The weekend after the election, the kids and I stopped by our local bookstore to browse. They went straight to the kids’ section while I looked at new releases. Moments later, Maggie comes running up to me with this book in her hands:
I didn’t manage to capture the look of wonder that she had on her face moments earlier, but she could not have been more excited that such a book existed. I was still pretty raw from the election, and my emotions ricocheted between hope and despair. Hopeful that as Maggie gets older, she will discover and nurture her own super powers. That her generation will join her. That she will appreciate the powers of the superheroes who preceded her (mothers, grandmothers, celebrated warriors, silent survivors). Despair that I’ll need to explain the phrase, “Grab them by the pussy;” that our culture still reveres hypermasculine cavemen; that two of the three superheroes on the cover are wearing swim suits.
The book, by the way, is only meh. Too moralistic for my taste: “Wonder Woman knows the importance of telling the truth.” Not to mention the absurd implication that DC Comics is at the vanguard of any sort of women’s empowerment. According a reputable recent study, women make up about a quarter of comic book characters, and among comic book creators, men outnumber women by a staggering nine-to-one ratio. But, I’m good with Maggie, at 4 ½, grabbing a book called Girl Power and thinking it’s the coolest thing ever. Someday, we’ll graduate to more sophisticated fare. (High on my reading list is Jill Lepore’s The Secret History of Wonder Woman. I think I’ll bump that into my next spot!)
On a barely related note (we’re talking about books, right?), one of Maggie’s favorite things to do is pull out my D&D books. She looks at the pictures, no matter how gruesome, making up stories as she goes. She is also very proud of the D&D character that she plays at our rare family games, proclaiming, “I’m a fighter with a really big sword!”
