In this daring, provocative, and insightful book,
bestselling author and internationally acclaimed playwright
Eve Ensler writes fictional monologues and stories inspired
by girls around the globe. Moving through a world of topics
and emotions, these voices are fierce, alive, tender,
complicated, imaginative, and smart. Girls today often find
themselves in a struggle between remaining strong and true
to themselves and conforming to society’s expectations in an
attempt to please. They are taught not to be too intense,
too passionate, too smart, too caring, too open. They are
encouraged to shut down their instincts, their outrage,
their desires and their dreams, to be polite, to obey the
rules. I Am an Emotional Creature is a celebration of
the authentic voice inside every girl and an inspiring call
to action for girls everywhere to speak up, follow their
dreams, and become the women they were always meant to
be.
Among the girls Ensler creates are an American
who struggles with peer pressure in a suburban high school;
an anorexic blogging as she eats less and less; a Masai girl
from Kenya unwilling to endure female genital mutilation; a
Bulgarian sex slave, no more than fifteen, a Chinese factory
worker making Barbies; an Iranian student who is tricked
into a nose job; a pregnant girl trying to decide if she
should keep her baby.
Through rants, poetry,
questions, and facts, we come to understand the universality
of girls everywhere: their resiliency, their wildness, their
pain, their fears, their secrets, and their triumphs. I
Am an Emotional Creature is a call, a reckoning, an
education, an act of empowerment for girls, and an
illumination for parents and for us all.