Obit: Icon Marilyn French dies at age 79

Marilyn French, author of The Women’s Room andregarded as one of the great feminist writers, has died of heartfailure aged 79 in New York.  The native New Yorker died on Saturday in a Manhattan hospital,said Carol Jenkins, a friend and president of the city’s Women’s MediaCenter.  Her 1977 novel about a housewife’s rebellion against male domination sold 20m copies and was widely translated.  French’s final novel is due to be published this autumn.  She was also working on a memoir. French is survived by her son, Robert French, and her daughter Jamie French.  In a 2004 poll of listeners to BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, TheWomen’s Room was voted one of the five books that have most changed theway women see themselves.

More at BBC News, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/8034946.stm