First published 2025
Karen Weingarten assembles writings from before 1973, when Roe v. Wade changed American law. The collection draws from stories, poems, essays, and memoirs published during decades when abortion remained illegal across most states. Contributors include Langston Hughes, Gwendolyn Brooks, Edgar Allan Poe, Lucile Clifton, Eugene O'Neill, and Shirley Chisholm. The anthology also presents rare firsthand accounts from both abortion providers and women who sought the procedure. Weingarten argues that these diverse voices reveal how illegal abortion created more precarious and constrained lives for women. The selections show abortion woven into broader human experiences of love, death, medicine, motherhood, enslavement, and freedom. The editor demonstrates how access to abortion depended heavily on race and class, with consequences varying according to these same factors. This reproductive justice focused collection spans centuries of literary treatment, making the case that the need for abortion has persisted across time and that legal, accessible abortion remains necessary.
Genres: american-fiction, historical-fiction, 20th-century, gender-studies, feminism, african-american, biography-memoir, activism
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: diverse-voices, historical-perspective, personal-narratives
Setting: United States
Period: Before 1973, Decades when abortion was illegal
240 pages · Paperback · Penguin Classics
Content warnings: medical-trauma, racism, sexism