The Good Body

The Good Body
by Eve Ensler

The Good Body
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Book Summary Information

Author: Eve Ensler
Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2005-11-08
ISBN: 0812974735
Number of pages: 112
Publisher: Villard
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Book Reviews of The Good Body

Book Review: Necessary Monologues
Summary: 4 Stars

Every woman should read this book and reclaim control over their body image. What a
different world it would be if we could once again eat bread and pasta and chocolate with pleasure and hunger and satisfaction, instead of in shame and with guilt. If we stopped dieting, stopped obsessing, stopped suppressing our needs, we would be well nourished and our minds would be clear and we would not continue to harm ourselves. We would love our bellies, respect the source of our strength and balance. (What a concept, right?)

Ensler's writing on this subject is emotionally compelling, absolutely necessary, and ultimately empowering. If all the women in the world started celebrating their diverse beauty and talents and accomplishments, women's magazines as we know them would become extinct.

I agree with the criticism that THE GOOD BODY could have more accounts (maybe just one more) inspired by Asian women (I loved Priya, the fit and fat "Indian treadmill lady"!), but I appreciate the fact that each voice is vivid and to the point. And by the way, anyone who thinks that most Asian women are happy with their bodies is living under a rock! Right now Asia - particularly East Asia - is probably the epicenter of eating disorders among women.

Summary of The Good Body

Botox, bulimia, breast implants: Eve Ensler, author of the international sensation The Vagina Monologues, is back, this time to rock our view of what it means to have a "good body." "In the 1950s," Eve writes, girls were "pretty, perky. They had a blond Clairol wave in their hair. They wore girdles and waist-pinchers. . . . In recent years good girls join the army. They climb the corporate ladder. They go to the gym. . . . They wear painful pointy shoes. They don't eat too much. They . . . don't eat at all. They stay perfect. They stay thin. I could never be good."

The Good Body
starts with Eve's tortured relationship with her own "post-forties" stomach and her skirmishes with everything from Ab Rollers to fad diets and fascistic trainers in an attempt get the "flabby badness" out. As Eve hungrily seeks self-acceptance, she is joined by the voices of women from L.A. to Kabul, whose obsessions are also laid bare: A young Latina candidly critiques her humiliating "spread," a stubborn layer of fat that she calls "a second pair of thighs." The wife of a plastic surgeon recounts being systematically reconstructed-inch by inch-by her "perfectionist" husband. An aging magazine executive, still haunted by her mother's long-ago criticism, describes her desperate pursuit of youth as she relentlessly does sit-ups.

Along the way, Eve also introduces us to women who have found a hard-won peace with their bodies: an African mother who celebrates each individual body as signs of nature's diversity; an Indian woman who transcends "treadmill mania" and delights in her plump cheeks and curves; and a veiled Afghani woman who is willing to risk imprisonment for a taste of ice cream. These are just a few of the inspiring stories woven through Eve's global journey from obsession to enlightenment. Ultimately, these monologues become a personal wake-up call from Eve to love the "good bodies" we inhabit.


From the Hardcover edition.

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