Begum Nusrat Bhutto

From The Nation:

Born Nusrat Ispahani, the young woman from an Iranian Pakistani family, who grew to love her adopted country, rests today in the soil of Sindh.

Begum Nusrat Bhutto’s political role does not start with Ziaul Haq, but it was during his rule that her determination was forged of an unbreakable iron. With her eldest daughter, Benazir, Begum Bhutto fought fearlessly to save her husband, Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, whose life was stolen by the most vicious military dictator in our nation’s history; a dictator, who denounced democracy, abrogated the Constitution, cynically toyed with religion, and denied the basic rights of the people.

Too strong to be easily intimidated, Begum Nusrat Bhutto was motivated by the depth of Zia's tyranny to put her heart and soul into the fight for the restoration of democracy, the Constitution and basic human rights. She stood steadfast against a usurper and dictator not out of any desire for personal gain, but out of an unwavering dedication to her principles. Many were intimidated by General Ziaul Haq and quickly acquiesced to his rule; but for Begum Nusrat Bhutto there was never a moment of doubt. The fundamental rights of the Pakistani people could not be sacrificed at the altar of dictatorship.

Dubbed the “Iron Lady of Pakistan,” Begum Bhutto was the backbone of the Movement for the Restoration of Democracy (MRD) - a coalition comprising PPP and other democratic political parties determined to restore the democratic order on which Pakistan was founded.

Women in Tunisia

From the Financial Times:

Suad Abd al-Rahim, a tall, elegant, 47-year-old Tunisian woman with dyed red curls, is no one’s idea of what an Islamist politician should look like.

Yet the businesswoman, who says she has no plans to don the Islamic headscarf, has just been elected to Tunisia’s new constituent assembly on the ticket of Nahda, the Islamist party that has emerged as the strongest political force in the country.

After 22 years of repression under the regime of Zein al-Abidine Ben Ali, the former president ousted by a popular uprising this year, Nahda has staged a powerful comeback, winning 90 out of 217 seats according to final results of this week’s election.

Now the largest party in the new assembly that will write the country’s democratic constitution, it is poised to lead a coalition government.

Wallis Simpson - That Woman

From the Sydney Morning Herald:

ALMOST everyone knows the story of King Edward VIII's abdication to marry the American divorcee Wallis Simpson but few have read the mountain of books about the saga. That Woman, the first biography by a woman of Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor, is for them.

Anne Sebba's intention "to humanise not demonise" the woman works, no doubt to the chagrin of those who still detest her.

It works because of the material discovered in the King's Proctor's files at the National Archives in London but most of all because, as a woman, Sebba could get into Wallis's mind the way male authors could not. So hats off to Sebba for turning a complex slice of history into a gripping yarn.

Stephanie Dray - Song of the Nile

Sorceress. Seductress. Schemer. Cleopatra’s daughter has become the emperor’s most unlikely apprentice and the one woman who can destroy his empire…

Having survived her perilous childhood as a royal captive of Rome, Selene pledged her loyalty to Augustus and swore she would become his very own Cleopatra. Now the young queen faces an uncertain destiny in a foreign land.  Forced to marry a man of the emperor’s choosing, Selene will not allow her new husband to rule in her name. She quickly establishes herself as a capable leader in her own right and as a religious icon. Beginning the hard work of building a new nation, she wins the love of her new subjects and makes herself vital to Rome by bringing forth bountiful harvests.  But it’s the magic of Isis flowing through her veins that makes her indispensable to the emperor. Against a backdrop of imperial politics and religious persecution, Cleopatra’s daughter beguiles her way to the very precipice of power. She has never forgotten her birthright, but will the price of her mother’s throne be more than she’s willing to pay?

 

Visit Melisende's Library for an excerpt from Stephanie's book.

Rogues Gallery of Restoration Actresses

From the Guardian:

The emergence of the actress on the Restoration stage was revolutionary. As every pupil of Shakespeare knows, it was men in drag who took the ladies' parts before. Imagine the frisson, then, when Nell Gwyn first showed herself aged 14 to a packed house at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, in 1664. This unprecedented female exhibition provoked salacious frenzy, which theatre companies hoped to harness to their profit.

The showcasing of beauties in "breeches roles" exploded ideas of decorum. Actresses welcomed the chance to demonstrate the virtuosity demanded by parts such as Viola and Rosalind. But the display of their shapely legs was condemned as an exercise in "brazenness" which confirmed the shameless immodesty and sexual availability of the actress. That both theatre-land and prostitution had their metropolis in Covent Garden was not lost on the press. From the first, the "actress" of popular imagination was a shimmering mixture of whore, coquette, talent and celebrity.

A new exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, The First Actresses: Nell Gwyn to Sarah Siddons, investigates the concept of the "actress" in all its troubling contradictions. The artists include Reynolds, Gainsborough, Hoppner, Lawrence, Zoffany and Gillray.

The exhibition is the brainchild of Gill Perry. When she was writing her book Spectacular Flirtations: Viewing the Actress in Eighteenth Century Art and Culture, she realised that the NPG had an exceptional collection of early actress portraits – "And not only that they are in Covent Garden," she says.

When modern critics rate a female performance on whether it's theatrical Viagra or doubt that a woman is thin enough to play Juliet, they invoke a long and dishonourable tradition. "Modern actors should see the first actresses as trailblazers, fighting prejudice and innuendo," Perry concludes. Certainly women today might take comfort that so many of their forebears managed to seize the public relations initiative and shape the culture that so objectified them.

From Sex Trade To Second Chance

From the Daily Beast:

“There was no way to go back and erase a criminal conviction in New York,” says Sienna Baskin, co-director of the organization the Sex Workers Project of the Urban Justice Center. SWP is a legal advocacy organization that helps sex workers of all kinds, from trafficked individuals to those who freely engage in commercial sex. In 2007, SWP helped create the New York Anti-Trafficking law, which made human trafficking a statewide offense.

“We wanted to have as part of that law a remedy for people who’ve been convicted of prostitution,” said Baskin, but it wasn’t included in the final bill. So in 2010, they drafted and were instrumental in passing Criminal Procedure Law §440.10(1)(i), which allows judges to vacate convictions directly related to an individual’s history as a trafficked person. This law, the first of its kind in the nation, gave Maria and other survivors the chance to truly leave their pasts behind. It also sparked a wave of similar organizing around the country.

Historian Marjorie Reeves

From the Wiltshire Times:

The nephew of a renowned historian and educator, who grew up in Bratton and went to Trowbridge Girls’ School, is bringing her memoirs to the reading public.

Medieval history specialist Marjorie Reeves, the daughter of Robert Reeves, the owner of R&J Reeves and Son ironworks, achieved great renown in the academic community for her work on heretics and mystics.

Although based in Oxford as a fellow at the Society of Oxford Home Students from 1938 to 1972, she never lost touch with her Bratton roots.

Anthony Sheppard, 62, of Claygate in Surrey, found his aunt’s memoirs after she died in 2003, at the age of 98.

Who Was Gladys Porter?

From Nova News Now:

Due to repairs on the Gladys Porter Bridge in Port Williams, many motorists waiting for the light to change are wondering, who was the namesake?

According to the Women's Institute history of the village, the current bridge is named after Porter because she was the MLA responsible for securing provincial funding for its construction. The bridge was opened in 1968, at a cost of $650,000, 50-feet west of earlier bridges over the Cornwallis River.

Although the bridge is more than 40 years old and undergoing a two-year repair project, the sign indicating Porter's name was only installed by the transportation department about a year ago.

Japanese Warrior Women

From Archaeology News Network:

'The archaeological evidence, meager though it is," writes historian Stephen Turnbull in "Samurai Women 1184-1877" (2010), "tantalizingly suggests a wider female involvement in battle than is implied by written accounts alone."

Armor and weapons have been found in the tombs of 4th-century female rulers. Do they support the historicity of the legendary Empress Jingu? They might — or might not; scholars disagree.