Nancy Friday

2025-10-14T12:11:18Z

62.74.10.31:

{{Use mdy dates|date=January 2023}}
{{Short description|American author (1933–2017)}}
{{Infobox writer
| name = Nancy Friday
| birth_name = Nancy Colbert Friday
| birth_date = {{Birth date|1933|08|27}}
| birth_place = [[Pittsburgh]], Pennsylvania, U.S.
| death_date ={{Death date and age|2017|11|5|1933|08|27}}
| death_place = New York City, U.S.
| alma_mater = [[Wellesley College]]
| spouse = {{ubl|{{marriage|Bill Manville|1967|1986|end = divorced}}|{{marriage|[[Norman Pearlstine]]|1988|2005|end = divorced}}}}
| genre = 
| subjects = [[Female sexuality]] and liberation
}}

'''Nancy Colbert Friday''' (August, 1933 – November 5, 2017) was an American author who wrote on the topics of [[Human female sexuality|female sexuality]] and liberation.<ref name="NYT">{{Cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/05/obituaries/nancy-friday-84-best-selling-student-of-gender-politics-dies.html |title = Nancy Friday, 84, Author On Women's Sexuality, But Not a Feminist, Dies |last=Gates |first=Anita |date=November 5, 2017 |website=The New York Times |language=en-US |access-date=November 5, 2017|page = D7|url-access = limited}}</ref> Her writings argue that women have often been reared under an ideal of womanhood, which was outdated and restrictive, and largely unrepresentative of many women's true inner lives, and that openness about women's hidden lives could help free women to truly feel able to enjoy being themselves. She asserts that this is not due to deliberate malice, but due to [[Group dynamics|social expectation]], and that for women's and men's benefit alike it is healthier that both be able to be equally open, participatory and free to be accepted for who and what they are.

==Biography==
Nancy Friday was born in [[Pittsburgh]], Pennsylvania, the daughter of Walter F. Friday and Jane Colbert Friday (later Scott).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://fultonhistory.com/newspaper%208/Niagara%20Falls%20NY%20Gazette/Niagara%20Falls%20NY%20Gazette%201948%20may-Jun%20Grayscale/Niagara%20Falls%20NY%20Gazette%201948%20may-Jun%20Grayscale%20-%200099.pdf|title=Jane Colbert Friday to Wed Naval Officer|date=21 May 1948|website=fultonhistory.com|access-date=1 September 2023}}</ref> She grew up in [[Charleston, South Carolina]], and attended the only local girls' college-preparatory school, [[Ashley Hall (school)|Ashley Hall]], where she graduated in 1951.<ref>{{cite news | last = Thompson | first = Bill | title = Alumna Humphreys to read from work | work = [[The Post and Courier]] | location = Charleston, South Carolina | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20110807080201/http://www.ashleyhall.org/common/news_detail.asp?newsid=510499&L1=3&L2=1 | archive-date = August 7, 2011 | url = http://www.ashleyhall.org/common/news_detail.asp?newsid=510499&L1=3&L2=1 | date = February 8, 2009 }}</ref> She then attended [[Wellesley College]] in [[Massachusetts]], where she graduated in 1955.<ref>{{cite news | last = Rowes | first = Barbara | title = Author Nancy Friday explains why men's sexual fantasies are different from women's | url = http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20076858,00.html | work = [[People (magazine)|People]] | publisher = [[Time Inc.]] | date = June 30, 1980 }}</ref> She worked briefly as a reporter for the ''[[San Juan Island Times]]'' and subsequently established herself as a magazine journalist in New York City, England, and France before turning to writing full-time.

Her first book, published in 1973, was ''[[My Secret Garden]]'', a compilation of her interviews with women discussing their sexuality and fantasies, which became a bestseller. Friday regularly returned to the interview format in her subsequent books on themes ranging from mothers and daughters to [[sexual fantasies]], [[loving relationship|relationships]], [[jealousy]], [[envy]], [[feminism]], [[BDSM]], and beauty. After the publication of ''The Power of Beauty'' (released in 1996, and re-released under the tile of ''Our Looks/Our Lives'' in 1999),<ref>{{cite book | isbn=0061097942 | title=Our Looks/Our Lives: Sex, Beauty, Power, and the Need to be Seen | last1=Friday | first1=Nancy | date=May 5, 1999 | publisher=HarperCollins }}</ref> she wrote little, contributing an interview of porn star [[Nina Hartley]] to ''XXX: 30 Porn Star Portraits'', a book published in 2004 by photographer [[Timothy Greenfield-Sanders]], with her final book being ''Beyond My Control: Forbidden Fantasies in an Uncensored Age'', published in 2009.

Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s she was a frequent guest on television and radio programs such as ''[[Politically Incorrect]]'', ''[[The Oprah Winfrey Show|Oprah]]'', ''[[Larry King Live]]'', ''[[Good Morning America]]'', and [[NPR]]'s ''[[Talk of the Nation]]''. She also created a website in the mid-1990s, to complement the publication of ''The Power of Beauty.'' Initially conceived as a forum for the development of new work and interaction with her diverse audience, it was not updated in later years.

Despite the judgment of [[Ms. magazine|''Ms.'' magazine]] ("This woman is not a [[feminist]]"),<ref>{{citation | last = Friday | first = Nancy | contribution = Introduction | editor-last = Friday | editor-first = Nancy | title = My secret garden: women's sexual fantasies | page = xvi | publisher = Pocket Books | location = New York | year = 2008 | isbn = 9781416567011 | postscript = .}} [https://books.google.com/books?id=8vf0sCEdnssC&pg=PR16 Details.]
:''Quote:''
::When I sat down to write this book, I thought the feminists would embrace it. I didn't realize that it was unwelcome at Feminist Headquarters until a former friend turned editor at ''Ms.'' magazine, gave me a rap on the knuckles, proclaiming that "''Ms.'' will decide what women's fantasies are." Soon after, a review in that magazine followed with the opening line "...this woman is not a feminist."</ref> she predicated her career on the belief that [[feminism]] and the appreciation of men are not mutually exclusive concepts.{{Citation needed|date=December 2019}}

==Literary motivation==
Friday explained how "in the late 1960s I chose to write about women's sexual fantasies because the subject was unbroken ground, a missing piece of the puzzle ... at a time in history when the world was suddenly curious about sex and women's sexuality."<ref>{{citation | last = Friday | first = Nancy | contribution = Report from the erotic interior | editor-last = Friday | editor-first = Nancy | title = Women on top: how real life has changed women's sexual fantasies | pages = 6–7 | publisher = Pocket Star Books | location = New York Toronto | year = 1991 | isbn = 9780795335259 | postscript = .}}</ref> The backdrop was a widespread belief that "women do not have sexual fantasies ... are by and large destitute of sexual fantasy."<ref>[[Allan Fromme]], quoted in Friday, ''Top'' p. 7</ref>

Friday considered that "more than any other emotion, guilt determined the story lines of the fantasies in ''My Secret Garden'' . . . women inventing ploys to get past their fear that wanting to reach orgasm made them Bad Girls."<ref>Friday, ''Top'' p. 4-5</ref> Her later book, ''My Mother/My Self,'' 'grew immediately out of ''My Secret Garden''{{'}}s questioning of the source of women's terrible guilt about sex."<ref name="Friday, Top p. 8">Friday, ''Top'' p. 8</ref>

When she returned 20 years later to her original topic of women's fantasies in ''Women on Top,'' it was in the belief that "the sexual revolution" had stalled: "it was the greed of the 1980s that dealt the death blow ... the demise of healthy sexual curiosity."<ref>Friday, ''Top'' p. 11-13</ref>

Friday, like other feminists, was especially concerned with the controlling role of the images of "Nice Woman ... Nice Girl"<ref>Friday, ''Top'' p. 20-22</ref>—of being "bombarded from birth with messages about what a 'good woman' is ... focused so hard and so long on never giving in to 'selfishness.'"<ref>{{citation | last = Johnson | first = Sonia | author-link = Sonia Johnson | contribution = Introduction to Sonia Johnson | editor-last1 = Foss | editor-first1 = Karen A. | editor-last2 = Foss | editor-first2 = Sonja K. | editor-last3 = Griffin | editor-first3 = Cindy L. | title = Readings in feminist rhetorical theory | page = 297 | publisher = Waveland Press | location = Long Grove, Illinois | year = 2006 | isbn = 9781577664970 | postscript = .}}</ref> However, as feminism itself developed "a stunning array of customs, opinions, moral values, and beliefs about how the world of women ... should conduct itself,"<ref>[[Paula Gunn Allen]], Introduction to Paula Gunn Allen in ''Readings'' p. 210</ref> so too it ran into the difficulty of moralism versus human nature—the fact that "feminism—any political philosophy—does not adequately address sexual [[psychology]]" eventually sparking the '[[Feminist Sex Wars|feminist "sex wars"]] ... from the early 1980s"<ref>Bright, p. 382 and p. 379</ref> onwards. Against that backdrop, Friday's evidential and empirical concerns continue to address the "open question of how many of their sexual freedoms the young women ... will retain, how deeply they have incorporated them."<ref>Friday, ''Top'' p. 21</ref>

===Criticism===
"Critics have labeled Friday's books unscientific, because the author solicited responses",<ref name="Sova">{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8VAIbXY8rUUC&pg=PA281|title=Literature Suppressed on Sexual Grounds|first=Dawn B.|last=Sova|date=September 1, 2006|publisher=Infobase Publishing|isbn=9780816071494 |accessdate=September 1, 2023|via=Google Books}}</ref> thus potentially biasing the contributor pool.

''My Secret Garden'' was greeted by a "salvo from the media accusing me of inventing the whole book, having made up all the fantasies"; ''My Mother/My Self'' was "initially ... violently rejected by both publishers and readers";<ref name="Friday, Top p. 8"/> while ''Women on Top'' "was heavily criticized for its graphic and sensational content."<ref name="Sova" />

Friday was also criticized for her reaction to the [[Clinton–Lewinsky scandal]] affair, which critics interpreted as sexist. The journalist [[Jon Ronson]] wrote "In February 1998, the feminist writer Nancy Friday was asked by the ''[[New York Observer]]'' to speculate on Lewinsky's future. 'She can rent out her mouth,' she replied."<ref>{{cite news | last = Ronson | first = Jon | author-link = Jon Ronson | title = Monica Lewinsky: 'The shame sticks to you like tar' | url = https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/apr/16/monica-lewinsky-shame-sticks-like-tar-jon-ronson | work = [[The Guardian]] | date = April 22, 2016 }}</ref>

==Personal life==
Friday married novelist Bill Manville in 1967, separated from him in 1980, and divorced him in 1986. Her second husband was [[Norman Pearlstine]], formerly the editor in chief of [[Time Inc.]] They were married at the [[Rainbow Room]] in New York City on July 11, 1988, and divorced in 2005.

In 2011, Friday sold her home in [[Key West, Florida|Key West]]<ref>{{cite web | last = Keith | first = June | title = Nancy Friday's Saturday Sale (blog) | url = https://juneinparadise.blogspot.com/2011/06/nancy-fridays-saturday-sale.html | website = juneinparadise.blogspot.com | publisher = June Keith via [[Blogspot]] | date = June 9, 2011 }} {{Self published inline|date = February 2017|certain = yes}}</ref> and moved to New York City.<ref>{{cite web | title = About the Participants, "The Memoir", January 13-16, 2000, Nancy Friday | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070811022621/http://www.keywestliteraryseminar.org/memoir/bios/friday.htm | archive-date = August 11, 2007 | url = http://www.keywestliteraryseminar.org/memoir/bios/friday.htm | website = keywestliteraryseminar.org | publisher = Key West Literary Seminar }}</ref>

Nancy Friday died at her home in [[Manhattan]] from complications of [[Alzheimer's disease]] on November 5, 2017, at the age of 84.<ref name="NYT" />

==Bibliography==
* ''[[My Secret Garden]]'', Simon & Schuster, 1973
* ''[[Forbidden Flowers]]'', Simon & Schuster, 1975
* ''My Mother, My Self: The Daughter's Search for Identity'', Delacorte Press, 1977
* ''Men in Love, Men's Sexual Fantasies: The Triumph of Love Over Rage'', Dell Publishing, 1980
* ''Jealousy'', M. Evans & Co., 1985
* ''[[Women on Top: How Real Life Has Changed Women's Sexual Fantasies]]'', Simon & Schuster, 1991
* ''The Power of Beauty'', HarperCollins Publishers, 1996. Republished as ''Our Looks, Our Lives: Sex, Beauty, Power and the Need to be Seen'', HarperCollins Publishers, 1999
* ''Beyond My Control: Forbidden Fantasies in an Uncensored Age'', Sourcebooks, Inc., 2009

==See also==
{{Columns-list|colwidth=30em|
* [[Jenny Diski]]
* [[Betty Dodson]]
* [[Carol Gilligan]]
* [[Sex-positive feminism]]
}}

==References==
{{reflist|33em}}

==External links==
*[http://www.nancyfriday.com Official site] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/19971222045239/http://nancyfriday.com/ |date=December 22, 1997 }}
*[http://www.power-surge.com/transcripts/friday.htm A series of chats with Nancy Friday]

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Friday, Nancy}}
[[Category:1933 births]]
[[Category:2017 deaths]]
[[Category:20th-century American non-fiction writers]]
[[Category:20th-century American women writers]]
[[Category:21st-century American non-fiction writers]]
[[Category:21st-century American women writers]]
[[Category:American feminist writers]]
[[Category:American relationships and sexuality writers]]
[[Category:American sex educators]]
[[Category:American women educators]]
[[Category:American women non-fiction writers]]
[[Category:Deaths from Alzheimer's disease in New York (state)]]
[[Category:Educators from Pennsylvania]]
[[Category:Feminism and history]]
[[Category:People from Key West, Florida]]
[[Category:Sex-positive feminists]]
[[Category:Wellesley College alumni]]
[[Category:Writers from Charleston, South Carolina]]
[[Category:Writers from Manhattan]]
[[Category:Writers from Pittsburgh]]

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Nancy Friday