We are undervalued, ridiculed or ignored by society which consciously and unconsciously assumes that the white male is the standard and the norm." LAWRENCE SPIVAK: Said, and I quote, "women are not taken seriously. She's questioned by moderator Lawrence Spivak. Magazine, the nation's first feminist mass-market monthly. JAFFE: You can hear the hostility in this 1972 episode of NBC's "Meet the Press." Steinem appeared just after launching Ms. STEINEM: The very idea that women might be equal to men was viewed as an insult to men. The decades that she spent on the road have made gender issues a regular part of the national conversation, so much so that it's hard to remember that when she began her journey, the notion of women's equality was, at best, an undecided question. There's an assumption that the road is too dangerous for women. If you think of the classic "Odyssey," of, you know, classical literature or Jack Kerouac or almost any road story, it's really about a man on the road. STEINEM: The road has been viewed as a male turf. Traveling itself, says Steinem, can be a kind of liberation for women. Later, this became her model for organizing the women's movement. The highlight was the week she found herself traveling village to village with people organizing against violence between different castes. In the 1950s, still in her 20s, she spent a couple of years in India. JAFFE: And which she has been for her entire adult life. STEINEM: I understood that he had given me a gift, too, which is the ability to live with insecurity and to be open to the next moment's adventure, which he definitely was. In childhood, she'd longed for a home, but in writing the book, she began to think differently of her father's vagabond ways. Steinem didn't live in one place, really, until she was in high school.
In reality, he sold antiques, mostly from town to town. JAFFE: Her father was a larger-than-life figure who always had his eye on the next big chance. And we were almost constantly in the car and a house trailer.
GLORIA STEINEM: It didn't occur to me that I should start with my father because I thought I had rebelled against the life he led, in which he never had a home. INA JAFFE, BYLINE: After spending most of her life writing, speaking and organizing for women's rights, it's surprising that the most vivid character in Gloria Steinem is a man, specifically her father. Gloria Steinem spoke with NPR's Ina Jaffe. Her new book, called, fittingly, "My Life On The Road," tells what she's learned from decades of traveling to promote equality for women. Travel, she says, gives her hope and keeps her relevant. We have a story about Gloria Steinem, one of the leaders of the feminist movement and, at age 81, someone who has lived a life on the road.
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