Uppity Women of Ancient Times

Rating:
Summary: !!!!!amazed...
Review: ...at how bad this book is and at how so many reviewers gave it 5 stars (not humanly possible, they must be friends).. I spent this last New Years reading it with a couple of friends.. and laughed and laughed on how stupid it all is... for a laugh its great... a waste of money though.

Rating:
Summary: Wonderfully Witty
Review: Even though I adore ancient history, the format of most history books is, well, boring. Uppity Women of Ancient Times defies all sterotypes, though. With over two hundred women in this book, she dosn't get much room to talk about the individuals, but her wording is brief, modern, and perfectly hilarious. With this book not only can you relate to the charactors, but you can actually understand why the did the things they did (in most cases, at least). Full of clever, powerful, and just plain funny women, this book gives meaning to the saying "you go girl."

Rating:
Summary: History Made Interesting
Review: I enjoy the Uppity Women series by Vicki Leon greatly. I have read most of the volumes and have been lucky enough to purchase for myself a couple for my library. I will keep adding to the collection until I have every one. Some may find her style to be flip or fluffy. But, I think her writing is passionate and shows a deep love and affinity for women in history. If anyone who wrote the other reviews actually read the writing of women in history. In particular, travel literature by Isabelle Eberhardt, Flora Tristan, Isabelle Bird, Francis Trollope etc. You and they might see that women in history wrote about themselves in an exuberant, lively, fun and impassioned manner. Ms. Leon is only following in their brilliantly and unfortunately almost forgotten footprints. If you love women, literature, and history, please by the series and buckle up! It is a wild and wonderful ride through the world of women!

Rating:
Summary: Good concept, but go elsewhere for in depth information
Review: I really appreciate the thought behind this series of books but constantly find myself frustrated at the tiny amount of space given to each subject. I always want to know more and am annoyed when that's all there is. I would instead recommend something like "The Mammoth Book of Outrageous and Heroic Women", which gives you a one paragraph summary of each woman, but then goes on to give you another six or eight pages of detail.

Rating:
Summary: Art house history at its finest!!!
Review: In her entertaining and excellent work Vicki Leon, has written biographies of some of the most famous, not so famous, and infamous women of the ancient world. Leon spins her tales of these women, who are indeed uppity, with humor, wit, and a knack for presenting them as real people not just historical figures. Many professional historians, and other fans of history would scoff at a book like this as not being serious history. However, history also need not be heavy, and dry. Why not make it an exercise in both learning and fun? This book is simply for the fan of history, who wants to enjoy it with a good laugh. And in this Leon has done a superb job, and I recommend her book highly.

Rating:
Summary: History Made Interesting
Review: Ms. Leon is clearly a well-researched historian, and has endeavoured to provide useful information in easily digestible sound-bites for those who could otherwise be bored by history. Brava! I really enjoyed this book, and plan on getting the others in the series. People who never read history will be entertained by the short, informative, juicy little 1-page tidbits on each compelling woman. Ms. Leon presents a view of some of these women that is different for what I have seen elsewhere, and I would be interested in seeing how she arrived at some of her conclusions. Probably another story.

Rating:
Summary: please by-pass if you're looking for "scholarly"
Review: This book (and the rest of the series) is written for people who are NOT fascinated by dry, scholarly textbooks. Plenty of people are subjected to the usual bland recounting of historical events and have surmised that history is not only boring, it's sexist. This series turns both notions on their heads. If you are looking for a "serious" tome on feminist history, don't bother reading this. The author wrote in conversational, slang-ridden style in order to appeal to people who AREN'T history buffs. Why so many people wrote reviews trashing this book because it isn't boring just shows the elitist snobbery that academica carries within. If you are mildly interested in learning a bit about women who never got their fair shake in male-centric world of historical writing, this book is for you. THe research is solid, the stories are true and nothing in this book is "bad" other than her glib style. If writing in an appealing way is somehow tantamount to heresy in historical writing then so be it. I personally cannot understand why a book with so much to say (in a short amount of time) is so maligned just because it isn't written to put you to sleep.

Rating:
Summary: HORRIBLE!!!
Review: This is probably the worst book I have ever started reading. Never ever in my life had I left the book unfinished. But with this one, I simply couldn't afford to waste my time. I hoped to find a decent scholarly work on some of the most important women of old. But the criterion for the author seemed to be ANY mentioning of ANY woman in ancient documents. And needless to say, most of them are just a little bit more (or not even that) than your regular "street girl". I kept asking myself who did she write this book for? Who was her target audience? Her language is mediocre, vulgar and tedious. Did she want to be funny?! As someone has already said, it's a shame that she conducted such a serious research only to publish something that no historian will ever consider worth studying. Simply, it was an ordeal to read. Thank God I didn't waste my money on it. It was given to me as a present.

Rating:
Summary: Great Series
Review: This whole series is a wonderful resource, and this volume is the most intriguing reading of them all. Short, lively, accurate vignettes showing that women have always been active in a wide variety of fields.