Penguin Classics: The Problem That Has No Name

The problem lay buried, unspoken, for many years in the minds of American women´ The pioneering Betty Friedan here identifies the strange problem plaguing American housewives, and explains the malignant role advertising plays in perpetuating the myth of the ´happy housewife heroine´. About the Author Betty Friedan (1921-2006) is hailed by historians as a seminal figure in the ´Second Wave´ of the women´s feminist movement. In 1957, Friedan wrote a questionnaire for her former classmates at a reunion at the all-female, Smith College. The results revealed that many women shared the same frustrations as her in their roles as housewives and mothers. Friedan´s findings provided a clear-eyed analysis of the issues that affected women´s lives in the decades after the Second World War, and became the basis to her book, The Feminine Mystique. A sensation on publication selling over 3 million copies, it established Friedan as one of the chief architects of the women´s liberation movement.