The Equivalents: A Story of Art, Female Friendship, and Liberation in the 1960s

FINALIST FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD

In 1960, Harvard’s sister college, Radcliffe, announced the founding of an Institute for Independent Study, a “messy experiment” in women’s education that offered paid fellowships to those with a PhD or “the equivalent” in artistic achievement. Five of the women who received fellowships—poets Anne Sexton and Maxine Kumin, painter Barbara Swan, sculptor Marianna Pineda, and writer Tillie Olsen—quickly formed deep bonds with one another that would inspire and sustain their most ambitious work. They called themselves “the Equivalents.” Drawing from notebooks, letters, recordings, journals, poetry, and prose, Maggie Doherty weaves a moving narrative of friendship and ambition, art and activism, love and heartbreak, and shows how the institute spoke to the condition of women on the cusp of liberation.

“Rich and powerful. . . . A love story about art and female friendship.”
—Harper’s Magazine

“Reads like a novel, and an intense one at that. . . . The Equivalents is an observant, thoughtful and energetic account.”
—Margaret Atwood, The Globe and Mail (Toronto)

The book, The Equivalents: A Story of Art, Female Friendship, and Liberation in the 1960s [Bulk, Wholesale, Quantity] ISBN#9780525434603 in Paperback by Maggie Doherty may be ordered in bulk quantities. Minimum starts at 25 copies. Availability based on publisher status and quantity being ordered.