Hello All

Another update from me, Ros Ball, author of Women Who Won.

Welcome to new pledgers, and particularly to those who have come via the Unbound newsletter. We are project of the week! I'm so pleased to have you all on board. Please check out the previous updates where I have introduced two amazing women who will be in the book - Shirley Chisholm and Vigdís Finnbogadóttir.

Today I have a clip of the world's first elected woman Prime Minister, Sirimavo Bandaranaike. She was elected PM of Ceylon (as it was then) in 1960 and the newspapers didn't know what to call her. London’s Evening News wrote, “There will be need for a new word. Presumably, we shall have to call her a stateswoman." Yes, big surprise, she was treated differently to male Prime Ministers, for example, she was challenged on whether she'd be running a 'Kitchen Cabinet'. I'm eyerolling here.

She was extraordinarily resilient and served three terms at separate times. Her legacy is complicated and brings up the challenges we face when celebrating women pioneers in politics. I'll explore that further in the book.

If you have a women's network in your workplace perhaps you'd like me to do a talk about Women Who Won? Or your oganisation might want a page in the book - please get in touch. All these things help to get the book published soon!

Happy weekend everybody.

Ros