The Curious History of the World's Most Famous Heroine [EPUB]
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Paperback: 320 pages Publisher: Chicago Review Press (1 April 2014) Language: English ISBN-10: 1613749090 ISBN-13: 978-1613749098 With her golden lasso and her bullet-deflecting bracelets, Wonder Woman is a beloved icon of female strength in a world of male superheroes. But this close look at her history portrays a complicated heroine who is more than just a female Superman. The original Wonder Woman was ahead of her time, advocating female superiority and the benefits of matriarchy in the 1940s. At the same time, her creator filled the comics with titillating bondage imagery, and Wonder Woman was tied up as often as she saved the world. In the 1950s, Wonder Woman begrudgingly continued her superheroic mission, wishing she could settle down with her boyfriend instead, all while continually hinting at hidden lesbian leanings. While other female characters stepped forward as women's lib took off in the late 1960s, Wonder Woman fell backwards, losing her superpowers and flitting from man to man. Ms. magazine and Lynda Carter restored Wonder Woman's feminist strength in the 1970s, turning her into a powerful symbol as her checkered past was quickly forgotten. Exploring this lost history as well as her modern incarnations adds new dimensions to the world's most beloved female character, and Wonder Woman Unbound delves into her comic book and its spin-offs as well as the myriad motivations of her creators to showcase the peculiar journey that led to Wonder Woman's iconic status.
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joshua13 at 2014-04-09 20:11 CET:
I've read the original 1940s Wonder Woman comics. It's astonishing to me that there wasn't a big uproar immediately about the radical (for the time) feminist politics in them. Regarding the recurring theme of bondage in the comics, this was billed in as Amazonian training in obedience to civil authority and the peace, morality and justice it represented. The creator and his wife were reportedly found of sexual bondage play, the presentation of this in the comics would not have seemed overtly sexual at the time without that background info. There was no hint of S&M for example. Wonder Woman's one weakness was that if she ever allowed a man to bind or shackle her, she was helpless, her powers gone until she got free. Some see this as anti-feminist, but it was the opposite in intent. She had this weakness because millennia ago her Amazon people had foolishly trusted men and been betrayed and enslaved by them. Once they got free, the Goddess Hera decreed they should forever after wear their slave bracelets as a reminder to ensure that they never again allow men to get the upper hand. Hera also decreed the specific curse of temporary powerlessness on any who let a man capture and bind or chain them. The lesson was clear - men must never be allowed to rule over society or an individual or women will be rendered helpless servants, powerless. The Amazons believed that male rule would never create a free and just society of men and women alike.
I remember reading the oldies in the early 1970's in Arabic (in Lebanon). My uncle worked as a translator of comics and pulp fiction books (lots of Arsene Lupin) from English and French into Arabic. He Translated all those early Wonder Woman but they were never published (for obvious reasons). He gave them to me and to some other Baccalaureate students of my father's. They were a joy to read. I always enjoyed the feminist point of view in them - though I never was really conscious of it as such; I just thought it was natural. Looking back, I think this was my uncle's way of being subversive. Of course, the civil war started soon after and all that was wiped out. History keeps repeating...
Thanks for the upload.
Thanks for the upload.
There was a lot of pretty wild stuff in the old pulps and comics that create some serious WTF reaction today. For instance, Doc Savage had a medical facility where he performed brain surgery on convicted criminals to 'cure' them of their undesirable behavior. This was the era of lobotomies performed on psychiatric patients, so it didn't produce the same kind of horror from readers as it would today.
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