FOR A WOMAN THE MOTHER OF ALL QUESTIONS IS: WHY DON'T YOU HAVE CHILDREN?

There are those who are told “their suffering and rights are of no consequence” at the hands of domestic violence, but then there are “the people who speak and are believed, and the consequence is that they disappear.”

This is a culture, Solnit explains, that insidiously and silently makes it clear that men’s voices count for more than women’s, that places a priority and a price tag on whose voice carries more weight, and where. We see the stark difference in movies and on television, and we see it in governing bodies.

Solnit reminisces on a new era of the women’s movement, praising it as a rejuvenated feminism. It may seem like futile idealization in a time when women are marching around the world for things our mothers and grandmothers marched for decades before. However, Solnit reassures us that we have the power to make a change and force the world to listen.

As much as social media has served as a way to silence and punish the marginalized, it has also offered a platform for many, as seen in discourse born online and via hashtags: including this year’s #yesallwomen about domestic violence, #ibelieveher in support of Jian Ghomeshi’s abuse victims, and #notokay, through which millions of women around the world revealed how they had been sexually assaulted in response to the leaked video of Trump talking about grabbing women “by the pussy.”

In the way we have reinvented conversation, we can break gender roles, Solnit writes, and we can begin by “calling things their true name, listening particularly to those who have been silenced,” and by using our privilege to lend a voice to others. When Solnit writes, “There is always someone struggling to find the words,” I wonder if she is referring to women of colour, to LGBT women, to women who have an invisible voice and don’t get much more than footnotes in The Mother of All Questions. Although she frequently references American social activist bell hooks, Solnit’s specific allusions to minority women lack substance and the direct citation they so sorely need. If “the history of silence is central to women’s history,” it is far more intersectional than Solnit demonstrates. And yet, her words still ring true with a uniquely fierce indignation that feels necessary.

This “new” feminist era has clearly inspired Solnit. With her latest two books she has proved a knack for capturing whichever consequence of sexism is most on trend and presenting an antidote – in 200 pages or less. There was 2014’s pivotal Men Explain Things to Me, a cure for that most insufferable of male tendencies, mansplaining, a term she may not have coined but certainly introduced in concept.

Now, Solnit speaks for the Madonnas, the whores, and all the real women between when she dares to ask The Mother of All Questions: who are we, as women, if not just maternal figures? And how do we break through the silence to redefine what it means to be female? Resist, Solnit suggests, and while she doesn’t provide much more than encouragement, there is reassurance in her rage for those who need a reminder that they are not alone in their hunger for more.