Bad-Ass Feminism
King Kong Theory (2006) Virginie Despentes This is a review of the English Edition, published by Serpent's Tail, rather than the French Edition. Let's get the negatives out of the way quickly because this is an important little book that might have got more praise if its faults had been more sincerely addressed by its Editors. It has three spectacularly interesting chapters on rape, prostitution and pornography that would have made excellent articles in some intelligent monthly. These sit oddly between an equally interesting introduction, in which Virginie Despentes places her book in some context, and an utterly daft rant at the end in which she lets vent to her furies. There are plenty of blank pages between chapters and the print is large so that this reads like a collection of articles or a pamphlet, scarcely a book at all. It is also so 'French' as to make it dangerously close to being dismissed in Anglo-Saxon circles. There are cultural differences ...