dlberglund's review against another edition
3.0
While Wangari Maathai’s life has been rich with struggle, strife, and success, those things did not always translate into compelling storytelling in this autobiography. She begins with her birth (literally, explaining the traditions around birth and celebration, with several pages about the landscape and how it was changing in the decades before she was born), and brings us up through her political career and the Nobel Peace Prize received at age 64. There's so much to take in, so much to understand about the immense changes that took place in Kenya over the decades of her life. Her environmental activism certainly had its roots in the land of her childhood, and she was an impressive woman who accomplished so much in one lifetime. For me, though, this book wasn't the most engaging autobiography I’ve read.
worldlibraries's review against another edition
5.0
What a deeply inspiring read! This month, I read Wangari Maathai's autobiography, #Unbowed. What a spiritually beautiful book! What a wonderful life well-lived!
Wangari Maathai was the first African woman to win a Nobel Peace Prize. She was a pioneer her entire life, being the first Kenyan female to be awarded a PhD (in biology), to being the first Kenyan female to head a university department (in a specialty that wasn't even hers)!
What she won her Nobel Peace Prize for was founding the Greenbelt movement. The goal of the Greenbelt movement was to employ rural women all across Kenya, many of whom were illiterate, in planting trees to combat the deforestation throughout Kenya. Between 1950 and 2000, Kenya lost 90% of its forest due to development. How inspiring that every single woman who participated, even if they couldn't read or write, could leave their own legacy to their country with a planted tree! Wangari Maathai encouraged everyone in the Greenbelt Movement to begin to solve the problem of deforestation themselves, and not to look to the government or outsiders for help.
Wangari viewed trees as a way to communicate simply to all the need to take care of the environment. While issues like erosion, or land use, could make someone’s eyes glaze over in boredom (or simply be too complicated for an illiterate person to understand), the optimistic and easy-to-understand issue of planting trees seems so noncontroversial and could attract many more followers than if she had said, ‘I’m going to challenge the corruption of my government and its use of public land.’
So much of this book is universal to all humanity. How do you stop governments from parceling off public lands to their chosen supporters? How do you keep governments from looking at urban parks as development sites? There were so many parallels in this book to other nations and their fights to save urban green spaces and national forests. In addition to planting trees all over the nation, Wangari and the Greenbelt Movement worked to save Nairobi's most beloved urban park from a massive multi-million dollar development, and to keep Kenya's most beloved forests from being decimated by government land handouts to cronies and ministers. This made her the opposite of a popular person with the authoritarian Kenyan government.
Another universal theme in this book is 'what's a smart woman to do?' Throughout her entire career, men, including her husband, resented her success. Government men frequently worked to jail her, or impede her, otherwise she might give other women ideas and cause them to be bold beyond their place. Over and over again, we see her hopes dashed, or her thrown in jail to thwart her work. She would deal with it with wisdom and integrity. She was so honest about all of her failures. We see her pick herself up again and again after her hopes are dashed.
As Wangari Maathai said in her book, the generation that degrades the environment, isn’t the generation that pays the price. When she was a child, she was able to drink directly from the streams near her homestead. She would look down at the water and see the frog eggs, attempting to pick them up so she could string them together for a necklace. Now those streams are dried up, and it is no longer safe to drink directly from the water as they are full of silt. A young child would no longer see the frog eggs and have no idea of what they lost.
This was the first time an environmentalist won the Nobel Peace Prize. She pioneered this too! The Nobel committee awarded it to her because her work linked sustainability and good governance to peace. Wangari thinks of her work as a three-legged African stool: the three legs of democratic rights, sustainability, and peace, hold up the stool seat basin that represents society. Society begins to fail when one leg goes missing, and completely crashes when two are gone. Is this not universal?
One of the things I learned from this book is there is a Congolese Forest in Africa (multiple nations asked her to be the Goodwill Ambassador to protect it) every bit as important to the planet as the Amazon Forest. How could it be that I am just learning about the Congolese Forest at this age? There are scads of wonderful children's books about the importance of the Amazon rain forest, for example, and only two about the Congolese rain forest! How will humanity help Africa protect something we don't even know of?
Unbowed by Wangari Maathai is a wonderful, wonderful read. Prepare to be fascinated by details of British colonization, Wangari's academic adventures in the United States, and her feminism. I can't recommend this book enough, especially to book clubs. I honor Wangari Maathai for leading the women of Kenya in planting 30 million trees across their country.
Wangari Maathai was the first African woman to win a Nobel Peace Prize. She was a pioneer her entire life, being the first Kenyan female to be awarded a PhD (in biology), to being the first Kenyan female to head a university department (in a specialty that wasn't even hers)!
What she won her Nobel Peace Prize for was founding the Greenbelt movement. The goal of the Greenbelt movement was to employ rural women all across Kenya, many of whom were illiterate, in planting trees to combat the deforestation throughout Kenya. Between 1950 and 2000, Kenya lost 90% of its forest due to development. How inspiring that every single woman who participated, even if they couldn't read or write, could leave their own legacy to their country with a planted tree! Wangari Maathai encouraged everyone in the Greenbelt Movement to begin to solve the problem of deforestation themselves, and not to look to the government or outsiders for help.
Wangari viewed trees as a way to communicate simply to all the need to take care of the environment. While issues like erosion, or land use, could make someone’s eyes glaze over in boredom (or simply be too complicated for an illiterate person to understand), the optimistic and easy-to-understand issue of planting trees seems so noncontroversial and could attract many more followers than if she had said, ‘I’m going to challenge the corruption of my government and its use of public land.’
So much of this book is universal to all humanity. How do you stop governments from parceling off public lands to their chosen supporters? How do you keep governments from looking at urban parks as development sites? There were so many parallels in this book to other nations and their fights to save urban green spaces and national forests. In addition to planting trees all over the nation, Wangari and the Greenbelt Movement worked to save Nairobi's most beloved urban park from a massive multi-million dollar development, and to keep Kenya's most beloved forests from being decimated by government land handouts to cronies and ministers. This made her the opposite of a popular person with the authoritarian Kenyan government.
Another universal theme in this book is 'what's a smart woman to do?' Throughout her entire career, men, including her husband, resented her success. Government men frequently worked to jail her, or impede her, otherwise she might give other women ideas and cause them to be bold beyond their place. Over and over again, we see her hopes dashed, or her thrown in jail to thwart her work. She would deal with it with wisdom and integrity. She was so honest about all of her failures. We see her pick herself up again and again after her hopes are dashed.
As Wangari Maathai said in her book, the generation that degrades the environment, isn’t the generation that pays the price. When she was a child, she was able to drink directly from the streams near her homestead. She would look down at the water and see the frog eggs, attempting to pick them up so she could string them together for a necklace. Now those streams are dried up, and it is no longer safe to drink directly from the water as they are full of silt. A young child would no longer see the frog eggs and have no idea of what they lost.
This was the first time an environmentalist won the Nobel Peace Prize. She pioneered this too! The Nobel committee awarded it to her because her work linked sustainability and good governance to peace. Wangari thinks of her work as a three-legged African stool: the three legs of democratic rights, sustainability, and peace, hold up the stool seat basin that represents society. Society begins to fail when one leg goes missing, and completely crashes when two are gone. Is this not universal?
One of the things I learned from this book is there is a Congolese Forest in Africa (multiple nations asked her to be the Goodwill Ambassador to protect it) every bit as important to the planet as the Amazon Forest. How could it be that I am just learning about the Congolese Forest at this age? There are scads of wonderful children's books about the importance of the Amazon rain forest, for example, and only two about the Congolese rain forest! How will humanity help Africa protect something we don't even know of?
Unbowed by Wangari Maathai is a wonderful, wonderful read. Prepare to be fascinated by details of British colonization, Wangari's academic adventures in the United States, and her feminism. I can't recommend this book enough, especially to book clubs. I honor Wangari Maathai for leading the women of Kenya in planting 30 million trees across their country.
dave37's review against another edition
3.0
A truly compelling story, but Ms. Maathai's prose definitely belies her scientific background. A bit too "just the facts" to make it a page-turner despite her amazing life. Still great to learn more about one of my heroes, but it definitely felt like work to get through.
59caron95's review against another edition
challenging
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
4.5
ckiley4's review against another edition
4.0
I read this for an Ecofeminism class I took, and fell in love with the author, Wangari Maathai, and her story. She started the Green Belt Movement in her home country of Kenya. The Green Belt Movement paid and taught women in Kenya to grow and plant trees, thus improving the economic status of women while fighting to reverse deforestation. Wonderful memoir and inspiring story.
foundeasily's review against another edition
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
2.5