Doctor Zay

It's a timeless classic. I've always loved reading this novel. However I really do think they need to revisit the cover design. Slapping such a cheesy and inappropriate cover on such an interesting, very intelligent and well written novel about women's successful entrance to the medical field is really inappropriate. It makes one think that the cover designer and publisher didn't even bother to read the novel. I think the author would have been a bit appalled.

Customers take note: when the publishers warn that there MIGHT be errors, they're completely correct. I was shocked when I received this book because I hadn't read the full description. As this is a textbook, I'm not too upset about the illegibility of some pages. I also appreciate that General Publishers gives you a pdf of the original for reference. All of their efforts taken into consideration, though, some pages ARE completely illegible. Even getting used to c's and o's and e's being interchangeable, and 1 possibly meaning l or i, I'm not sure this book is worth the price. I suppose that, since you get the pdf, it'll do in most cases.

I recently picked up the Feminist Press's republication of Elizabeth Stuart Phelps's Doctor Zay. I'm a self-proclaimed 19th century literature snob -- background information. From 1882, the novel is chronologically situated between George Eliot's Daniel Deronda (1876) and Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles (1891). Yet the thematic content of Doctor Zay completely diverges from the other two. Mr. Yorke, the protagonist, meets Doctor Zay, a female physician in upstate Maine. The gender roles are completely inverted: Yorke goes on dramatic internal rants, romanticizes nature, and is terrible behind the wheel reins. Doctor Zay, on the other hand, is financially secure because of her profession, emotionally reserved, and driven by logic rather than emotions.The gender inversion is so refreshing.But I don't want to sell it to you only on that platform. Phelps's writing style is witty, reflective, and chuckle-on-the-subway worthy. I found myself regularly reading passages aloud to anyone within earshot. Phelps is funny. Yorke's running internal monologue is reminiscent of Jane Eyre, only wittier. He views everything (man, dog, tree) as either a friend or foe on his romantic journey."Those delicate lovers, the birch and aspen, and the more ardent ones, the oak and hickory beyond them, were now making themselves obnoxious, as lovers always do in third parties" (23).I can't get enough of this book.Yorke and Dr. Zay have a Mindy/Danny relationship (for any viewers of "The Mindy Project"). They're polar opposites. Mindy (Yorke) is endearing in how she narrates her life like a romantic comedy. She's smart, reflective, and mocks her own inability to control her dating life. Yorke is no different. Doctor Zay and Danny couldn't appear to care less. But, as viewers and readers, we read the subtext. We understand their banter.And ultimately, we just join along for the ride - watching the ups and downs, the bumps and stumbles along the way. Phelps takes this known format and inserts a striking social critique of gender roles. As Michael Sartisky writes in the Afterword, "Phelps invites her reader into the embrace of a comfortable romantic tale, only to gracefully invert the prevailing conventional social assumptions about the roles of men and women, matrimony and professions."Doctor Zay is funny, witty, endearing, and a fabulous read. Jump on the bandwagon. Do it.