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Germaine Greer

Australian writer and public intellectual (born 1939) · Australia · Writers

Germaine Greer is read about 685 times a day, in 67 languages.

A typical day, 30 days to 15 October 2026

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Germaine Greer wrote The Female Eunuch in 1970 and became the face of a question that still divides rooms: what does liberation mean if it isn't about becoming equal to men? She argues it's about asserting difference, not assimilation into an unfree world.

A life in dates

2016Fellow of the Royal Society of LiteratureAward2014“Sexism is here a misleading name for misogyny, which is distrust, hatred and contempt of women. And it's not just men who feel these feelings and act on them.”In their words14 May 2014"Germaine Greer: the failures of the new feminism", New Statesman (14 May 2014, updated 2 June 2014)

2009“No one goes to the toilet in novels. You'd think none of us had bladders.”In their words24 July 2009Newsnight Review (24 July 2009)

2001Victorian Honour Roll of WomenAward1999“Even if it had been real, equality would have been a poor substitute for liberation; fake equality is leading women into double jeopardy.”In their words"Recantation"

“Men have still not realized that letting women do so much of the work for so little reward makes a man in the house an expensive luxury rather than a necessity.”In their wordsWork, p. 136

“The few men who do a hand's turn around the house expect gratitude and recognition, so sure are they that, though it is their dirt, it is not their job.”In their wordsHousework, p. 141

1991“Women over fifty already form one of the largest groups in the population structure of the western world. As long as they like themselves, they will not be an oppressed minority.”In their wordsIntroduction

1939Born29 January 1939

Also in Deutsch

Photos 10

Elwood beach. The skyline of the Melbourne city centre is visible in the distance.Elwood beach. The skyline of the Melbourne city centre is visible in the distance.The Old Arts building, University of MelbourneThe Old Arts building, University of MelbourneRoyal George Hotel, Sydney, 2010Royal George Hotel, Sydney, 2010Newnham College, CambridgeNewnham College, CambridgeGreer lived in the room next to Clive James at Friar House (white building), Bene't Street, Cambridge.Greer lived in the room next to Clive James at Friar House (white building), Bene't Street, Cambridge.Greer in June 1972Greer in June 1972Greer on the cover of Oz magazine, early 1969, with Vivian Stanshall of the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah BandGreer on the cover of Oz magazine, early 1969, with Vivian Stanshall of the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band

In their own words 10

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Germaine Greer
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10 statements, newest first

  1. How do we form ourselves into an activity - a force to improve the situation? I don't have the answers. I'm an academic - the most useless people in the world.

    Aug 31, 2014, FemiFest radical feminist conference, London (31 August 2014), Own words

  2. Sexism is here a misleading name for misogyny, which is distrust, hatred and contempt of women. And it's not just men who feel these feelings and act on them.

    May 14, 2014, "Germaine Greer: the failures of the new feminism", New Statesman (14 May 2014, updated 2 June 2014), Own words

  3. No one goes to the toilet in novels. You'd think none of us had bladders.

    Jul 24, 2009, Newsnight Review (24 July 2009), Own words

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Awards

Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature2016
Victorian Honour Roll of Women2001
Australian National Living Treasure
Honorary Doctor of the University of Sydney
Ackerley Prize

Family

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Germaine Greer

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About this person

Born in Australia in 1939, Greer moved to the UK in 1964 and built an academic career teaching English and women's literature at Warwick, Cambridge, and Tulsa. The Female Eunuch arrived in 1970 as a systematic takedown of womanhood and femininity as male constructs, forcing women into submissive roles to satisfy fantasies not their own. It became an international bestseller and a watershed. Over the next decades she produced more than 20 books - Sex and Destiny, The Change, The Whole Woman, The Boy - and columns for The Sunday Times, The Guardian, and half a dozen other papers. In 2013 she published White Beech, an account of restoring rainforest in Queensland's Numinbah Valley. She has spent her later years between Essex and Australia, still insisting that women's potential was never about matching men's actual lives.

Country
Australia
Category
Writers
Type
Writer / Author
Status
living
Dates
Born 1939 · age 87

In common with Germaine

Susan SontagAlso in Town Bloody Hall (1979)Norman MailerAlso in Town Bloody Hall (1979)Michael SheardAlso in Universal Soldier (1972)D. A. PennebakerAlso in Town Bloody Hall (1979)Lynda BaronAlso in Universal Soldier (1972)Rudolph WalkerAlso in Universal Soldier (1972)

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