Men Explain Things to Me

Read on lunch breaks and on the bus. Laughed out loud and also felt my blood boil.

Solnit describes experiences most women have had, of being talked down to, talked over, ignored, not taken seriously, and connects them to the statistics for sexual assault in the US. The title essay starts with the famous story of Solnit having her own book explained to her at a party by a man who wouldn't hear that she had written it and ends contemplating another man who dismissed the idea that a woman he'd seen run out of her house naked in the middle of the night screaming, “My husband's trying to kill me” could possibly be telling the truth.

I've been a fan of Solnit's other writing on travel, wandering and getting lost. Her ability to put a name to experiences that are slippery and hard to name, in beautiful and precise language, is on full display in this book. I recommend it highly.