Menopause, Greer believes, should be a time of stock-taking, of spiritual as well as physical change, when the middle-aged woman, rejecting the roles held out by patriarchal society, attains a mature serenity and power. In a wise, witty and inspiring book, she rebukes doctors, psychiatrists--and women themselves--who blame the aging female for her menopausal distress. Skeptical of hormone replacement therapy, which she views as a boon to the pharmaceutical industry, Greer asserts that the "climacteric syndrome," marked by depression, fatigue and irritability, is treatable by holistic medicine. Tweaking "hardy perennials" like Joan Collins and Helen Gurley Brown who, in Greer's opinion, refuse to grow old gracefully, she urges women to devise their own private ways of marking the menopause and puts forth the Witch and the Crone of history and literature as role models. Greer dispels all manner of myths and misconceptions about menopause.