Hotbed: Bohemian Greenwich Village and the Secret Club that Sparked Modern Feminism

by Joanna Scutts

The dazzling story of the early feminists who blazed a trail for the movement's most radical ideas.

New York City, 1912: in downtown Greenwich Village, a group of women gathered, all with a plan to change the world.
This was the first meeting of 'Heterodoxy', a secret social club. Its members were passionate advocates of women's suffrage, labour rights, equal marriage and free love. They were socialites and socialists; reformers and revolutionaries; artists, writers and scientists. Hotbed is the never-before-told story of the club whose audacious ideas and unruly acts transformed an international feminist agenda into a modern way of life.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Feminism, New York, Womens, Biography, Sociology

416 pages, Hardcover

Published July 14, 2022

Reviews

[Natalie all_books_great_and_small · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received a gifted copy of this book to read in exchange for an honest review as part of the book tour hosted by Random Things Tours.

Hotbed is an intriguing, interesting and insightful book about an amazing group of women who formed the Heterodoxy club. This group helped pave the way in the unitedness of feminism. This group of string females came from many different backgrounds and represented different parts of feminism. These included Suffragists, public health activists, labour activists and much more.
I enjoyed reading this book and felt it was an important piece of history to piece together and revive. The club was a secret club and they didn't record anything on paper and this is a great revival by looking at the history of these amazing women, what they stood for, how they made strong female friendships which in turn empowered other women, formed changes and impacted and influenced the work of activism going forward.
I enjoyed seeing photographs of these women through the book and thought the author handles the cultural differences and paints an insight into the different pilriorities of different classes of women such as working class, women of colour and the majority that were educated middle-class white women.
This book shows how we have come so far since 1912 when this club was formed by Marie Jenney Howe but also sadly highlights how women are still fighting for some of these basic rights still today.

[Britta Böhler · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5*

[Keely · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Hotbed, Joanna Scutts explores the lives, work, and legacy of the members of Heterodoxy, a Greenwich Village group of feminists, suffragists, labor and public health activists, and other "women who did things." Founded in 1912 by Marie Jenney Howe, the group included such notables as Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Susan Glaspell, Dr. S. Josephine Baker, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, and many others who, sadly, have been more or less lost to history. The "Heterodites" kept no written records of their meetings, so Hotbed ends up being less about the group itself, and more about how the friendships fostered there empowered the important work these women were involved in individually and as part of activist movements. Although Heterodoxy endured for decades longer, Hotbed zeroes in on its heyday, which continued through the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920.

Because the focus of Hotbed is divided among so many women, it does get a bit sprawling and unwieldy in places. However, I still enjoyed it and found it valuable as a piece of rescued history. Scutts does a thoughtful job of considering race and class as they relate to the overwhelmingly white, educated, middle-class women of Heterodoxy, and the differences in their priorities from those of women of color and other working-class women. She also highlights the importance of the arts in how the members of Heterodoxy thought, worked, and engaged with the broader public on social issues. And though it can be discouraging to think about how we're still fighting for so many of the same rights that the Heterodites championed more than a century ago, Scutts manages to end the book on a hopeful note, emphasizing the enduring power of women's friendships and collective action to effect needed change.

[S. Wigget · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just finished reading this and have tears in my eyes. What a wonderful book! I intend to read biographies on some of the women featured in this history.

Phenomenal. Inspiring.

For Women's History Month, I read for a book discussion group a book that isn't my kind of history book--Women of the Cousin's War. Reading it, I felt acutely aware that I don't care for fifteenth century England and would've been burned at the stake. In contrast, I relate to 1910s Greenwich Village, one of the times & places I'd want to visit as a time traveler.

This book reminded me of when I was a volunteer at In Other Words, a feminist bookstore and community center in Portland, Oregon. It unfortunately closed in 2018, but I'm still in touch with frirnds I met there and have a large number of books from IOW.

This book is about members of a feminist group called Heterodoxy, who met at a Cafe in Greenwich Village from 1912 to the 1940s. The focus of the history book is mostly on the 1910s and the radical movements in which these women participated.

[agata · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hotbed is a fascinating and inspiring book about a little known group of feminists called Heterodoxy. Heterodoxy was founded in the early twentieth century in the artistic neighborhood of New York City known as Greenwich Village. It’s a meticulously researched book that describes how the group started out and grew in incredible detail. It’s a captivating glimpse into the era that planted seeds for modern feminism and I loved that Scutts highlighted the connections between feminism, labor rights, suffrage, and civil rights. That being said, I appreciated that Scutts acknowledged that back then the movement was mostly white and led by high society figures, and that the struggles faced by Black, immigrant, and working class women were often less ‘photogenic’ than what the famous feminists were focusing on. I also loved that the author didn’t focus only on the bare facts and dates, but made sure to paint the women as real human beings and placed a lot of emphasis on the relationships and friendships between them. It added some breathing room to what would otherwise a pretty dense read, and made it feel more lively.

TLDR: Hotbed is a must read for anyone who considers themselves a feminist and wants to understand what being a US feminist meant a century ago.

[Emma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Extremely interesting read about the roots of feminism in America (early 1900s). I learned so much, especially about the interweaving between feminism and the labor movement and the impacts of the war on women’s rights strategies. In focusing on Heterodoxy, the “secret” feminist society, it details the efforts of well-known feminist icons (like Charlotte Perkins Gilman) but also highlights many founders and fighters that you’ve probably never heard of. At times, it flits between figures and makes it a bit hard to follow, but overall I loved this!

[Morgan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hotbed tells the story of the early days in Greenwich Village that sparked the feminist movement. I really enjoyed learning about the women who were influenced by the Heterodoxy club. This book is, overall, very well researched and a good source for anyone wanting to learn more about feminist history. Thanks to NetGalley, the author, and Seal Press for an ARC in exchange for an honest book review.

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really interesting overview of women's (and others') social movements in the 1910s and '20s. Lots of information about the issues in play at the time woven together skillfully—labor rights, civil rights, access to birth control, pacifism—all under the umbrella of women's suffrage, and the Greenwich Village Heterodoxy club, which brought a range of (mostly white, well off) women together to debate and advocate. Scutts makes a point of acknowledging the conflicts and areas where class and race constrained their activism to their particular lanes—particularly, but not limited, to—the gaps between white and Black women's suffrage. There's a lot to be learned here even if you know your history of the period, and plenty that has resonance in today's political climate. Not a quick read, but very rewarding, and I enjoyed getting some background on the women I've only known as names in my reading.

[Amy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was not a quick or comfortable read, especially not with everything going in this particular moment in time. There were many times where I just had to set it down for a little bit. But it felt like a very important book. And it certainly resonated with me in more ways than any book has in a very long time.

Hotbed centers around a Greenwich Village women's club called Heterodoxy and its members. The main focus is on the decade starting in 1910, but as it deals with many members of the group it does talk about time before and after that decade. But while that is its focus, it is also about suffrage, civil rights, the definition and evolution of feminism, war and pacifism, unions, and the influences and evolution of Greenwich Village at the time. The author did a good job of bringing in the subjects and weaving them together using the through line of the women in Heterodoxy. From my limited perspective, she also seemed to do a good job of acknowledging the immense shortfalls of the women. They were often from the upper classes and almost exclusively white. The author discusses those shortfalls and the unique challenges facing working class men & women, immigrants, and black Americans. It was a modern discussion attempting a large-scale conversation. She took her topic and showed not only their small part, but also the larger context, highlighting the trials, their successes, and their short comings.

I also really appreciate the way she focused on the friendships of the women in Heterodoxy. It can feel, at times, like the book is spending a lot of time on all of the issues and not a lot of time on Heterodoxy itself. But the friendships and support and network of these women is really what binds it all together.

"our friends have a profound influence on our work and our beliefs, on the way we live every day. For the women in this book, friendship was a bolstering, emboldening force."

While much of the book deals with all of the facts, the way the women influences, support, challenge, and love each other is woven throughout.

Now, while that is all amazing, I am not generally a fan of non-fiction books finding them either too boring & hard to follow, or entertaining with little actual research & sources and being more opinion that fact. And while I was very intrigued by the topic, I was quite afraid that the book would fall into the usual pitfalls of non-fiction.

The book is filled with citations, quotes, and has a very impressive "Notes" and a bibliography in the back. It's well researched and has a good flow and organization to it. I was also very impressed by the use of quotes. In my mind, this puts the book squarely in the column of a better non-fiction, as it had good organization and, you know, facts & research. It did fall prey to some of the standard non-fiction pitfalls. The members of Heterodoxy are MANY and trying to keep track of all of the names was a trial. I really could have used a name reference in the front of the book with a list of members, when they joined the club, and partners or major causes. Something to help me keep track of everyone. Granted, there's an index in the back so if you're like, "Wait shouldn't I know that person?" You can go look for the first mention and refresh your memory. But I felt that a quick guide would have helped. Also, there was a LOT covered in this book and while it is not as hefty as some NF volumes, it still felt very dry in places with a plethora of names & dates. That's awesome from the perspective that she's giving lots of details, but is a hard read IMO.

So, in the end it is an excellent read, but still a non-fiction book. I've honestly struggled with whether I want to give this book 4 or 5 starts. On the one hand, I will probably never read this book again, because non-fiction just isn't my cup of tea and it was too dry for what I would consider a fun read that I want to come back to. On the other hand, I will be recommending this book to everyone I think may have even the slightest interest. And I have come out of it with a plethora of quotes that I will go back to because they resonate with me on a deep level. So in the end, I'm coming down with 5 stars because I think everyone should read it, and if you like non-fiction and are considering this book, you probably wouldn't ding it for being NF.

Final disclaimer, I did receive this as a free copy via a Goodreads giveaway. But that has never stopped me from giving an honest opinion before, and I don't believe it has done so now. But a free book is a free book, and I do believe it got me to read a book that I might not otherwise have given a chance.

[Julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is difficult to do justice in a relatively short review to an immense book that introduces “Bohemian New York and the Secret Club that Sparked Modern Feminism”. In Joanna Scutts’ Introduction which is invaluable in setting the style and nature of a coming together of women in America in 1912 onwards, as well as a book which surveys them in all their different agendas, lives and work, she outlines some of the difficulties of setting out the nature of the Society. Despite its loose association and arguable lack of structure compared with other campaigning groups, it survived a World War and more local pressures in terms of Prohibition, Depression and pressure on its key members from legislation and life choices, and only faded in the onset of another cataclysmic World War. Taking the form of a secret social club in which discussion and activism in so many fields, including women’s suffrage, equal marriage, free love, child rearing and labour rights dominated activities, the “Heterodoxy” was far from a single issue group. Perhaps its strength was its loose form, which allowed and perhaps even tacitly encouraged experimentation and different lifestyle choices from its members rather than the strict and focused efforts of the various suffrage groups in Britain, which split on such things as the level of activity some members proposed as necessary and the personalities of some of its founder members.

The group had its origins in the college educated women who would gather in certain restaurants in New York for informal discussions. Led and somehow hosted by its first founder, ex religious minister Marie Jenney Howe and her husband Frederic, a coming together of women in a cheap and somewhat district called the Village for lively discussion and resulting activities which blossomed into an organisation which attracted the articulate and dissatisfied. A significant number were relatively well off financially, which meant that publications and campaging magazines could be funded and could be distributed. Many members were writers, some of whose radical and innovative works gave new insights into a woman’s lot. One of the best known was Charlotte Perkins Gilman, who had published a serious work “Women and Economics” as early as 1900, but who is perhaps best known today for her novella “The Yellow Wallpaper” which is a fictional but no less powerful protest against masculine medical oppression in female mental health. Many remarkable women identified with the causes central to Heterodoxy, including those in same sex relationships, and many who chose to use the forms of birth control then available to limit their families. Experiments with family structures, childcare arrangements and living arrangements were essayed - most women associated with the society had the financial and intellectual resources to write, live and generally challenge the social norms of the time. This is not to suggest that the living was easy - there were personal tensions, and divisions caused by War did upset some. There were also outside pressures on those who openly questioned the status quo and political organisations from the highest level.

This is an immense work which like its subject, does not confine itself to straightforward chronological descriptions. There are pen portraits of leading memebrs of the group, together with such debates such as “Pacifism Versus Patriotism”. This book is about the early days and waves of “feminism” in America, and while the definition of even that basic term is debated in this book, the Epilogue sets out how femisinism today can be affected by some of the basic tenets of the group in terms of coming together.

Technically this is a very readable yet academically robust book. The Notes section at the end of the book gives notes and references for each chapter in enormous detail. The bibliography, or here “Works Cited and Consulted” is equally extensive. There is also an Index, which also highlights the well chosen illustrations.

This book is a huge achievement in terms of women's studies but also the nature of political and intellectual awareness and activity in America in the early part of the twentieth century. I was very pleased to have the opportunity to read and review it.

[Khirs · Rating 4 out of 5]

First, thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for this eARC in exchange for a fair and honest review. Now on to the fun part!

This book was both informative and entertaining, centering around the early days that sparked modern feminism in Greenwich Village early on in 20th Century U.S. While from Scutts, we as readers learn more about who was involved, how, etc., she is also sure to mention those who were excluded and the limits of the Heterodoxy group. The different causes the group members champion were endlessly fascinating, and to get a bit more behind the fight for things we now have was awesome. Another benefit is to see how much hasn't changed, how much that still needs to change

As far as the writing, you can tell there has been extensive research done, and overall, it's well-written. It was able to more or less keep my attention through the more dense sections.

4/5

[Joy Corkery · Rating 3 out of 5]

I cannot resist a book about the strong women who featured throughout history. Needless to say, I jumped at the chance to learn more bout the women of Heterodoxy.

Hotbed is an extremely well-researched book. The author goes to amazing lengths to fit every piece of information in. I appreciated how the personalities of the different women shone through the book, instead of just a stoic retelling of the events they were involved in. The women were brought even more to life by the inclusion of their portraits.

As much as I felt the book was well-researched and I learned a lot, I did find it difficult to read. There was just so much information included that it felt overwhelming at times. Most days, I could only manage one chapter before I had to go put the book down and process everything.

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

I received this as a e-galley ARC from NetGalley.

This is the second of Joanna Scutts' feminist-focused history books I have read and I enjoyed this one even more than the first. She picks a time period and some folks I may know about (1910s-1920s, Greenwich Village) and then teaches me so much more about the time period.

[Jessie Brown · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think the subject and time were unusual and interesting. Some authors can breath life into history, unfortunately this was not that. If you want to know about what was happening and who was involved in this group of early 20th century feminists it’s covered. If you want a sense of the personalities and motives and interpersonal relationships you will have to search elsewhere.

[Julia · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author gets 5 stars for research. But somehow reading the book was a bit of a slog - hence the three stars.

[Alice · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Hotbed, Joanna Scutts tells the stories of a selection of women who made a name for themselves as activists in New York in the 1910s, who were connected by their membership of an exclusive and lively discussion club, Heterodoxy, founded by trailblazing feminist Marie Jenney Howe.

I came to this book with little to no prior knowledge of Heterodoxy, any of its members, or women’s lives in New York/the US in the 1910s in general, so it was great to learn something new and hitherto unsuspected. It was a thrilling surprise to find, among Heterodoxy’s members, a number of divorced women, women who kept their surnames after marriage, and women who lived as couples, discreetly or otherwise.

At the time the club formed in 1912, Greenwich Village was a scruffy, bohemian enclave where radical middle-class men and women were more or less free to live as they liked. While Hotbed is a history of people, the neighbourhood comes across as a character in itself, crucial to the women’s personal development and successes. They occupy its homes; talk about big ideas and make big plans in its drawing rooms, cafes and restaurants; and use its public spaces as platforms from which to deliver their campaigns.

Heterodoxy’s members worked together on campaigns on a variety of hot topics, with individual women taking the lead on, or getting most involved with, whichever ones were closest to their hearts. We see them making the case for women’s suffrage; better working conditions and pay; reforms to race relations; marriage reform; education on and availability of birth control; pacifism; communism; and more.

I was especially interested to read about their campaign for the vote, being far more familiar with suffragettes’ and suffragists’ activities in Britain. I also paid particular attention to their views on limiting family size, and how they could help working-class women obtain information about, and access to, birth control, as this corresponded with my own work on family size in Britain during this period.

While this all sounds great, Scutts doesn’t shy away from the ways these women were very much ‘of their time’. They were mostly white and middle-class, and as a result, many of them didn’t understand how working-class and Black women faced multiple barriers, or had different goals to themselves. It’s an uncomfortable truth that while some members of Heterodoxy were simply ignorant but had their hearts in the right place, others were overtly racist.

But you do also see women making the effort to get among those they want to help and actually learning what life is like for them, and what they hope to gain. While the various displays put on by the more well-off and artistic members of Heterodoxy sounded very worthy and interesting, it was the women who had lived experience, or went out ‘on the ground’ - domestically and abroad - who particularly impressed me.

Historical time also plays its part in the club’s ultimate drift. The big cause that united virtually everyone in Heterodoxy was women’s suffrage; once that was achieved, there was nothing as unifying to take its place. Time also changed the character of Greenwich Village as it became a tourist hotspot (I kept thinking ‘I’d love to go back in time for a visit, but then I’d be a dreaded tourist!’), then succumbed to gentrification.

The First World War was a particularly big divider, as the women differed so much in what they thought their role in wartime should be: were they obligated to play a part in it as mothers, wives, sisters and US citizens, or should they oppose war as an outdated and incredibly male method of solving conflict? Following the war, differences in opinion on what women should be fighting for became even wider, especially in the light of the Red Scare, and a backlash against feminism from conservative women in the 1920s.

In the introduction, Scutts writes:

'Friendship is an elusive subject for history, because we tend to take it for granted, to view it as something organic, unspoken, a connection that doesn’t require work or analysis… Biographers often treat friendship as subordinate to romantic or filial relationships, and less important than the influence of mentors and teachers in shaping a person’s life. But our friends have a profound influence on our work and our beliefs, on the way we live every day. For the women in this book, friendship was a bolstering, emboldening force.'

This is a message she reinforces throughout the book, by emphasising the living arrangements, collaboration, and assistance between the women of Heterodoxy.

Scutts gets closer to her subjects by examining not only their accounts of themselves, but what their friends said about them. We see them speak of one another with kindness and build each other up, without fawning or glossing over flaws or differences of opinion, and this helps Scutts build up her portraits of these women as admirable but imperfect, and therefore human.

Hotbed is an interesting and timely account of a group of remarkable women who were both of, and ahead of, their time.

[Kate: The Quick and the Read · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ll admit that my knowledge of feminist history was very much UK-focused. I’m quite au fait with British suffragettes and events – Pankhursts, Emily Davison and the King’s horse, hunger strikes and the Cat and Mouse Act, and all that. However, I’d not really paused for thought about their American sisters – so this is why I was delighted to be invited to join the blog tour for ‘Hotbed’.

This book focuses on the early days of Heterodoxy, an all-female social club that first met in New York’s Greenwich Village in 1912. Notes from the meetings do not exist, so Scutts instead deals with the lives of the individual members and the various issues they were passionate about. Although their common ground was women’s rights and suffrage, the other issues on the table often overlapped with feminist concerns – labour rights, birth control, pacifism, racism, sex, psychoanalysis, to name a few. Indeed, Heterodoxy thrived on a wide range of perspectives and opinions and often navigated some touchy subjects and disagreements.

It’s evident that this approach is a forerunner of modern intersectional feminism – a lot of the club’s members recognised that different aspects of female identity cannot be isolated. Hence, they recognised that the fight for women’s rights also needed to consider (for example) race, class and sexuality – and Scutts uses these topics to structure the chapters for her book, introducing us to the key players and the contemporary events.

Personally, I found the separation of the issues both helpful and interesting. I enjoyed that I could read a chapter on labour rights (including some shocking descriptions of conditions for working-class women in various textile factories and the tragedy of the fires that took lives) and then a chapter on Black activism (as a response to racial double standards and lynchings of Black men who were stereotyped as predatory towards to white women while white men freely took advantage of Black women). We move from feminist art to pacifist approaches to World War I, arguments about Freud to the controversy of birth control education. Each chapter is highly impactful and engrossing.

I also loved that the book introduced a whole host of inspiring and amazing women. While some might be considered extremely problematic in modern terms (eugenics, anyone?!), each is recognised for their input in moving the feminist cause forwards. In particular, I was fascinated by the tragic story of Inez Milholland, a glamorous, vocal and extremely active member of Heterodoxy who contributed so much in her short life span. I need to read more about her! Rose Pastor Stokes proved another highlight – a Jewish woman who married a rich man and used her status to support female factory workers. Plus Mary Ware Dennett, a single mother of two sons whose frank sex advice got her writing banned. To be honest, I could have easily picked twenty more examples.

This is the kind of book that you’ll want to come back to again and again – it’s actually a bit overwhelming to read it in one hit because there are so many names and acronyms and events to keep up with! The only one of the women that I was aware of before reading this book was Charlotte Perkins Gilman, author of ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’, so this covered a lot of new ground for me.

There are a good number of black and white pictures included in the book, something I also found really engaging. It was lovely to see some of the women being discussed. I’d really like to have seen even more – more photos, more paintings, more feminist illustrations, maybe even some contemporary news reports? I realise that this would make an expensive and deluxe edition, but these women are absolutely worth it!

This is an important and extensively researched book – I really did feel that this was a labour of love for Scutts and the list of references at the end is mind-boggling. It seems that no stone was left unturned, resulting in a comprehensive look at American feminism of the 1910s. Scutts has turned a huge, amorphous, diverse subject into something controlled and eminently readable – and it is an absolute treat for those interested in feminist history.

[Terri (BooklyMatters) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Riveting, exquisitely detailed and beautifully rendered, the true-life story of a remarkable and exclusively feminine society, gathered at the turn of the twentieth century in Greenwich Village, NY, in an informal and highly-connected club - a powerhouse of informed, educated and motivated champions, prepared to weigh in on the issues of the day, ranging from the somewhat nebulous challenges of “feminism”, to the more specific agenda of “women’s rights, Socialism and labor laws,sexual autonomy and access to birth control, and racial justice”.

“A network of mutual support whose legacy runs long and deep int the lives of its members”.

This unusual and tight-knit group of friends and sometimes lovers, meeting in a “place where ideas burst forth from intimacy”, show us how “women, denied the vote, get things done.“

in a world, one scant century behind us, where women were still essentially the property of men (be it their husbands, or the patriarchy at large), this eclectic group gathered, essentially apolitical in this formation, yet hugely influential in the causes championed and the connections sparked, literally changing the world thats followed in terms of both tangible policy and the broader social freedoms eventually afforded women.

Followed closely and documented here are the exploits of this team centering on one ten year period only - that of the first decade of the group’s formation - the years encompassing 1912 to the early 1920’s.

In that timespan, the scope of issues championed include (and are not limited to): the passing of the U.S Nineteenth Amendment; labor laws protecting (primarily female) worker safety and entitlements; women’s right to vote, school-board mandatory maternity leave and job security for married teachers, Freudian analysis and the enlightenment of women’s psychological awakening, pacifism and women’s role in anti-war activism before and during WW1.

Recounted in a story-telling style focusing on the lives, loves, and exploits of many of these remarkable women, this chatty, encyclopedic narrative is both fascinating in its peek into a charmed and challenged world, and an incredibly informative look at the dawn of feminist history.

With tools in their arsenal that ranged far beyond their initial informed debates, this small group of women, ahead-of-their-day in economics, schooling and professional accomplishments, in their roles as journalists, writers, physicians, lawyers, artists and educators, raised public awareness and championed causes supported, leveraging art and theatrical pageants, summits, books, magazines, pamphlets, marches, parades and public-education briefings.

For this reader, the glimpses provided into this time period, (just over a hundred years hence )- the feminist challenges faced, lifestyles proudly championed, choices rendered, friendship celebrated, and most of all, the optimism, hope and strength of convictions exemplified, came together in a colorful explosion so inspiring and poignant that my admiration for these women, (in context with the recognition of what can only be seen as as the current-day cultural feminist slippage, cynicism, widespread atrophy and some terrible truths) inspired a sort of nostalgic wistfulness.

A wonderful read, highly recommended, this is a book for every person interested in women and the feminist agenda, to savor, study, and perhaps, most important of all, to learn from.

A great big thank you to the author and the publisher for an ARC of this book. All thoughts presented are my own.

My stop today on the @RandomTTours #blogtour for Hotbed by @Joanna-Scutts

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

Picture the scene: Downtown New York, 1912, an underground cafe in bohemian Greenwich Village. It’s the perfect place for for revolutionaries to gather, only this time all of the members of the group are women. Hotbed is the story of America’s early feminists who formed an exclusive and secret club, Heterodoxy, a place where ideas were sparked and dreams of a better future for all women were born.

When I got the chance to read this one I jumped at it, the birth of feminism in early 20th century New York? And a hardback version with a beautiful cover like this? Yes please!
I did a module on Votes for Women at college but that focused on the UK and so the American fight for female suffrage is a topic I know nothing about. I imagined a more glamourous set would’ve been taking up the mantle there and this book did little to dispel that notion, so many of the women featured are described as being as beautiful as they were accomplished.

As Heterodoxy was a secret society, they did not keep written records of their meetings and so very little has ever been recorded about these extraordinary women, who came together from all walks of life to form one sisterhood. And there are so many of them, it’s difficult to keep track! The women featured pop up again and again throughout the book, as do the running themes of suffrage, marriage, sexuality, race relations and labour rights, so what a task it must have been for Scutts to create this book. It is meticulously well-researched though and I learned so much from reading it. I loved Dr Jo Baker’s description of the March and how every woman there felt ‘like a giantess in her own right’, it sounded incredible and what a moment that must’ve been.

You cannot help but be inspired as you read this book, it made me rethink my own acceptance of society’s conventions and the power of the patriarchy. I wasn’t all that interested back when I first learned about the fight for the vote, but I’ve since grown up, had two daughters of my own and become increasingly annoyed at the state of the world. It is more than a little disheartening to think that the things these women were fighting for over a century ago are STILL ongoing issues, but I’ve no doubt that this book will help to bring more minds to the cause.

AD Pr Product - Thank you to @randomthingstours and @duck_books for my copy ❤️

[J Earl · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hotbed: Bohemian Greenwich Village and the Secret Club that Sparked Modern Feminism, by Joanna Scutts, is a snapshot of a very specific time and place that speaks to much of what has come along since and what we are still struggling for and against.

While some of the names will be familiar this is about the power of community. I would argue that in particular it is about community that is open to change and greater inclusion as opportunity presents itself. Just like individual people are far from perfect, so are groups of people, so one can certainly find things that, in an ideal world, would have been different. But these women also realized their humanity and when they saw opportunities to include more people and more ideas, they did, and that is the sign of compassionate intelligence.

A book I recently read (The Quiet Before by Gal Beckerman) emphasizes the importance of some form of community that allows ideas to form and be modified through debate and discussion (and yes, sometimes argument) prior to a movement being able to make an impact. Otherwise, what we often get is a flashpoint then a return to something close to what was before. This group would fit nicely in that work, Heterodoxy served as that incubator for the ideas that could serve as the foundation for a movement.

Although suffrage was a major cause at the time these women did not limit their thoughts or actions to just one cause. They were concerned with women's lives as a whole, of which suffrage was a part. They also illustrate for today's movements the power of both formulating ideas within a community as well as of working in groups to accomplish goals.

Whether your interest is strictly in history or in feminist history in particular this book will be a rewarding read. It is well written, engaging, and offers a splendid works cited section as well as excellent notes for those wanting to learn more. Also, please read the acknowledgements page, both as a courtesy and to learn about how you can view a digitized copy of the "Heterodoxy to Marie" album, it is a fascinating thing to view.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.

[Yofish · Rating 3 out of 5]

I felt a little deceived on what this book was really about, but that wasn’t my main problem with it. It just never grabbed me. I could not really keep track of the large number of movers and shakers. That said, it was about a period in American history that’s a bit of a blind spot for me, so I did learn some things.

The hook is that there was this secret-ish all-women society that met in Greenwich Village starting in the 1910s. They continued to meet until WWII-ish, but the book is mostly grounded in the ‘10s. The author’s thesis is something like these were the movers and shakers that really created the feminist movement in the US. (Starting with suffrage, because it was the 1910s.) The problem with telling this story that way is that the society was secret-ish in that they didn’t take minutes, or really record in any way what happened during these meetings. So it was sort of like “I have this list of people who attended these meetings. Here are all the interesting things that happened in this time period that involved---in some way---at least one of these people.” And, as I mentioned, the list was long, so there were a lot of things.

I do not think that the author did a good job of spinning all these things into a coherent story. It became sort of this random listing of facts.

Many of the woment were (or at least are believed to have been) lesbian. There were plenty of socialists, which was problematic in the US during and after WWI. Lots and lots of anti-war stuff---also problematic for the participants. Some of the facts were interesting---I sort of wanted to hear more about the labor issues. But it just became a bit of a jumble (for me).

[Amelia · Rating 4 out of 5]

"No matter how publicly popular its basic principle might be, that people out not to be held back by their sex from pursuing the life they want to live, the reality and consequences of that principle at work still inspire vicious opposition. As the women of Heterodoxy discovered, however, it was easier to ride out those ups and downs in the company of friends."

A well-researched book on the class-defying social club Heterodoxy, Scutts offers a historical look on an early feminist group. Heterodoxy consisted of various women, from the likes of Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Susan Glaspell, and Marie Howe. Scutts takes care to mention the group's tendency to be white, middle class, and citizens, showing how despite their best efforts, this group still had a gap in their activism. She also takes care not to just create a timeline from basic facts and dates, but shows how this social group created a community and various friendships across Greenwich village.

Working through speeches, novels, and activism from the 1910s and onward, Heterodoxy became a multi-generational, multi-issue group that worked to educate and enlighten. As a consciousness-raising group, Heterodoxy is a hugely interesting society that has finally gotten what it deserves: a highlight in American feminist history.

[Ruth · Rating 4 out of 5]

A feminist manifesto of the early days of feminism in New York City, specifically Greenwich Village. A group of women meet regularly at a club called Polly's on MacDougal Street and call their group Heterodoxy.. They want lives independent of their identities as wives. The group consists of women who are wealthy, white, and have influence. They blossom into a political and activist group as well as a social group.

The group grows, quickly becoming diverse regarding race and economic standing. Individual members become champions of political and social actions as the right of women to vote, birth control, pregnancy as cause for termination at work, and womens' independence from men as a definition for their existence.

This is an overlooked segment of the Womens' Movement for equality. So much is based in Greenwich Village, in the first decade of the 20th Century. The author has done extensive research. A valuable addition to any Womens' Studies curriculum.

Thanks to Net Galley for the eARC.

[Kate Shotliff · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is such an interesting read, I had never heard of the Heterodoxy society and I loved reading about it. The fascinating women who founded this society and were just unapologetically themselves standing up for what they believed in, in a society and time where they were expected to just be docile and domestic.

I knew very little of Greenwich Village in the 1910s, so it was nice to read about the bohemian lifestyle and environment alongside the members themselves. As much as the movement was progressive in its time period, there is little socioeconomic or racial representation – this was a very much white middle to upper class society and Scutts does not shy away from this.

This is a very well researched piece of feminist history and I am so happy that I got to read it, and see where some of the roots for the movement came from and how they have developed over the last century. There is obviously still such a long way to go but if these women can do it then that gives me hope.

Thank you to RandomThingsTours and the publisher for my gifted copy.

[Mandy · Rating 4 out of 5]

In 1912, in New York City, feminist Marie Jenney Howe started a new social club called Heterodox, a meeting place for radical women thinkers of all stripes, a place where they could come together and plan to change the world. With just 25 members at the start, the club grew to more than 100 by the 1940s, when, for a variety of reasons, the group disbanded. In this meticulously researched, wide-ranging and comprehensive account of the club, the author focuses on the period up to the 1920s. Many of the members went on to play important and significant roles in the burgeoning feminist movement. The book is a complex social history, which sometimes feels overwhelming with so many characters introduced, and the style can occasionally feel overly academic and dry. It’s certainly hard keeping track of everyone. But it’s a wonderfully illuminating survey of the early days of feminism in the US and a significant contribution to women’s studies. Many photos enhance the text and the effort and concentration needed to read it is amply repaid. Highly recommended.

[Ashley · Rating 4 out of 5]

A super interesting historical account of a secret society called “heterodoxy.” The society was so secretive that things were not written down or documented but we follow the story of multiple inspiring and amazing women who dared to see the world differently and attempt to make it better. There are feminists, suffragists, labor and health activists who sought out how to change the existing system so that women had more rights (although at the time this was focused primarily on white women). I was inspired learning about topics such as birth control and maternity leave, how women fought to maintain jobs after marriage and motherhood, and overall how much they had to overcome. This book was a reminder for me to continue to try to improve the world using my vote and voice that so many women fought so hard for me to have, something especially important right now with the current state of the political field and women’s rights.

[Kelly_Hunsaker_reads ... · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hotbed by Joanna Scutts is a book that every feminist, budding feminist, or historian should read. It introduces the reader to the birth of a powerful and important movement -- and to the women who helped us to live the lives we can live today.

Heterodoxy, a group formed in 1912 by Marie Jenney Howe, included names you will already know as well as some you do not, including Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Susan Glaspell, and many others. Although you will not recognize the names of many -- you should. It is a failing on the part of historians that these women are not known. The book illustrates the work these women were involved in as part of activists, as well as some of the repercussions they suffered.

If you are a woman you can vote because of the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. This group of women helped that to happen, so please read about them.

Thank you to the publisher, Seal Press, for my gifted copy in exchange for my honest review.

[Megan Feulner · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is an absolute treasure for readers of feminist/women's history.
I loved learning about the bold, deeply committed and vastly creative women of Heterodoxy in the shabby glam era of early 1900s Greenwich Village.
Scutts also deftly handles the group's shortcomings in terms of race, class, and other identity markers. She writes, "I invite you to treat the women in this book as they treated one another - not as role models or heroines, statues at whose feet we are supposed to sit, but as friends: flawed, frustrating, and human." In line with historians like Alice Echols and Victoria Hesford, Scutts elegantly leads us to consider our feminist past in all its complexity. I can't wait to read her first book (The Extra Woman)!

[margot · Rating 4 out of 5]

[4.5 stars, rounded down]
I wanted to read this book for Reacting but didn't have the time, I'm glad I finally got around to it now. This historical niche is quickly becoming a favorite of mine, and I'm adding practically everything from the bibliography to my TBR.
Scutts successfully emphasizes the way Hederodites were spread thin across various issues by arranging chapters roughly by social issue, but they often end somewhere they didn't start—I think this is a productive way to organize the book.
However, with the never-ending roster of impressive names and faces, I wish the book had slowed down to explore the people and institution of the club itself. It's possible there isn't much more out there about the club—but if it's out there, I feel it should've been included.

[Alison Lockley · Rating 3 out of 5]

I would agree with the reviewer who said that the research for this book was incredible, but unfortunately the author could not make the telling of it very interesting. It just became endless paragraphs about various members of the Heterodoxy - an early 20th Century New York club for women who were challenging the patriarchy as it existed then (and seemingly still does to some extent). Although it should have been engaging, it just became very boring with no real sense of how the women lived their lives. When compared with Diane Sohami’s ‘No Modernism without Lesbians’, which to be fair has a slightly different focus, it is dry and lifeless, whereas Sohami breathes life into a less academic study of European women in a similar era.