I was recently contacted by Jenny Holland, daughter of Irish author, journalist, poet and teacher, Jack Holland 1947-2004, with information on Mr. Holland's posthumously published final work, Misogyny: The World's Oldest Prejudice. Published first in the UK, in August 2006, it saw its American publication a month later. After reading excerpts from the book, and considering my life-long interest in its subject matter, I agreed to read Mr. Holland's attempt to examine the mystery behind the female experience, throughout history.

I am now reading Misogyny: The World's Oldest Prejudice, and am impressed by the author's honest and intelligent presentation. Often, writers' treatments of unpopular truths, are veiled in apologies. Attempts to explain the why and how of deeply rooted, ancient prejudices and attitudes, concerning the female face of our human past, are not uncommon. Yet too often these attempts are subject to a writer's personal prejudices, and agendas. Rarely, are these attempts wholly objective.

Mr. Holland makes no apologies, nor does he attempt to justify what has been the female experience, through the ages. He merely sets before us, Truth, with an eye toward objectivity, and a voice touched with humanity. I am convinced his book may stand as one of the most important, enlightening works, of our time.

Excerpt from the book's forward, written by Jenny Holland:

'The (book's)topic was quite a conversation starter. A common response from other men, when my father told them what he was working on, was an assumption that he was writing some sort of defense of misogyny, a reaction he found startling. Another common response was surprise that such a book should be written by a man. To this, his answer was simple. 'Why not?' he would say, 'It was invented by a man.'--Jenny Holland

Further words from Mr. Holland's daughter:

'He (Jack Holland) was not an academic historian. But the techniques he used in tackling this topic were ones he used to make other conflicts tangible to many readers — his ability to condense difficult, inaccessible material, his deep knowledge of western culture and history, his sympathy for the oppressed, and his lyrical prose style.'
--Jenny Holland

Excerpt from Misogyny: The World's Oldest Prejudice-Chapter Two: Women at the Gates: Misogyny in Ancient Rome

'A difference quickly emerges between the misogyny of the Greeks and that found in Rome. Greek misogyny is based on fears of what women might do if they were free to do it. However, as far as is known, if women challenged men, these actions were confined to their private world and only made public through the realm of the Greek imagination. But from the start, Roman women openly challenged the prevailing misogyny and made public their feelings and demands. Roman women protested their fate and took to the streets. In Rome, the veil of their anonymity was lifted. Women enter the public sphere, and make history. They intervened in wars and stopped them; they took to the streets in protest at government policy and changed it; they murdered their husbands; a few trained and fought as gladiators in the arena (evoking worrying images of Amazons); they subverted the authority of their fathers; they even sought personal satisfaction in their relationships, and rejected their role as breeders of rulers; and, perhaps most disturbingly of all, they came tantalizingly close to political power. They provoked a backlash which mustered some of the biggest guns that literature and history have ever aimed at them.'

Misogyny: The World's Oldest Prejudice