Visionary Women
Podcast: Dropping in with Diane Dewey, December 2020. Listen on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.
”Visionary Women: Andrea Barnet on How Four Women Change the World”
Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation, November 8, 2018
Video of Andrea giving a talk on the lives and work of Jane Jacobs and Rachel Carson, with a specific focus on their relationship to the city and Greenwich Village.
The Marc Bernier Show, November 17, 2018
Interview with Andrea about Visionary Women at the Miami Book Fair.
Post and Courier, September 23, 2018
”Review: Four Women and Their Radically Influential Lives”
Design Observer, June 8, 2017
"The Age of Wreckers and Exterminators," excerpt from Visionary Women.
WAMC Radio, interview with Ralph Gardner Jr., May 12, 2018
"I suppose all of this is a long-winded way of saying this work is laced with an easy-going reverence and even spirituality that manifests itself through inspired discovery and creative action – discovery and action that came about because, Barnet argues, each of these women was an outsider unencumbered by conventional wisdom."
WGXC Afternoon Show, May 10, 2018
Listen to Andrea discuss her book with Ellen Thurston and Tom DePietro on WGXC radio.
The Nation, review by Bill McKibben, May 9, 2018
"...Barnet’s thesis seems correct. These four gave their moment—and ours—a unique and compelling way to perceive the interconnections within a society, as well as its relationship to its surroundings. We will always need the perspective of outsiders, of unsocialized, uncredentialed nonexperts, in order to see what plainly needs to be seen. Carson, Jacobs, Goodall, and Waters were and are geniuses, extraordinary spirits, remarkable souls—just the kind of people rarely produced by the normal order of things."
Dallas News, April 2018
"[Barnet] offers a fresh analysis of why they came to prominence at the time they did, and how their habits of mind matched up in startling ways despite their having never met."
The Lakeville Journal, April 12, 2018, by Emily Gates
"Barnet is smart, engaging and highly readable...With enthusiasm and eloquence--and a good dose of optimism--she tells the women's stories, while making her larger point that each was responsible for helping to change the world."
LA Times Festival of Books, April 21, 2018
Video of panel discussion on biography, including Andrea, Jonathan Eig, John Farrell, and Adam Federman.
WAMC interview, April 20, 2018
Radio interview with Andrea about Visionary Women.
The Paris Review, April 17, 2018
"The Age of Wreckers and Exterminators," excerpt from Visionary Women.
The New Yorker, April 2018
“'Revolutions are sometimes sparked by unexpected characters,” according to this collection of biographical sketches, which demonstrates a surprising convergence in the ideas of Rachel Carson, Jane Jacobs, Jane Goodall, and Alice Waters. As a postwar generation of women found themselves stranded in the suburbs, Barnet’s subjects all rejected the time’s hypermasculine, technology-obsessed ethos, in which “nature existed to serve humankind’s needs”; instead, they saw people as an integral part of nature. Barnet’s vivid portraits demonstrate that the struggles were not without cost. Carson was dismissed as a “spinster” and a “bird and bunny lover.” During the McCarthy era, Jacobs was investigated by the Loyalty Security Board."
Largehearted Boy Book Notes podcast, March 28, 2018
"In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book." Here, Andrea discusses Visionary Women and creates a playlist by the women of the book.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch, March 2018
"In “Visionary Women,” while bringing forth the biographies of four remarkable women, Barnet has added greatly to our understanding of the way human beings with a vision can change society for the better by pursuing their dreams."
"Bill's Books" segment on NBC New York, March 25, 2017
Visionary Women mentioned at 1:23.
LitHub, March 2018
Excerpt from Visionary Women.
Washington Post, March 2018, Joanna Scutts
"...Barnet makes a powerful case for a shared perspective among her subjects...All four women learned by immersing themselves in their environment and letting their eyes lead the way. Of the many lessons they have to teach us, this may be the most potent of all: Pay attention.
PopMatters, March 2018, Elisabeth Woronzoff
"Visionary Women expertly makes the connections between these women's monumental cultural impact....Barnet is an engaging writer and Visionary Women is entertaining, informative and inspiring."
National Book Review, March 2018
"Barnet examines a quartet of trailblazing, progressive female outsiders, not linked by friendship, age, or issue, and artfully argues that they catalyzed shifts in consciousness that transformed the culture...and Barnet captures their vitality and passion. She also reminds us that the power of one voice can be transformative, because change begins “with the local, the particular, and the passionately observed.”
Santa Fe New Mexican, March 2018, Jennifer Levin
"The tone of Andrea Barnet’s Visionary Women: How Rachel Carson, Jane Jacobs, Jane Goodall, and Alice Waters Changed Our World (Ecco Press) is that of a seminal biography of any great leader. Such a take stands out because Barnet emphasizes these luminaries’ feminine attributes, rendering gender, class, and other formative contexts as just as integral to their stories as what they accomplished."
Newsday, March 2018, Tom Beer
Featured new book of the week.
Booklist Starred Review, March 2018
"Barnet maps the "shared ethos" that propelled four visionaries whose efforts alerted people to the dangers of unbridled technology, consumerism, and industrial assaults against nature and the "human ecosystem," and who offered "a new, more holistic way to think about the world, and a more benign way of living in it." Founding modern environmentalist Rachel Carson, city advocate and "master strategist" Jane Jacobs, "born naturalist" and primate expert turned global ambassador for the living world Jane Goodall, and Alice Walker, a "natural collaborator" and pioneering organic restaurateur and sustainability activist, were or are acutely observant and intuitive, recognizing the crucial interconnectedness of life, cherishing beauty, and understanding the deep significance of community. Raised by intellectually nurturing mothers, all four original thinkers and risk-takers can be described as impassioned and tenacious, sharply attuned to the threats of their time, and deeply concerned about the future. With both resonant detail and purposeful distillation, Barnet tells their dramatic stories within the context of the counterculture of 50 years ago, charts the ongoing vitality and influence of their compassionate visions, and asks if we will yet accomplish what these four accidental revolutionaries" call on us to do to preserve the web of life."
Entertainment Weekly, January 2018, Ernest Macias
Books to read after the Women's March anniversary.
Library Journal, October 2017, Marie M. Mullaney, Caldwell Coll., NJ
"In this highly readable collective biography of four women who transformed American life during a period of cultural, political, and social change, Barnet (All-Night Party) uses primary and secondary sources to demonstrate how these "accidental revolutionaries," despite working in different fields, influenced values and priorities during the 1950s. With Silent Spring, Rachel Carson effectively began the modern environmental movement. Citizen activist Jane Jacobs condemned the overdevelopment of American cities, and through her work in historic preservation, extolled the virtues of human-scale neighborhoods. Jane Goodall introduced the scientific community to little-known aspects of primate behavior, challenging the notion that animals existed only to be harnessed to serve human needs. When Alice Waters opened Chez Panisse in Berkeley, CA, she altered American eating and created the farm-to-table movement with her celebration of local cuisine. Although none of these women knew one another, Barnet skillfully analyzes the overlapping patterns in their ideas. She uniquely separates their voices from the feminist movement of the period, arguing that, instead, they were trying to save endangered aspects of our culture. VERDICT For informed readers interested in the lives of women and cultural changes of the mid-20th century."
All-Night Party
"Risk-taking and the writing life: Long-time downtown resident with a new book on Bohemian women," DowntownExpress, September 2004, Aileen Torres
Profile and interview of Andrea Barnet. "Barnet’s book reveals the character of these historic figures by exploring their internal and external struggles, sketching these bold personalities as the storyteller she chose to become.
Foreword Magazine, September 2004, Emily Mead
"...Barnet does fully capture the gleefully subversive ethos of life as performance art, and the air of lawless idealism that briefly raised dissent and transgression to an art form."
The Country and Abroad, August 2004, Sunny MacMillan
"It's summer, tantalizing us with dreams of fresh lemonade and "a good read." This is the perfect book. You can't help wondering what drove these women, what energized them, what kept them going until they almost literally collapsed...The narrative of this engaging book rarely fails to deliver. Anarchists "of spirit" and sexuality as well as politics, these women had tremendous self-confidence....Barnet's liberal use of photographs and references enhances her fascinating portraits in text. It's a gem."
Bust Magazine, Spring 2004, Emily Rems
"Barnet's style will remind you of lectures by the best history teacher you ever had. Her work is meticulously researched and of a high academic caliber, but her flair for storytelling and enthusiasm for this endlessly fascinating subject makes each juicy chapter go down as deliciously as an E! True Hollywood Story."
The New Yorker, April 2004
"This eclectic assortment of the daring, the devastating, and the derelict includes hostesses like Mabel Dodge and A’Lelia Walker, singers like Ethel Waters, and the editors of the Little Review. Barnet paints her subjects as pioneering feminists in revolt against established mores."
Elle, April 2004
"Regardless of your degree of knowledge about this remarkable era, you'll find something--and someone--to celebrate in this comprehensive, consistently entertaining volume."
Library Journal, March 2004
"Barnet displays a gift for re-creating these flawed but fascinating individuals. An epilog makes a good case for the continuing relevance of these women and their stories; Barnet is to be especially commended for giving equal voice to the women of Harlem who, as a group, have been too long neglected. The informal style, supported by obviously serious scholarship, makes this work suitable for both public and academic libraries."
Publishers Weekly, March 2004
"Barnet engagingly illustrations this extraordinary period of cultural freedom for American women...[Her] treatment of his scintillating era is as lively and appealing as the women she's writing about."
Booklist, March 2004, Whitney Scott
"The span between 1913 and 1930 was a time of scandal-laced creativity for New York City's fierce Bohemian spirits, who tended to congregate in two centers: Greenwich Village and Harlem. Barnet focuses on that era's bold feminists, including Mina Loy, a beautiful modernist poet, and Margaret Anderson and her lover, Jane Heap, founders of the famed Little Review. These blazing talents crossed paths with other creative women, such as the sexually daring poet Edna St. Vincent Millay; social activists Emma Goldman and Margaret Sanger; the revolutionary dancer Isadora Duncan; and blues divas Ethel Waters and Bessie Smith. They met at (in)famous salons like Mabel Dodge's, and their creative cross-pollinations were to shape an age, attitude, and a feminist movement for decades to come. Barnet's beautifully detailed portraits of these pioneering women are delicately shaded, filled with resonating emotional nuance, and surrounded by such stellar supporting characters as Carl Van Vechten, Edmund Wilson, and Djuna Barnes. Boasting Man Ray photos and Beatrice Wood drawings, copious end notes and bibliography, All Night Party is sure to arouse great interest."
The Boston Globe, March 2004, "Short Takes" by Barbara Fisher
"Andrea Barnet persuasively and delightfully presents these women as the first generation of feminists, the women who 'blasted the door open to the rest of the century, leaving it to us to imagine future lives as stunningly original as theirs.'"