Enter Helen: The Invention of Helen Gurley Brown and the Rise of the Modern Single Woman
Written by Brooke Hauser
Narrated by Tavia Gilbert
3/5
()
About this audiobook
“Engaging…. Nimble-footed…. Amusing….Throughout, Hauser weaves in passages connecting Brown to her contemporaries and the cultural landscape of the 1960s…[to] situate her life in the context of its times.”— New York Times Book Review
This female Mad Men-like story chronicles the legendary Cosmopolitan magazine editor’s rise to power as both a cultural icon and trailblazer who redefined what it means to be an American woman.
In the mid-Sixties, Helen Gurley Brown, author of the groundbreaking Sex and the Single Girl, took over the ailing Cosmopolitan magazine and revamped it into one of the most successful brands in the world. At a time when magazines taught housewives how to make the perfect casserole, Helen reimagined Cosmo and womanhood itself, championing the independent, ambitious, man-loving single woman. Though she was married, to Hollywood producer David Brown, no one embodied the idea of the Cosmo Girl more than the Ozarks-born Helen, who willed, worked, and—yes—occasionally slept her way to the top, eventually becoming one of the most influential media players in the world.
Drawing on new interviews with Helen’s friends and former colleagues as well as her personal letters, Enter Helen brings New York City vibrantly to life during the Sexual Revolution and the Women’s Movement and features a cast of characters including Hugh Hefner, Nora Ephron, and Gloria Steinem. It is the cinematic story of an icon who bucked convention, defined her own destiny, and became a controversial model for modern feminism, laying the groundwork for television shows like Sex and the City and Girls.
“Bad Feminist” or not, Helen Gurley Brown got people talking—about sex, work, reproductive choices, and having it all—forever changing the conversation.
Brooke Hauser
Brooke Hauser has written for the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, Allure, and Parade, among other publications. She is the author of The New Kids: Big Dreams and Brave Journeys at a High School for Immigrant Teens, a winner of the American Library Association’s Alex Award. She lives in western Massachusetts with her family and has taught nonfiction writing at Smith College.
Related to Enter Helen
Related audiobooks
Fifth Avenue, 5 A.M.: Audrey Hepburn, Breakfast at Tiffany's, and the Dawn of the Modern Woman Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Harlow in Hollywood: The Blonde Bombshell in the Glamour Capital, 1928 – 1937 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Sex and the Single Woman: 24 Writers Reimagine Helen Gurley Brown's Cult Classic Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dead Girls: Essays on Surviving an American Obsession Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Carrie Fisher: A Life on the Edge Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Fabulous Bouvier Sisters: The Tragic and Glamorous Lives of Jackie and Lee Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Marilyn Monroe: The Private Life of a Public Icon Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Widow's Guide to Sex and Dating: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5When You Lie about Your Age, the Terrorists Win: Reflections on Looking in the Mirror Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Ladies Who Lunch: A satirical novel about L.A. in the nineties Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsUnabashed Women: The Fascinating Biographies of Bad Girls, Seductresses, Rebels and One-of-a-Kind Women Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Extra Woman: How Marjorie Hillis Led a Generation of Women to Live Alone and Like It Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5It's Messy: On Boys, Boobs, and Badass Women Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dorothy Parker Drank Here Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5How to Lose Friends and Alienate People Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5As If!: The Oral History of Clueless, as Told by Amy Heckerling, the Cast, and the Crew Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hollywood's Eve: Eve Babitz and the Secret History of L.A. Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Sex and the City and Us: How Four Single Women Changed the Way We Think, Live, and Love Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5You Play the Girl: On Playboy Bunnies, Stepford Wives, Train Wrecks, & Other Mixed Messages Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bolshoi Confidential: Secrets of the Russian Ballet--From the Rule of the Tsars to Today Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Sensational: The Hidden History of America’s “Girl Stunt Reporters” Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Astor Orphan: A Memoir Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Forgotten Flapper: A Novel of Olive Thomas Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Feuding Fan Dancers: Faith Bacon, Sally Rand, and the Golden Age of the Showgirl Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Bling Ring: How a Gang of Fame-Obsessed Teens Ripped Off Hollywood and Shocked the World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Seduction: Sex, Lies, and Stardom in Howard Hughes's Hollywood Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Primates of Park Avenue: Adventures Inside the Secret Sisterhood of Manhattan Moms Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Neon Girls: A Stripper's Education in Protest and Power Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Normal Gets You Nowhere Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Matrimony, Inc.: From Personal Ads to Swiping Right, a Story of America Looking for Love Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Women's Biographies For You
The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Down the Drain Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Uncultured: A Memoir Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Everything I Know About Love: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Worthy Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Babysitter: My Summers with a Serial Killer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Sound of Gravel: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Diana: Her True Story in Her Own Words Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Wake Up With Purpose!: What I’ve Learned in my First Hundred Years Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Sex Cult Nun: Breaking Away from the Children of God, a Wild, Radical Religious Cult Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Finding Me: A Memoir Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Tell Me Everything: A Memoir Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Own It All: How to Stop Waiting for Change and Start Creating It. Because Your Life Belongs to You. Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5In the Dream House: A Memoir Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5You Got Anything Stronger?: Stories Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Love, Pamela: A Memoir of Prose, Poetry, and Truth Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Life of One's Own: Nine Women Writers Begin Again Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Glass Castle: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Year of Magical Thinking Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Class: A Memoir Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5What My Mother and I Don't Talk About: Fifteen Writers Break the Silence Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Letter to My Rage: An Evolution Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Butts: A Backstory Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Written in Bone: Hidden Stories in What We Leave Behind Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Rabbit: The Autobiography of Ms. Pat Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Bad Vibes Only: (and Other Things I Bring to the Table) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Enter Helen
9 ratings2 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Enter Helen by Brooke Hauser is a biography of Helen Gurley Brown, best known as the author of Sex and the Single Girl and as the editor who created a new identity for Cosmopolitan magazine in 1964 and made it the “must-read” magazine for young women for decades. I grew up during the 1960’s and 70’s and remember faithfully buying my copy of Cosmo. Helen Gurley Brown appeared to have her finger on the pulse of young North American women as she wrote about the changing times for women. From sex tips to career options, Cosmopolitan Magazine told us what to wear, how to look, where to travel and what to read and see. This was the first magazine to cater to young, single women and acknowledge the fun things we were able to do in comparison to magazines like Ladies Home Journal and Good Housekeeping which was aimed at stay-at-home wives and mothers. “Good girls go to heaven. Bad girls go everywhere, “ she declared.Helen comes across very much as a woman who learned how to make the very best of herself. Ambitious and strong willed, she took control of her editorship and rose to become a cultural icon. She was strongly supported by her film producer husband, David Brown. They worked together as a team. Enter Helen is both a great look back at this time and a well researched portrait of an influential woman who encouraged single women to strike out and pursue their own interests. A highly entertaining read for anyone who remembers or wants to learn about this era.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5As a biography of Helen Gurley Brown, I preferred Jennifer Scanlon's Bad Girls Go Everywhere. Enter Helen skips around chronologically, beginning with her meeting and marrying David Brown in 1958-1959, then in chapter 22, suddenly going back to Helen's childhood and teenage years in the 1920s and 1930s. Some of the chapters about the women's liberation movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s are interesting reading, but don't even have anything about Helen in them. I was interested in a new biography of Helen, but didn't enjoy Enter Helen as much as I thought I might.