<Tr> <Th> ISBN </Th> <Td> 0 - 393 - 32257 - 2 </Td> </Tr> <P> The Feminine Mystique is a book written by Betty Friedan which is widely credited with sparking the beginning of second - wave feminism in the United States . It was published on February 19, 1963 by W.W. Norton . </P> <P> In 1957, Friedan was asked to conduct a survey of her former Smith College classmates for their 15th anniversary reunion; the results, in which she found that many of them were unhappy with their lives as housewives, prompted her to begin research for The Feminine Mystique, conducting interviews with other suburban housewives, as well as researching psychology, media, and advertising . She originally intended to publish an article on the topic, not a book, but no magazine would publish her article . </P> <P> During the year of 1964, The Feminine Mystique became the bestselling nonfiction book with over one million copies sold . In this book, Friedan challenged the widely shared belief in 1950s that "fulfillment as a woman had only one definition for American women after 1949--the housewife - mother ." </P>

Betty friedan's the feminine mystique was groundbreaking because the book