Arrogant Agitation: Pleasure and Struggle in the 1960s

For Gretchen Brooktree, life is a bit of a struggle. It is 1961, and she works as a secretary to the commanding officer of an air force base, returning home at night to her family’s farm. She is isolated from city life and worldly affairs by both distance and a fundamentalist parochial education. Gretchen can recite Bible verses and the tenets of her religion and loves to learn, but she is unsophisticated and unfamiliar with the social ways of the world.

Thus, when she suddenly finds hersel...