A New Zen for Women

Zen Buddhist teacher and author Besserman hangs a load of dirty laundry in this book, both a memoir of her training years and an argument for a new and improved Zen that accommodates the unique strengths of women. The memoir part is a page-turning account of the time she spent—exactly how long is unclear—in London and in a Japanese monastery with her teacher, a highly placed roshi. The latter is portrayed as an autocratic, sexist, arbitrary, perfidious and nasty creep. Besserman in turn comes across as a woman scorned by a substitute for her overcritical father. She slugs her teacher when he speaks heartlessly about a woman whom she believes he has impregnated. Buddhism has certainly had its share—maybe more than its share—of personally outrageous teachers. But Besserman selectively stacks the deck against this one in a crusade for justice for women in Buddhism. That subject is important and alive, and Besserman is admirably familiar with the growing literature of women confronting and wrestling with yet another historically patriarchal wisdom tradition. But contrary to the publisher's description, she has written not a "heartwarming narrative of a woman's life in Zen" but an unloading of old wrongs. Other books on women and Buddhism—Sallie Tisdale's, for example—offer more spacious and gracious correction. (Apr.)