Thursday, December 02, 2010

Mother and men

Edith says that she is like her mother "in the only way she valued: we both preferred men to women." Why do you think she included all that background about her sad childhood and her strange, distant mother? And why did she make distinctions between men and women like that?
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5 comments:

cl said...

Honestly, I don't really get that. I could see them both preferring the company of men, but for different reasons. Her mother for being a bit of a vain, aging vamp, and Edith because she prefers men for their more straightforward rulebook than the women in her life (such as her neighbor-friend).

Maybe women have more the power to hurt her as her mother did by chipping away at her self-esteem or pointing out her Achilles heel (single at 36ish), or barring that, making that fact an Achilles heel when it isn't one to begin with.

10:35 AM, December 08, 2010
kc said...

Yeah, at first I detected a little misogyny in Edith, like she was one of those women who showed disdain for the women's movement because it didn't appeal to her aesthetically, but then she later specifically mentioned the feminists and said it wasn't their cause she took issue with but their "target," i.e., that they should hold women just as accountable as men. And she talks in this context about hating women who are "ultra-feminine," that is, women who think it's their right to be pampered and fussed over and helpless and silly and stupid and superficial. I thought she was basically saying that women who didn't respect themselves didn't deserve respect from men and that the "feminists" shouldn't expect men to respect such women.

I like your reference to men's "more straightforward rulebook," cl. The women she encountered in the book weren't straightforward with her. You always had the sense that there was something — some kind of competition? judgment? — always taking place beneath the surface. But then all the men she dealt with were kind of squirrely too. Maybe poor treatment is a bigger deal with other women because part of you always expects the camaraderie of sisterhood and is disappointed when it's not there.

10:28 AM, December 09, 2010
kc said...

I don't think I expressed that last part very well, but it feels like there's some notion that women have lower standards when it comes to men — like they just don't expect that much from them, like they're more willing to overlook boorish behavior in them — kind of like how we overlook inappropriate behavior in children, like there's some idea that they can't really "help" it. Women just kind of expect men to show up and be tolerably decent. They tend to expect more from other women and the disappointment when women don't come through is proportional to the height of the expectation.

10:59 AM, December 09, 2010
kc said...

Which is why I think Edith shows disdain for women. She needs them to be better.

11:35 AM, December 09, 2010
cl said...

"I thought she was basically saying that women who didn't respect themselves didn't deserve respect from men and that the "feminists" shouldn't expect men to respect such women."

Oh, that's good, kc. I think that sums up her complicated take really well. I found her attitude kind of ambivalent throughout, but this gives a clearer guide to her outlook, I think?

I'm chewing on the part about holding men to a lower standard. You know, my first thought was to say, no, it's how the women in Edith's life were more underhanded and treacherous in toying with her feelings, but that's not really true at all. Mr. Neville did the same thing! But because he wasn't a coquette or a competitor, it was taken (even by me as a reader) as very candid and insightful when if women talked to her that way, it was thought to be manipulative and condescending.

Monica, maybe, was the best of the bunch!

2:18 PM, December 09, 2010

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