In this compelling, courageous, and eye-opening collection of essays, Ayaan Hirsi Ali presents profound meditations on Islam, the role of women, the rights of the individual, the roots of fanaticism, and Western policies toward Islamic countries and immigrant communities.
Hard-hitting, outspoken, and controversial, The Caged Virgin is a call for women to awaken to the brutal religious and cultural oppression of Islam and for Muslim women to free themselves from its outdated cult of virginity. It is also a call for Western governments to recognize the internal threat presented by radical Muslim immigrants. In this defiant argument for clear thinking and for an Islamic Enlightenment, the woman who has been called "the second coming of Spinoza" draws on her love of reason and the Enlightenment philosophers, on whose principles democracy was founded, to address the great divide that currently exists between the West and Islamic nations and between Muslim immigrants and their adopted countries.
Reviews
"This is an immensely important book, passionate, challenging, and necessary. It should be read as widely as possible, because it tells the truth - the unvarnished, uncomfortable truth." - Salman Rushdie
"It's not tolerant to tolerate intolerance. That is the message of Ayaan Hirsi Ali's book: It's a critique that targets, and enrages, Muslim men. It also hits home in the halls of power." -Los Angeles Times
"The Caged Virgin is both an indictment of the repression she escaped and a call for democracies to address the subjugation of women within their growing immigrant communities. The examined life, we're reminded, isn't just worth living: It's worth fighting for." -Vogue