100 Books Like A Suffragette My Own Story

This was the first book I read on North Korea.

North Korea is a combination of the Soviet Gulag and Auschwitz. Under the reign of the three Kims (grandfather, father, and son), North Koreans have endured malnourishment and starvation since the 1990s. Most of this would been avoidable if the government hadn’t had ridiculous economic policies forbidding private enterprise, and also imprisoned anyone who criticized the Kims’ rule. 

Remick is a journalist who introduces North Korea to a general audience by interviewing six refugees.  I “assigned” this book to one of my ladies’ book clubs and they found it very interesting and easy to read.

We, the Karens, call our land Kawthoolei, which means "a land without evil." When I first came to the UK, Ben gave me a copy of his book, A Land Without Evil. After reading this book, I felt so much pain that I couldn't stop my tears because all of the suffering of my people that Ben wrote in his book were all true, and it brought back all the memories of our sufferings. For decades, my people have been brutally attacked by Burmese governments, but the world didn't know and pay attention in order to help us. 

When I was born, my father, Padoh Mahn Sha Lah Phan, named me after Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya. When he was a student at Rangoon University, he read about Zoya and her brother Shura resisting Nazi Germany’s invasion of Russia. Both Zoya and Shura were killed by the Nazis. My father was inspired by Zoya's story and he wanted me to help resist the Burmese government's violence against his Karen people. 

I knew Saw Ralph and Naw Sheera when we were in Manerplaw, which used to be the headquarters of the Karen resistance, in Burma. As a little girl, I often followed my mother Nant Kyin Shwe to her workplace and remembered seeing Naw Sheera in the office of the Karen Women's Organisation. When I read her book, it reminds me of all the places and the people, and my beautiful childhood in, Kawthoolei, Burma. 

This book takes you inside the tactics of the British Suffragettes in such vivid detail that I had to wonder what role I would have played on that issue, time, and place? The question is real for me as the movement began in Manchester, where I was born, and it is highly likely that some of the activists are distantly related.

The details of the risks taken by thousands of women, the suffering endured in prolonged hunger strikes, and deaths in protests are breathtaking and inspiring for any activists facing political and judicial oppression today. I certainly would have worked for this cause and taken to the streets. But I still wonder–would I have gone on a hunger strike in a prison for days or weeks or months on end? This book put me in Britain 120 years ago, fighting for the vote, but made me reflect on… show more.

This amazing account of the Edwardian struggle for women's suffrage was published in 1911, in the thick of it. While doing research for Sally Heathcote Suffragette, I discovered a review of it in Votes for Women, the official paper of the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU). It weaves the stories of three fictional women into what were then very recent events in suffrage history, bringing them to life. The Sally in the title, like my Sally, is a maid-of-all-work A coincidence? Yes, but not really surprising. Domestic service was the most likely form of employment for a woman of no means before the First World War; Sally (from Sarah) was a common name then and it alliterates well with ‘suffragette’.

I love this book and so wish it had been available to me, park planners, and the public in 1982. But it was published in 2011. I received it as a gift and did not immediately realize it was intended for young adults. But how significant is it to reach girls and boys while still young and unbiased so they could better understand their lives as they unfolded?

I loved that it was accessible in its words, and very much in its design. Lots of space, largish print, clearly written, all make it also very appropriate for women, and men, of my age, which is 82. Weakened eyesight, shorter attention spans, no base of information to build on, this book is perfect also for seniors who probably had no formal education in women’s history and women’s rights.

Purple, white, and green are the colours of the WSPU regalia. Suffragette ephemera fascinates me, especially their merchandising (soap, chocolate, board games, chinaware - all sorts of things). I first heard of it at a presentation by Diane Atkinson. This book is the catalogue of an exhibition she put together when she was a curator at the Museum of London. An excellent resource, it's full of images with pointers for where to find more. Ephemera is great for giving a sense of period, so I asked the artists on the graphic novel to cram in all they could.

The three main Pankhurst players in the Suffragette movement – Emmeline and two of her children, Christabel and Sylvia – all wrote accounts of the era. But Sylvia’s is arguably the most comprehensive and objective. The book starts out as a memoir of the Pankhurst family’s early life – their humble beginnings, their journey to political activism – and Pankhurst does not shy away from the gory details of militant suffragette activity. But she is also not afraid to chronicle divisions in the movement, both among the different factions of the WSPU, and between the WSPU and the Labour party, who eventually chose to support working men’s rights above those of women. Sylvia Pankhurst has emerged from the period as the most egalitarian of its heroines, after leaving the main WSPU branch to focus on the cause of working-class women. It’s a tome, but a worthy read.  

This is the handbook that is literally by my hand as I sit at my desk. It’s not only authoritative but every page is bursting with fascinating passages of biography and quirky histories. It’s one of those reference books to be read, that I return to again and again.