Gender and Culture in the 1950s In the mainstream American
imagination, the 1950s were an era of conformity when women
strove to be perfect middle-class suburban housewives a la June
Cleaver. But in reality, the 1950s were the decade of The Kinsey
Report and The Bell Jar, of Cold War Communists and Civil Rights
activism, and change for women. In this engaging collection,
cultural commentators explore the 1950s from the center to the
margins—from Norman Mailer to Peyton Place, from suburban porn
to Patricia Highsmith, and from Soviet women to lesbians in
post-Nazi Berlin. Fascinating reviews and interviews include
Alicia Ostriker on Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes, Diane Wood
Middlebrook on Willem De Kooning, and Ivy Meeropol on her
documentary about her grandparents Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.