Not All Bad Girls are Icons: The Unsettling Martyrdom of Bonnie Parker

In my family, we give gifts on Valentine’s Day. Or, more accurately, my mother gives gifts: ever since I was little, I’ve come downstairs for breakfast to find a “little something” on my chair-a book, a pair of socks, a set of pens. One year, when I was in high school, however, I came home to find Bad Girls Throughout History on my bed. The book has a pale pink cover emblazoned with illustrations of Eleanor Roosevelt, Ella Fitzgerald, et. al., but I probably don’t need to tell you that. With its painterly images and progressive, “#NastyWoman” agenda, Bad Girls is perched in the window of every indie bookstore from Brooklyn to Portland, not to mention the Instagram feed of every Millennial influencer worth her salt.

True to its title, Bad Girls Throughout History shares anecdotes about some truly incredible unsung heroines. In fact, the book’s strongest quality is that it features lesser-known women alongside blockbuster icons. Within the first few pages, for example, I was delighted to learn about not just Cleopatra and Joan of Arc, but also Tomyris, a 6th century Iranian warrior queen, and Khutulun, the “Wrestler Princess” of Mongolia. To call these women “bad girls” is pretty much the truth: they earned their place in history by breaking rules, pushing boundaries, and wreaking havoc from the battlefield to the Supreme…