Woman to Woman: An Anthology of Women's Spiritualities.

The late Carmelite poet, Jessica Powers, evidently corresponded with the activist nun, Margaret Ellen Traxler, SSND, during the 1960s. Zagano publishes a few of their letters, making one hope that if there is a large correspondence we will eventually see it in print. Likewise, Zagano has translated some of the correspondence of Mary Ward (1585-1645) whose attempt to found a religious order of women beyond the traditional pale of the clositer met with stern opposition (she fell under the power of the Inquisition for a time) in her own day. It was three centuries later that the institute she established could finally call Mary Ward its founder. The final four selections, all from this century, include Dorothy Day and Simone Weil, and two martyrs: Edith Stein (who died at Auschwitz) and Ita Ford (who was martyred in E1 Salvador in 1980).

Zagano concludes with a selected bibliography for each of the persons anthologized in the book. As befits a professor of communications (at Boston University), she appends the Library of Congress call number for each book in the bibliography; a nice touch that I have not seen before.

Dorothy Day has been the subject of some fine studies by William D. Miller (her authorized biographer) and Mel Piehl. To that list we can now add Merriman's book. Merriman focuses, as the subtitle indicates, on the sources and character of Day's luminous spiritual life. If there was ever a person nourished on the classic sources of spirituality, it was Dorothy Day. Deeply influenced by Benedictine monasticism, she loved both the liturgy of the hours and the Eucharist, the writings of the saints, and the great classics of the spiritual life. Furthermore, as Merriman documents, she was deeply marked by her lifelong engagement with the spiritual resources of the Eastern Christian tradition, nourished not only by her deep love for Tolstoy and Dostoevsky but through her friendship with the late Helene Iswolsky.