Back in 2006, I woke up one morning and posted about some of the books that “created” me. Among them was Marilyn French’s The Women’s Room. A friend of mine once wrote to me, “I knew my marriage was doomed when I read The Women’s Room during the week after my wedding.” My own copy of the book was a paperback that looked like this. It was passed among so many of my friends and relatives that it took on a tattered look suitable for its subject: the wear and tear on its female characters as they tried to redefine their roles in male-dominated institutions and society.
I mentioned in my 2006 post that I wasn’t sure how dated the novel would seem to me now, but it had an explosive effect on my attitudes at the time I first read it. It provoked many, many discussions among some of the smartest women I knew, becoming a touchstone for things that troubled and challenged us as we walked down a path just being cleared by strong and independent-thinking women ahead of us.
There are times I feel that generation and my own made great progress. Other times I think the backlash for our audacity was so severe that it set us back decades. Sometimes when I see how even the most forward-thinking men so easily call women names that I find hateful and demeaning when they disagree with how we use our voices, or how viciously women trash one another, I think we haven’t progressed at all.
When my mother died last year, I finally got rid of my old, battered copy of The Women’s Room, replacing it with her hardcover. We had a lot of conversations about this book, she and I, and about women and our relationships with men. Though I’m not the feminist I once was, I think anyone who reads my stories will understand that my female characters are less interested in finding a man than in discovering themselves. (This could be a reason why I’m not a brilliant success as a writer of contemporary romance!) In my created worlds, romantic love is usually the dessert in the great big banquet of life: desirable, but not everything one needs for nutrition.
The Women’s Room was translated into twenty languages and sold more than twenty million copies, but it was only part of a career that included other novels, memoirs, essays, and literary criticism.
Marilyn French died last weekend at age 79. A memorial service is planned for June in New York.
For reasons beyond my puny brain, I always think of Gay Talese when I see the paperback cover of this book… a book I’ve never read, by the way. But isn’t that strange? I’d make a terrible Pavlovian dog. : )
There seemed to be a period of time when if you wanted to signify that something was hip AND serious, it had to have that look.
Wow, it really did have a look to it! It’s almost a “school” like Impressionism. : )
I read this book in the late 1970’s and it did have a big impact on me as well. Mostly, I was horrified at the bitterness of it, the crazy energy the central female character poured into being society’s ideal of “the perfect wife” — and actually achieving that neurotic, perfectionist ideal — only to have her husband step out with another woman who was more interesting and exciting… less “perfect.”
Big impact message there? Oh, you bet! My own mom was bitter as hell, totally bought into the veneer of societal perfection, yet was relentlessly angry at all men for being oppressive. Very weird messages about males I was receiving. My dad, although far from perfect, was faithful and stood by her until she died, through long illness, and sucking up her contempt for him like he didn’t even see it. And I don’t think he ever did.
Probably I overcompensate by trying to understand men at a much deeper level. That explains much of my own attitude and behavior. Oh yeah, and I’m a crappy traditional wife! Couldn’t care less about failing in the eyes of society (or not too much anyway, because the outside scrutiny can be intensely negative). But according to most men I know (including the spouse), I’m a fun and interesting companion.
I think I chose the better part, and will endure society’s disapproval as the logical price for it. For awhile I half-heartedly played along with the stereotypes so that my kids would not be ostracized by other moms.
That time is over. It made me absolutely miserable, because my natural temperament was never suited for it. I’m a bohemian freak with a fierce streak of independence, almost incapable of conformity to rules.
*corrected an HTML glitch, sorry for double post email
I think that it’s easier for women our age to have better relationships and to understand men BECAUSE of the ground work first feminists have done for us. We do not have to be obsessed with being the perfect wife or being concerned with what society expects from us as women because they broke molds and paved the way for us to become independent. When women have the freedom and the security to be who they are naturally then of course they make better companions. Feminists like Marilyn French made it possible for my generation to make decisions that were right for us, no matter what that decision is. It wasn’t that long ago when we didn’t have the option
Becks check out The Mousewife… you might enjoy!