women and life on earth bookshelf

Ecological feminism

Anything We Love Can Be Saved Alice Walker Ballantine Books, New York 1997 225p. $12.95 ISBN 0-345-40796-2 Pb

"A healthy body, a well-trained mind, a sense of solidarity with one's people, these are harder to lose than a million dollars, and offer more security. This empowerment of the poor - literacy, good health, adequate housing, freedom from ignorance - is the work of everyone of conscience in the coming century... For, if the poor are not empowered - by any means at their disposal - they will continue to be devoured by the rich. Just as women, if not empowered, will continue to be the slaves of men."

In this collection of essays Alice Walker shares lessons from a life of activism and caring. She writes of peace and struggle for freedom, lessons learned from elders and from nature, with a special focus on women.

From the poem "A Woman is not a Potted Plant" (p. 105)

"... a woman
is wilderness
unbounded
holding the future
between each breath
walking the earth
only because
she is free
and not creepervine
or tree."

back to top
back to books on ecological feminism