unpartnered, and not having children. The vulnerability and deep dips of depression and mental ill health she's experienced. The difficulty of not having someone to list as an emergency contact.
Ruminations via Egyptian and Greek mythology help explore themes of hero and villian, survival and resilience.
Donna examines the history of singledom for women, the stigma, the cruel and barbed comments, the loneliness and fear, the expectations of society and friends that you'll find someone. The lack of written perspectives. The politics and feminist lens of living alone, unpartnered, and not having children. The vulnerability and deep dips of depression and mental ill health she's experienced. The difficulty of not having someone to list as an emergency contact.
March 19, 2020
I would like to thank Donna Ward and Allen and Unwin for the ARC of She I Dare Not Name.
This memoir is beautifully written. I took it with me on holidays and read it with great pleasure. The collection of essays details life without constant companionship. It is at times witty and is written with craft and skill. There is political comment regarding the unfair treatment of women in Australia by conservative politicians. Highly recommend. I intend to read Donna’s past and future books. Great Australian writer.
This memoir is beautifully written. I took it with me on holidays and read it with great pleasure. The collection of essays details life without constant companionship. It is at times witty and is written with craft and skill. There is political comment regarding the unfair treatment of women in Australia by conservative politicians. Highly recommend. I intend to read Donna’s past and future books. Great Australian writer.
March 18, 2020
Review to follow
February 11, 2025
Fantastic book a real page turner
Very thought provoking
Very thought provoking
April 28, 2021
"She I Dare Not Name: A Spinster's Meditations on Life" by Donna Ward came highly recommended by Jody Day of Gateway Women. Donna, 67, is a regular, wise presence at the Zoom chats for childless "elderwomen" that Jody organizes every quarter/season. This book, first published last year in Australia (and gradually making its way to other parts of the world), is a memoir in the form of a series of essays about Donna's life, and how she came to find herself in her 60s with neither husband nor children.
I loved this book overall, and could relate to a lot of it -- albeit not everything in it. We're both childless-not-by-choice, but Donna is single; I've been married for 35 years. I'm Canadian; she's Australian (although she spent parts of her childhood in America and Peru), and her references & descriptions were unfamiliar and slightly exotic (I found myself looking up many unfamiliar terms -- bluestone house, jarrah doors...), reminding me of just how much I don't know about this distant part of the world. Donna studied the classics and ancient history at university, and there are many references throughout the book to mythology (the ancient Greeks & Egyptians, in particular) -- some I dimly knew and others I did not. Perhaps a better knowledge of these myths and the characters in them would have added to my understanding & enjoyment of the book.
I'll admit it took me a little while to get into this book, but once I did, I didn't want it to end. The prose was stunning -- lovely and lyrical, punctuated with some amazing, sharp observations about single life versus married life with children. My e-copy is littered with bookmarks.
4 stars.
I loved this book overall, and could relate to a lot of it -- albeit not everything in it. We're both childless-not-by-choice, but Donna is single; I've been married for 35 years. I'm Canadian; she's Australian (although she spent parts of her childhood in America and Peru), and her references & descriptions were unfamiliar and slightly exotic (I found myself looking up many unfamiliar terms -- bluestone house, jarrah doors...), reminding me of just how much I don't know about this distant part of the world. Donna studied the classics and ancient history at university, and there are many references throughout the book to mythology (the ancient Greeks & Egyptians, in particular) -- some I dimly knew and others I did not. Perhaps a better knowledge of these myths and the characters in them would have added to my understanding & enjoyment of the book.
I'll admit it took me a little while to get into this book, but once I did, I didn't want it to end. The prose was stunning -- lovely and lyrical, punctuated with some amazing, sharp observations about single life versus married life with children. My e-copy is littered with bookmarks.
4 stars.
June 28, 2020
I devoured this book.
As a twenty year old I don't necessarily fit its target demographic However, as someone trying to understand their version of adulthood, its blurb spoke to many questions I have asked myself about the future. It elucidates the mystery of a life without a partner or children that according to mainstream media does not exist outside religious piety.
My favourite part of this book was how Ward follows through on the first essay's promise that during a life solitude, the landscape has a voice and active presence. Her descriptions of setting are relentlessly intimate and capture her relationship with place that is just as, if not more significant than relationships with other characters featured in her anecdotes. Moreover, this is the first description of Australia that resonates with my own contemporary experience (reflecting Australia's variety and beauty without copious descriptions of gum trees or kookaburras).
Ward's prose is entrancing, but this never detracts from its honesty. I felt like I was living alongside her and gained insights that would otherwise take years of first hand experience. Overall, I can't wait to re-read this book in a decade or so to see what new wisdom I might glean from its pages.
As a twenty year old I don't necessarily fit its target demographic However, as someone trying to understand their version of adulthood, its blurb spoke to many questions I have asked myself about the future. It elucidates the mystery of a life without a partner or children that according to mainstream media does not exist outside religious piety.
My favourite part of this book was how Ward follows through on the first essay's promise that during a life solitude, the landscape has a voice and active presence. Her descriptions of setting are relentlessly intimate and capture her relationship with place that is just as, if not more significant than relationships with other characters featured in her anecdotes. Moreover, this is the first description of Australia that resonates with my own contemporary experience (reflecting Australia's variety and beauty without copious descriptions of gum trees or kookaburras).
Ward's prose is entrancing, but this never detracts from its honesty. I felt like I was living alongside her and gained insights that would otherwise take years of first hand experience. Overall, I can't wait to re-read this book in a decade or so to see what new wisdom I might glean from its pages.
May 14, 2020
Honest and sometimes raw memoir of what it is to be a spinster in society. Also good to hear from an older woman, most of us don't have a voice. The prejudice, assumptions, economic status and how it feels. As a 'spinster' myself I identified. I loved the sentence - 'No, I'm not a lesbian. But thanks for asking'. Oh my god!!! Must use that the next time I'm asked....seriously. Whether it's your choice or not, don't judge. Do couples get asked, 'so, did you make the right choice?' - it's assumed they're happy - hell, maybe they're not! Wish some of my couple friends would read this. I know they won't. But I wish they would. I also enjoyed the myth analogies. It also affected me at times, made me sad (not good for isolation!!) but totally got it.
October 15, 2020
I don’t usually mark up books, but I underlined and made notes all over this one because Ward has got it so right. Not many people write about or understand what it’s like for women who never marry or have children. They spend their lives dealing with people’s rude questions and assumptions. In a world built for couples and families, they are just one person. As they age, there is no one ahead of them, behind them, or beside them. For this collection of essays, Ward has done her research, looking at never-married, never-mothering women like herself and how it is to be one of them. Fascinating reading.
August 30, 2024
In this memoir by the Australian writer Donna Ward, she examines how the prospect of herself as a ‘spinster’ (the ‘she I dare not name’ of the title) is a potentially unwelcome identity. The book offers a wider reflection on the fact that not all unpartnered people actively want to be single and this may not be the desired outcome for their life. Donna walks us through her solo life, with its moments of solitude that have taken her deeply inwards, as well as grief for what could have been and never was. But this isn’t a book filled with nothing but sorrow - there are moments of joy and a building strength as Donna roots herself into her single identity. It takes more fortitude than many partnered people realise to embrace the isolation of a single life. It’s also important to commend Donna on just what a beautifully written book this is - it has a lyrical, evocative style that carries you on the river of her memories and emotions.
There are also interesting recollections of earlier parts of Donna’s life - such as her childhood in Peru, America and Western Australia. This is a rich life, full of experience, and had the promise of also being full of love. And it still has been such a life - just not the one that Donna perhaps expected and not following the sole script that society writes for adult women. Donna fully expected to marry and have children someday, so she definitely feels that her tale is one of loss, rather than a feminist stance against the patriarchy. But, as anyone who lives outside of the expected narrative or marriage and/or children knows, we end up being a pioneer for unconventional lives everywhere when we fall outside of normal social boundaries. Donna draws upon a resilience and courage that she may never have discovered in a comfortable married life, as she forges her own path against the expectations of others - and her life is no less well lived for it.
There are also interesting recollections of earlier parts of Donna’s life - such as her childhood in Peru, America and Western Australia. This is a rich life, full of experience, and had the promise of also being full of love. And it still has been such a life - just not the one that Donna perhaps expected and not following the sole script that society writes for adult women. Donna fully expected to marry and have children someday, so she definitely feels that her tale is one of loss, rather than a feminist stance against the patriarchy. But, as anyone who lives outside of the expected narrative or marriage and/or children knows, we end up being a pioneer for unconventional lives everywhere when we fall outside of normal social boundaries. Donna draws upon a resilience and courage that she may never have discovered in a comfortable married life, as she forges her own path against the expectations of others - and her life is no less well lived for it.
April 16, 2023
Living solo in a society set up for couples and one that still stigmatises and pities people who live their lives without a partner, I read this hoping for some validation for my life, but was disappointed. The author seems quite sad about the way her life turned out. In the end I put it down to her being a fair bit older than me and therefore having had quite a different experience as a single woman coming into middle age, twenty years ago. There are a lot more 40-something single women around these days. I often wondered where her single friends were and why she socialised so much with couples and families if she was pained by them so much. She talks of feeling abandoned by friends when they coupled off and started having families. I sympathise with that and think it's brave of her to write this. But the lack of other single women around her was striking. I would get very bored if my social circle comprised only coupled-up people.
As a memoir of a woman living through the second wave of feminism in Australia it had some interesting observations. But as a memoir of a spinster it doesn't do what I was hoping - that is, to de-stigmatise spinsterhood without reinforcing the sex-in-the-city 'empowered' cliche of a single woman. I was probably expecting too much, but I came away thinking that the author really, really dislikes being single and is totally disappointed with what her life has culminated in, or not culminated in.
As a memoir of a woman living through the second wave of feminism in Australia it had some interesting observations. But as a memoir of a spinster it doesn't do what I was hoping - that is, to de-stigmatise spinsterhood without reinforcing the sex-in-the-city 'empowered' cliche of a single woman. I was probably expecting too much, but I came away thinking that the author really, really dislikes being single and is totally disappointed with what her life has culminated in, or not culminated in.
September 7, 2020
'I did not need to retreat into the utter silence of a monochrome desert to commune with the world around me. I began the road through solitude from my icy lounge room.'
'Some said my accumulation of books emasculated men, that reading withered a woman, sent her sterile. Turns out all this reading saved my life.'
'Dad's tear still lives in my thumb. '
On depression,,,
'It will be the time you will remember that death came, and still you found life. '
'Some said my accumulation of books emasculated men, that reading withered a woman, sent her sterile. Turns out all this reading saved my life.'
'Dad's tear still lives in my thumb. '
On depression,,,
'It will be the time you will remember that death came, and still you found life. '
May 29, 2021
Stunning
Where to start? A stunning piece of writing. It feels like I've been waiting the whole of my middle aged adult life for this book to be written. Never have I related so much to the words & thoughts within or highlighted so many sentences & passages. I didn't want this very comfortable companion to leave & it's presence will remain with me for a very long time. Highly recommended.
Where to start? A stunning piece of writing. It feels like I've been waiting the whole of my middle aged adult life for this book to be written. Never have I related so much to the words & thoughts within or highlighted so many sentences & passages. I didn't want this very comfortable companion to leave & it's presence will remain with me for a very long time. Highly recommended.
January 10, 2022
An elegant and eloquent lesson in compassion. This is a challenging read for its dense prose and raw honesty. I could relate to her experiences of feeling more invisible with time, I could relate to some of the callousness Ms. Ward experienced with each new decade of her journey. In less articulate terms, she "nails" what it feels like to be a single woman in today's world. Let's learn from her and become better humans to each other.
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