I worry about my ranting, because mainly I'm only stating the obvious, and often just what people have said before me a hundred times better before.
However, while it's true that before very recently many women married in large part because of the status (and economic security!) marriage provided.
Of course. And sadly, I have been making my eyes bleed by reading more of Mantel's articles for the LRB and found an especial gem (http://www.lrb.co.uk/v26/n05/hilary-mantel/some-girls-want-out)
Why would women feel so hounded, when feminism is a done deal? Think about it. What are the choices on offer? First, the promise of equality was extended to educated professional women. You can be like men, occupy the same positions, earn the same salary. Then equal opportunities were extended to uneducated girls; you, too, can get drunk, and fight in the streets on pay-night. You’ll fit in childcare somehow.
Feminism to Mantel is the chance to be a man. Not the chance to escape having to marry and breed or face obscurity. Instead she appeals to some sort of universal "girl" the access to which is currently blocked by feminism.
Girls may not be girls; they may be gross and sexually primed, like adolescent boys.
I think the point of feminism is that girls can be anything they like. It's a bit woolly, isn't it, this idea of universal girlhood? I'm tempted to say, like Camille's Vieux Cordelier appeals for "Freedom", it is a retreat into sophism in the face of political realities. I'm sure Ms Mantel would be the first to get a bit peeved if she suddenly had to turn over her bank account to the nearest available man.
I've come across far too many history classes whose instructors, like yours, find it appropriate to show in class.
To be fair, as I remember it, my history teacher showed it to us with a proviso that went something like - And this folks, is why I'm teaching you history. He was very much of the opinion that anyone can learn facts and dates but the real point of the exercise is learning analytical skills and recognising the uses to which the facts or the distortions of them are put to. I still fangirl him.
I think Danton is an absolutely gorgeous film, it's the whole empty spectacle of capitalism laid bare. From the first shot of the huge clitoral guillotine through the parade of architypical fairy story characters to Dantons emotive, powerful but ultimately meaningless speech and its gothicy horror music and its innate misogyny it is a complete, perfect demonstration of illusion sold as rebellion/freedom. It's so grossly in love with itself it gives the game away, completely. It might not say much about the French Revolution, but it says a lot about how eighties materialism saw itself. I don't think that was quite Wajda's intention.
Its also very difficult to watch that film and come out not loving Robespierre, or at least that was my experience. The characterisation is cardboard, to put it mildly, but he's the one who believes in something, and is therefore demonised as everyone who believes in something can be. If you nail your colours to the mast and say yes I am a Jacobin Terrorist (or in the films modern parlance socialist, or a even a feminist) you will lay yourself open to abuse. It's much better to adopt the wishy washy rock song rhetoric of freedom like Danton, the film tells us everybody will like you. I think I took from that film have the guts to be demonised or else live in a world of sumptuous cliches.
That probably wasn't Wajda's intention either.
And because I'm really narked now, I'm going to give the last word to Hillary:
It is possible that there is a certain personality structure which has always been problematical for women, and which is as difficult to live with today as it ever was – a type which is withdrawn, thoughtful, reserved, self-contained and judgmental, naturally more cerebral than emotional.
I think Wadja's film proves that this type of personality isn't just a problem when it occurs in women. But goodness, men and women must all be so very different mustn't they? Wadja and Mantel, you bloody well deserve each other.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2010-03-07 12:11 am (UTC)However, while it's true that before very recently many women married in large part because of the status (and economic security!) marriage provided.
Of course. And sadly, I have been making my eyes bleed by reading more of Mantel's articles for the LRB and found an especial gem (http://www.lrb.co.uk/v26/n05/hilary-mantel/some-girls-want-out)
Why would women feel so hounded, when feminism is a done deal? Think about it. What are the choices on offer? First, the promise of equality was extended to educated professional women. You can be like men, occupy the same positions, earn the same salary. Then equal opportunities were extended to uneducated girls; you, too, can get drunk, and fight in the streets on pay-night. You’ll fit in childcare somehow.
Feminism to Mantel is the chance to be a man. Not the chance to escape having to marry and breed or face obscurity. Instead she appeals to some sort of universal "girl" the access to which is currently blocked by feminism.
Girls may not be girls; they may be gross and sexually primed, like adolescent boys.
I think the point of feminism is that girls can be anything they like. It's a bit woolly, isn't it, this idea of universal girlhood? I'm tempted to say, like Camille's Vieux Cordelier appeals for "Freedom", it is a retreat into sophism in the face of political realities. I'm sure Ms Mantel would be the first to get a bit peeved if she suddenly had to turn over her bank account to the nearest available man.
I've come across far too many history classes whose instructors, like yours, find it appropriate to show in class.
To be fair, as I remember it, my history teacher showed it to us with a proviso that went something like - And this folks, is why I'm teaching you history. He was very much of the opinion that anyone can learn facts and dates but the real point of the exercise is learning analytical skills and recognising the uses to which the facts or the distortions of them are put to. I still fangirl him.
I think Danton is an absolutely gorgeous film, it's the whole empty spectacle of capitalism laid bare. From the first shot of the huge clitoral guillotine through the parade of architypical fairy story characters to Dantons emotive, powerful but ultimately meaningless speech and its gothicy horror music and its innate misogyny it is a complete, perfect demonstration of illusion sold as rebellion/freedom. It's so grossly in love with itself it gives the game away, completely. It might not say much about the French Revolution, but it says a lot about how eighties materialism saw itself. I don't think that was quite Wajda's intention.
Its also very difficult to watch that film and come out not loving Robespierre, or at least that was my experience. The characterisation is cardboard, to put it mildly, but he's the one who believes in something, and is therefore demonised as everyone who believes in something can be. If you nail your colours to the mast and say yes I am a Jacobin Terrorist (or in the films modern parlance socialist, or a even a feminist) you will lay yourself open to abuse. It's much better to adopt the wishy washy rock song rhetoric of freedom like Danton, the film tells us everybody will like you. I think I took from that film have the guts to be demonised or else live in a world of sumptuous cliches.
That probably wasn't Wajda's intention either.
And because I'm really narked now, I'm going to give the last word to Hillary:
It is possible that there is a certain personality structure which has always been problematical for women, and which is as difficult to live with today as it ever was – a type which is withdrawn, thoughtful, reserved, self-contained and judgmental, naturally more cerebral than emotional.
I think Wadja's film proves that this type of personality isn't just a problem when it occurs in women. But goodness, men and women must all be so very different mustn't they? Wadja and Mantel, you bloody well deserve each other.