The Stepford Wives

written by Ira Levin

Now here's a throwback for you! I had always heard of the movie, but had never seen it and never even knew it was based on this little novella. The book was originally published in 1972, during a time when feminism was kind of the up-and-coming thing. But it was a bit before my time so I didn't know too much about it, except that it had something to do with some kind of sinister plot to make all the wives in the town of Stepford think and act the same.

I'm told the book was quite groundbreaking back in the day, because of its not-s0-subtle feminist messages. And even though it's no longer what our present-day culture would consider revolutionary, it is pretty entertaining. Basic plot is, a family moves to the charming town of Stepford, which they are initially quite pleased with, but soon the wife begins to see that all the women are subservient cookie-cutter Mrs. Cleaver types. Additionally, the men essentially run the town and most evenings can be found congregating at the local men's association (which of course excludes women). Uneasy about this, she does some research and finds that a handful of the most influential men have backgrounds in either experimental science or have worked at Disneyland, the acknowledged hub of all things animatronic. Her conclusion is that the men calculatingly do away with their real wives and replace them with lifelike fembots whose functions are pretty much limited to housework and sex.

At times the book is laugh-out-loud funny. The most entertaining element to me, though, was to observe that what was edgy and borderline-conteroversial back in the early seventies actually comes off as a little chauvinist and provincial today. For example, the main character, though she considers herself a feminist, has what we would today consider a very conventional lifestyle: she doesn't work (except that she's somewhat of a hobby-photographer), her husband is the family breadwinner, and she busies herself with taking care of the house and the kids. Sure, she's a little feisty and independent, but even so, she takes part in a fair bit of daytime grocery shopping, ladies' luncheons, and mid-day tennis matches. Not that those are bad things; they just don't fit our present-day definition of feminist. Kind of interesting, I think, to note how our picture of feminism has shifted quite a bit in 30 years.

This is a quick, short book — only 123 pages, and although it doesn't quite fit the description on the back cover ("a masterpiece of psychological suspense"? That's a bit of an overstatement, I think!) it's still kind of a fun read.

Oh, and my favorite line in the book: when the main character is visiting a friend, they're sitting outside next to the friend's pool and "the maid, a slightly gray-haired woman named Nettie, brought them a pitcher of Bloody Marys and a bowl of cucumber dip and crackers." Who knew I'd make a cameo appearance!?