Bonnie Bluh

BLUH--Bonnie, age 82, died suddenly in New York City on October 2, 2008. The cause was an aortic dissection. Noted Feminist Author, playwright, actor, teacher, lecturer and performer. Bluh's sharp, insightful nonfiction narrative of the emergence of the European feminist movement, "Woman to Woman" (1974), is a landmark account of the second wave of feminism and her book is used in classrooms across the world. Her popular, comic novel "Banana" (1976) is considered by some the first truly feminist novel ever to be published. Bluh (pronounced blue), as friends and family knew her, was brought up in Sunnyside Queens, had lived in cities from coast to coast as well as Israel and Spain, but always called New York City her home. Since 1985 Bluh had lived at the Westbeth Artists Community in the West Village. In a building filled with interesting artists of all stripes she was known as one of the more outgoing, colorful characters. She was as devoted to her family as she was to her writing. And she never stopped fighting for the great causes of her time. The world will be a poorer, paler place without her. Bluh is survived by her sons, Craig, Kenn, and Brian Lowy, Brian's wife Karen Ilardi-Lowy whom Bluh considered a daughter, two granddaughters, Allee and Mariah, and her devoted friend Mordechai. Instead of flowers please plant a tree in Israel with JNF (www.jnf.org/ trees) or make a donation in Bluh's name to ArtsConnection, 520 Eighth Avenue, Suite 321, New York, NY 10018.