Thirty Ways of Looking at Hillary

By Helaine Olen, AlterNet. Posted January 31, 2008.

Hillary Clinton elicits reactions so intense, so vehement and at times so odd it's a wonder the poor woman manages to continue performing on the political stage. She's been called everything from a doormat to a drag queen, and her public image somehow manages to encompass both the story of Chaucer's Patient Griselda and the tale of Shakespeare's Lady Macbeth. She plays a large role in the internal psychodrama of many American women, who often seem convinced that Hillary Clinton finds them personally wanting.

There's something about Hillary, but what is it? Susan Morrison, a longtime editor at the New Yorker, decided to try to get to the bottom of our obsession with the former first lady and current presidential candidate by asking 30 well-known female writers and journalists to explore their thoughts about her. The result is a compulsively readable but ultimately erratic anthology devoted to all things Hillary: Thirty Ways of Looking at Hillary: Reflections by Women Writers (Harper 2008).

Morrison's goal was worthy, but one wishes she had gone about it by, well, mixing it up a bit. The vast majority of the contributors to her book are card-carrying members of the chattering classes, with more than half residing in New York City or the immediate surrounding area. Almost all identify as feminists and Democrats. As a result, there is a lot of hand-wringing over female competitiveness and the persistence of double standards for everything from grooming to likeability for men vs. women. A few more red staters, women who don't identify as feminists, or even a male viewpoint or two might have gone a long way toward shedding light on the topic of Hillary Clinton.

That's not to say the conversation isn't sometimes enlightening. Two of the best pieces in the collection are written by lawyers, who might well have a greater understanding than most of us for the environment that molded Clinton into the person she is today. Susan Lehman's piece "Firm Hillary: How the Culture of Corporate Law Shaped Hillary," ultimately attributes her controlled and controlling public persona, at least in part, to the 15 years she spent at the Rose Law Firm in Little Rock. She makes a compelling argument about what makes Clinton tick, even if you don't agree with her ultimate conclusion that after eight years of George W. Bush, a successful corporate lawyer is just what the United States needs.

In addition, Slate's Supreme Court correspondent Dahlia Lithwick writes a compelling brief about what women do and don't like to see in other members of their sex. In her view, Hillary Clinton reminds us of "someone shrill and judgmental" like a know-it-all neighbor. The genius of the piece lies in Lithwick's refusal to let either herself or us off the hook for feeling that way, arguing we are unlikely to elect any American female politician to the top job until we learn to "judge female candidates less brutally."

Nonetheless, a number of the essays in Morrison's anthology are intensely self-involved, more about the authors' reactions to Hillary Clinton than Hillary Clinton herself. There's little examination of Clinton's political skills or her record in the Senate. Despite what some of the essayists in this anthology think, the personal is not always political. Our need for action on problems ranging from healthcare reform to ending the war in Iraq go way beyond what these writers think of Hillary Clinton's -- or any other candidate's -- various haircuts or personal life. And whether one is pro-Hillary, anti-Hillary or an agnostic on Hillary, that's a sentiment all voters should share.

AlterNet sat down with Morrison in her New York office to see what insight she could offer into our fascination with Hillary Clinton, why she chose to approach her subject in the way she did and how she plans to vote in her state's primary on Feb. 5.

Helaine Olen: Why did you decide to edit an anthology on Hillary Clinton?

Susan Morrison: She clearly pushed different kinds of buttons than other politicians pushed. When people are talking about her, they were, more often than not, not talking about policy and ideas. They were talking about kind of strange, personal, emotional reactions. We have different expectations of her just because she's a woman. That's the jumping off point for the essays in this book.

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Helaine Olen is a freelance writer whose work has appeared in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Wall Street Journal, Salon.com and numerous other publications. Her book, co-written with Stephanie Losee, Office Mate: The Employee Handbook for Finding -- and Managing -- Romance on the Job, was published in 2007. Her Web site in progress is www.helaineolen.com.

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