The Shalvi/Hyman Encyclopedia of Jewish Women

Features thousands of biographic and thematic essays on Jewish women around the world. Learn more

V

b. May 25, 1953

by JWA Staff
Our work to expand the Encyclopedia is ongoing. We are providing this brief biography for V until we are able to commission a full entry.

V (formerly Eve Ensler)’s massively successful play The Vagina Monologues gave her a platform to launch V-Day, a campaign to end violence against women and girls. V wrote The Vagina Monologues, a play that explores women’s attitudes about their bodies and sexuality, based on interviews with over 200 women. The award-winning play, which includes monologues from the perspectives of a lesbian sex worker, a rape victim, and a menopausal woman, has been performed in 35 languages in over 200 countries. V, whose childhood was scarred by her father’s physical and sexual abuse, decided to use the play’s success as a launching pad for V-Day, an annual Valentine’s Day campaign to end violence against women and girls, which has raised and distributed over $100 million. V continues her work as an activist and a writer; her works include the plays Insecure at Last, Here, and Emotional Creature and the books In the Body of the World; A Memory, a Monologue, a Rant, and a Prayer; and I Am an Emotional Creature: The Secret Life of Girls Around the World

How to cite this page

Jewish Women's Archive. "V." (Viewed on June 9, 2023) <https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/ensler-eve>.

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