Wow, this is a lot. This is one hell of a secret history.
This history book is learned, all-encompassing, exciting, engrossing, and human, powerful bracelets and all.
'The Secret History of Wonder Woman' certainly reveals more than I expected, and it is spectacularly, thoroughly researched. Look at how much is dug up! How much is not lost to time! No document, no note, no diary entry, no piece of found writing is overlooked, in order to compose a narrative of the life, careers, credentials, scandals, and legacy of Wonder Woman's bizarre, controversial, prideful and unorthodox creator, William Moulton Marston, and all the women who were the superheroine's inspiration.
Even if the book is ten years out of date now, depressingly.
Jill Lepore somehow manages to make the density of the discoveries she made so engaging and immersive in her writing - and feel so real and lived in, because it is! - even without making it personal on her end. Her research alone must have taken her years! She is somewhat impartial; she doesn't share much of her own opinion on matters, only the facts as she found them. But she doesn't sound too detached and robotic, as she occasionally shows a wry sense of humour (especially at the end of each chapter, told in chronological order in the vast and complex history of the making of and political legacy of the world's most famous superheroine).
I am a huge fan of Wonder Woman, so I knew I had to check out 'The Secret History of Wonder Woman' at some point. I am so glad I finally did. Every Wondy fan should. The more I read, the more I learn about her, the more I love her. The more I want to be like her.
And you'll absolutely, definitely find out more from 'The Secret History' than in the 2017 film, 'Professor Marston and the Wonder Women'. There is much that the film left out when depicting William Moulton Marston and his life and careers (he was very versatile) (and he looked nothing like Luke Evans). Though it remains a favourite of mine.
On that note, it is strange that, in her book, Lepore barely hints at there being a possible romantic and sexual relationship between Elizabeth Holloway and Olive Byrne, before or after Marston's death. The threesome's unconventional, polygamous homelife is at the forefront and never undermined, however. At the same time, Lepore places emphasis on both Holloway and Byrne being solely in love with Marston; their possible queerness is barely touched on. The word "bisexual" is never used. There is a Marjorie Wilkes Huntley in the picture, too - I wish more was explored about her.
You may read and finish 'The Secret History of Wonder Woman' with the impression that Marston was maybe just a horny bastard, and all his psychology mumbo-jumbo, his bondage-and-dominance-and-submissiveness theory, were simply an excuse to justify his fetishes, perversions and sexual fantasies when it came to women (and from the looks of it, only conventionally attractive, beautiful women). He was very proud of his academic work and "discoveries", and would go out of his way to let everyone know his "accomplishments". But, for example, there's never been any solid, irrefutable proof that his lie detector test actually worked.
Still, when it comes to Wonder Woman and his work in comics, I believe Marston had the best intensions for her, and what she stood for. He cared about her greatly, and fought for her whenever he could. He despised censorship. He truly wanted women to be strong and equal; to stand on their own footing and be powerful and independent, with or without relationships with men. There is power and worth in the feminine. Gender is a social construct anyway, and should not matter.
In many ways, Marston was lightyears ahead of his time.* So was practically every woman he knew.
I think he genuinely believed everything he ever taught and wrote. His beliefs, insights, ambitions, and imagination were limitless. However eccentric he was, he was an extraordinary person in history, who shook and challenged convention and the conservative everywhere he saw it**.
And again, so was every woman he knew.
If I were to guess the five most important things to William Moulton Marston, it would be sex, psychology (largely pseudo, at best questionable), his ego, Wonder Woman, and his big, unconventional, and no less loving family. Including his children. And his mother. He was a real mummy's boy.
'The Secret History of Wonder Woman' - no longer a secret, and that's a great, wonderful thing.
Wonder Woman has always been about women's strength, women's power, women's rights, the suffrage movement, and the many waves of feminism. In spite of her numerous ups and downs over the decades - as happens to all famous superheroes who have lasted as long now - she is still popular. She is still going strong.
That should tell you all you need to know about her as an enduring pop culture icon and heroine.
From the very beginning, Wonder Woman has been political. She has been about feminism and women's representation and visibility (including in her invisible plane). She has been about fighting fascism and protecting democracy. Deal with it.
There are aspects to her that remain as Marston had envisioned her. Good. What a miracle, through all the movements, changes, and regressive, political sludges though time.
'The Secret History' is partly a good academic source concerning comic book history and censorship in comics, to boot (Wondy's red boots, that is).
Like, it was interesting to learn that Batman's aversion to guns originally came about because of censorship. That info is in here, too. So maybe "censorship is bad" has its exceptions. It all depends.
In terms of women's history, you'll learn much about women's suffrage, the birth control movement, and women - the wonder women of history - such as Susan B. Anthony, Lou Rogers, Dorothy Rubicek, Alice Marble, Lauretta Bender, and Joyce Hummel.
Wonder Woman, aka Diana Prince, like every superhero, has a secret identity. So did William Moulton Marston, aka Charles Moulton, aka Superprof (probably). At last, in the 21st century, nearly a hundred years later, all is revealed - about him, and about women and women's place and achievements in history.
Marston wanted freedom and equality for women. He fervently believed women's liberation to be the only hope for civilisation and humanity to survive. He wanted a woman to be President of the United States as far back as the 1920s.
Feminism is the cure for fascism. Nowadays, this is not so extreme a view - extremism has already happened on the other, wrong, worst side of politics, and it is destroying everything. It is deliberately undoing and dooming human progress and survival. "Feminism, freedom, and love can save the world" is simply fact. It is hope.
Sharing with women, and women having power, independence, and control over their own lives - and visibility and a voice - is not scary or radical, and it is fucking not going to end the world.
Oh, and I absolutely loved learning that, in 1970, there was a comic strip published that had Little Lulu say "Fuck this shit!". It was a response to sexism and the patriarchy from the second wave of feminism. Why did I not know about it until reading 'The Secret History of Wonder Woman'?! Why do women's rebellion and accomplishments, in politics, the media, and pop culture, keep getting ignored and erased? Why is the patriarchy stubbornly, frighteningly enduring as the status quo in society, most troubling and horrifying in 2025? Capitalism is largely to blame, I know. It's corruption, everywhere.
Anyway, despite only dedicating like, two pages to the 70s Lynda Carter TV series, 'The Secret History of Wonder Woman' is good nonfiction literature about the virtues of creativity and love. Good day!
Final Score: 4/5
*This is despite the fact that Marston was not strictly a feminist, since he believed in women's superiority over men, and not as their equals. He believed in a women's utopia; meaning, a world made better and more peaceful by women ruling it; a matriarchy that is sooner or later inevitable, because women are better than men, because of love and other stereotypical feminine traits, not the stereotypical masculine traits of war and destruction in men.
**Except his views on blonde and brunette women, and on race, which is wince-inducing from a current standpoint. Though maybe he grew to change this slightly overtime.
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