Germaine Greer (born 29 January 1939) is an Australian academic and journalist, and was a major feminist voice of the mid-20th century.
Greer's ideas have created controversy ever since her book The Female Eunuch became an international best-seller in 1970, turning her into a household name and bringing her both adulation and opposition. She is also the author of many other books including Sex and Destiny: The Politics of Human Fertility (1984); The Change: Women, Ageing and the Menopause (1991); Shakespeare's Wife (2007); and The Whole Woman (1999). She is Professor Emerita of English Literature and Comparative Studies at the University of Warwick.
Greer has defined her goal as "women's liberation" as distinct from "equality with men". She asserts that women's liberation meant embracing gender differences in a positive fashion—a struggle for the freedom of women to define their own values, order their own priorities and determine their own fates. In contrast, Greer sees equality as mere assimilation and "settling" to live the lives of "unfree men".
Following the publication of her highly controversial book 'The Beautiful Boy' in 2003, Greer has been labelled by some as promoting paedophilia with Greer herself describing the depiction of adolescent males in her own book as "full of pictures of 'ravishing' pre-adult boys with hairless chests, wide-apart legs and slim waists". She goes on to say that, "I know that the only people who are supposed to like looking at pictures of boys are a subgroup of gay men".
Read more about Germaine Greer: Early Life and Career, Middle Career, Later Career, Other Media, Aboriginal Australians
Famous quotes by germaine greer:
“We in the West do not refrain from childbirth because we are concerned about the population explosion or because we feel we cannot afford children, but because we do not like children.”
—Germaine Greer (b. 1939)
“Women have very little idea of how much men hate them.”
—Germaine Greer (b. 1939)
“The surest guide to the correctness of the path that women take is joy in the struggle. Revolution is the festival of the oppressed.”
—Germaine Greer (b. 1939)
“Perhaps ... women have always been in closer contact with reality than men: it would seem to be the just recompense for being deprived of idealism.”
—Germaine Greer (b. 1939)
“Women over fifty already form one of the largest groups in the population structure of the western world. As long as they like themselves, they will not be an oppressed minority. In order to like themselves they must reject trivialization by others of who and what they are. A grown woman should not have to masquerade as a girl in order to remain in the land of the living.”
—Germaine Greer (b. 1939)