Letter-of-intent

Letters of Intent pairs young feminists with their more seasoned counterparts in a series of epistolary Q&As designed to remind readers that despite the occasional internal struggles within the women's movement, there is a continuity between old and new. The older women include Gloria Steinem on abortion rights, Susan Faludi on the tradition of feminist writing, Angela Davis on the African American struggle, Dr. Phyllis Chesler on workplace relations, and Judy Blume on being a mother. But the basic misjudgment of the book is captured early on by Katha Pollitt: "This whole notion that writing is all about mentoring and networking and each generation smoothing the way for the next like party hacks down at the clubhouse is the wrong idea. Writing is about writing."

While a few of the dialogues do take off--most notably the lyrical, poetic exchange between young actress Eisa Dais and playwright Ntozake Shange--for the most part the pieces in Letters of Intent never exceed escape velocity. Part of the problem is structural: written letters, in this age of instantaneous e-mail, telephones, and frequent-flier miles, are highly personal declarations, and we read them with the expectation of eavesdropping on a developing relationship; but the missives here betray little sense of their writers' personalities. There's something contrived about bringing these authors together in this way that is at odds with the honesty of the women's movement. Still, the book is a useful compendium of feminist voices old and new that might not otherwise have been collected in the same volume. --Patrizia DiLucchio