Obituaries
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Universal Woman, Particular Jew
Blu Greenberg
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
New York
S he was, like most ordinary mor-
tals, a mass of contradictions.
Betty Friedan was loud and
sometimes imperious, yet she could be
charming, funny, gentle, kind and win-
some. A public persona, at times her ego
needed massaging, but she remained sur-
prisingly unassuming and unpretentious.
Though she exuded self-confidence,
her vulnerabilities were right out there
for all to see. She could fix her eyes and
set her jaw in a "take no prisoners" posi-
tion, but she could also listen to opposite
views, change her mind and soften at the
distress of others.
She was universal woman and particu-
lar Jew. The word Jewish does not appear
at all in The Feminine Mystique, her sem-
inal work; yet, every heartbeat was a
Jewish one.
- This complicated, complex woman
changed all of our lives -- even those
who never read The Feminine Mystique
or never heard of NOW, the National
Organization for Women.
But others did.
These were a handful of Jewish
Betty Friedan died Feb. 4, 2006, at age 85. women of the 1960s, women of Ezrat
She spawned the most profound social
Nashim, women of other denominations
revolution of the last few cen-
who were writ-
turies without a drop of blood
ing about or
being shed. She will go down in
modeling the
history as one of the great
new values,
change agents of modern histo-
women who
ry; and for us, she will be a con-
mediated secu-
tinuing source of Jewish pride,
lar feminism
characterized in our own histo-
into Jewish fern-
ry books as one of the contribu-
ini'sm. Once
tions we made to the world.
° these pioneer-
Yet, along with the excesses of
ing Jewish femi-
early feminism was the under-
nists estab-
lying idea Betty Friedan offered
lished the con-
the world: gender equality. This
nections, I
meant much more than the
could
apply
Betty Friedan
women's vote. It meant equal
them to my own
access, equal talent and brains, equal dig- community — not out of a sense of
nity of women — and all of it a matter of abuse for still I felt none, but out of a
justice.
sense of ethics, of meeting the original
She opened the door to broader appli-
biblical paradigm — male and female
cation of the idea of equal access and dig-
created as equals in the image of God.
nity to other spheres- of life. In 1963, I
Betty went on to found or co-found
made no connection between feminism
NOW, the National Women's Political
and Jewish religious life, the imbalances in Caucus and the First Women's Bank and
traditional Judaism created by gendered
Trust Company. She co-organized the
religious roles, the prevailing limitations
first protest march, the Women's Strike
on women studying Talmud or even the
for Equality in 1970. In 1969, though
real disabilities in Jewish divorce:
already beleaguered by opposition to
Playwright. Of Contemporary Women
I Abigail Schwartz
.1 Jewish Telegraphic Agency
New York
laywright Wendy
Wasserstein was known
for her wry portrayal of
strong, conflicted women.
While not always overtly
Jewish, her characters.still bore
the mark of the playwright's tra-
ditional Jewish upbringing in
New York.
Later in her life, the feminist
writer became a Jewish mother,
though perhaps not in the way
her own Jewish mother pictured.
Wasserstein, 55, died of lym-
phoma Jan. 29, 2006, in New York.
She wrote "in ways that are
profoundly Jewish:' said Joyce
Antler, professor of American
Jewish history and women's
studies at Brandeis University.
And though her focus was on
the American woman, not just
p
the Jewish American woman,
she expressed "the modern
dilemma of American women
with a Jewish accent, a Jewish
sensibility:' Antler said.
Susan Weidman Schneider,
editor in chief of Lilith magazine,
said, "She may be the only play-
wright of national stature to cap-
ture, moment by moment, the
changing lives of women in the
last part of the 20th century"
Wasserstein's works included
The Heidi Chronicles, for which
she won a Pulitzer Prize and .
Tony Award in. 1989, and The
Sisters Rosensweig, which fea-
tured three middle-aged Jewish
siblings who come together in
London for a birthday party.
In that play, "she was able to
have anger at aspects of Jewish
family life and yet be apprecia-
tive," said Schneider, of both "the
discomfOrt and warm pleasures
of family life."
Sisters deals with "developing
feminism, she was unafraid to publicly
take on the abortion issue, founding
NARAL, the National Abortion and
Reproductive Rights Action League.
She saw Jewish feminism as a logical
extension, of secular feminism — access,
education, the need for "outside" or pub-
lic roles as well as inside ones; freedom
to control one's destiny in marriage and
divorce.
Betty's greatness also lay in her ability
to rethink matters. In publishing The
Second Stage, she recognized that she had
gone too far in The Feminine Mystique in
denigrating women's roles in the home.
She wrote of transcending the false
polarization between feminism and fam-
ily, between men and women. She
addressed the realities and satisfactions
of work of the home and the satisfactions
of women who chose those as their pri-
mary roles.
It was a privilege for me not only to
have personally known this extraordinary
woman, but also to be among the billion _ s
of men and women, now and in the
future, whose worlds she would alter.
Blu Greenberg is founding president of the
Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance and
founding chair of One Voice: Jewish Women
for Israel.
new identities out of Jewish
later when Holly and her friends
expectations," Antler said.
reunite over lunch to compare life
One sister, who is secular,
paths. Each one is simultaneous-
comes home, dis-
ly successful and
cusses with her sib-
lacking in her life
lings what it means
— the profes-
to be Jewish and
sionals are still
discovers her
seeking fulfilling
Jewish identity.
relationships, one
"And issues are
is happily mar-
raised and dis-
ried and preg-
cussed in a Jewish
nant but unem-
communal way:'
ployed and
Antler added.
unsure of
Even in plays
whether she
Wendy Was serstein
with less overtly
should have pur:-
Jewish themes,
sued a career.
Wasserstein's work reflects the
The member of the group that
perspective of "a woman who
has both a fulfilling marriage and
bears demographic accents of a
career is unable to make it, hav-
Jewish woman:' Antler said.
ing moved to Iraq — the implica-
The lead protagonist in her
tion being that in order to achieve
first play, Uncommon Women
both these things, she had to
and Others in 1977, is Holly, a
make an extreme sacrifice.
Jewish woman in the last year of
Wasserstein's characters most-
an elite women's college similar
ly aged with her and continued in
to Mount Holyoke in Massachu-
this vein: strong, interesting and
setts, Wasserstein's alma mater.
passionate, if conflicted, and gen-
The play continues six years
erally "uncommon."
Wasserstein's best-known
work, The Heidi Chronicles, cov-
ers the life of Heidi, a feminist
art historian, over the span of a
few decades, from a dance
school in 1965 to her decision to
adopt a child and become a sin-
gle mother in 1989 -- a mirror
to Wasserstein's own decision to
have a baby by herself in 1999.
In addition to about a dozen
plays, Wasserstein's oeuvre
included two collections of
essays, Bachelor Girls and Shiksa
Goddess: or, How I Spent My
Forties; the non-fiction work
Sloth, a parody of a self-help
book; and a forthcoming novel.
Her plays might have been
loosely autobiographical, but her
essays were frank discussions of
events in her life, such as her deci-
sion to have a child on her own.
"She followed a path from career
woman to being a Jewish mother;'
Antler said. And though she didn't
follow the traditional route, "she is
the voice of her generation as a
proud Jewish mother." ❑
February 16 • 2006
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