Thirty years ago, in a lecture at the Radcliffe Institute, Tillie Olsen first addressed the problem of silences in literature--paving the way for future explorations of the subject, including her landmark work, Silences. The subject of silences and silencing--as fact, as trope, as lens through which to understand literary history--has been central to feminist criticism ever since.
In Listening to Silences, a group of distinguished feminist literary critics reevaluates Olsen's heritage to reassert, extend, redefine, and question her insights, and to probe the dynamics of...