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Title: The Soul of a Woman: On Impatient Love, Long Life, and Good Witches by Isabelle Allende
Details: Copyright 2020, Random House, English translation copyright by Isabelle Allende 2021
Synopsis (By Way of Front Flap): "From the New York Times bestselling author of A Long Petal of the Sea comes a passionate and inspiring meditation on what it means to be a woman.
“When I say that I was a feminist in kindergarten, I am not exaggerating,” begins Isabel Allende. As a child, she watched her mother, abandoned by her husband, provide for her three small children without “resources or voice.” Isabel became a fierce and defiant little girl, determined to fight for the life her mother couldn’t have.
As a young woman coming of age in the late 1960s, she rode the second wave of feminism. Among a tribe of like-minded female journalists, Allende for the first time felt comfortable in her own skin, as they wrote “with a knife between our teeth” about women’s issues. She has seen what the movement has accomplished in the course of her lifetime. And over the course of three passionate marriages, she has learned how to grow as a woman while having a partner, when to step away, and the rewards of embracing one’s sexuality.
So what feeds the soul of feminists—and all women—today? To be safe, to be valued, to live in peace, to have their own resources, to be connected, to have control over our bodies and lives, and above all, to be loved. On all these fronts, there is much work yet to be done, and this book, Allende hopes, will “light the torches of our daughters and granddaughters with mine. They will have to live for us, as we lived for our mothers, and carry on with the work still left to be finished.”"
Why I Wanted to Read It: I recently read and loved The House of the Spirits, Allende's first book. I had heard this was a must-read of hers as well, but knew nothing else about it.
How I Liked It:
It's pretty unusual for an author to succeed with both fiction and non-fiction. Thinking back, I've thought of how many authors I've read that I felt accomplished both. Marjane Satrapi, famous for her masterpiece memoir Persepolis (and its delightful screen adaptation), also writes fiction. Stephen King, famous for his fiction, wrote an absolutely excellent memoir cum writing manual. One of my favorite of Kurt Vonnegut's books is one of his last books, the non-fiction Man Without a Country. So where does that leave Isabelle Allende?
The memoir begins with Allende's bold assertion that she was a feminist in kindergarten (which would've been the 1940s). She talks about her life and how it was shaped by witnessing the disparity in how women (especially her mother) were treated and the impositions on them. She had a tumultuous childhood (she professes gratitude for her unhappy childhood because it provided ample material for her writing; she concludes she doesn't know how novelists with normal homes manage). She lobbies her mother and the rest of her family on feminism (but especially her mother) and once she comes of age, settles down into marriage and children, but still "carried a burning restlessness" when it came to feminism.
She eventually starts working as a journalist in 1967 and credits her work with a newly launched feminist magazine with helping her not be "suffocated by frustration". From there, she adopts a more tangential, and more non-linear approach, talking about feminism, aging, sexuality, writing, and motherhood, telling more family and life stories. She ends on a positive note with her new husband (finding love in her seventies, and another husband is a wonderful, welcome surprise) and talks about their happy life together through the strange and challenging 2020s (at the time of her writing, the pandemic had just broke).
If ever there was an author whose life story is suited to memoir, it's Isabelle Allende. Fleeing a country in the midst of a totalitarian take-over and finding massive, unprecedented success in what had previously been seen as a male-only genre of fiction, losing a daughter and starting so much in her honor, not to mention her far-reaching career. So it's not surprising that this is her fifth work of non-fiction and memoir.
And Allende doesn't disappoint. She's sharp, funny, thoughtful, and if some of those thoughts are a bit misguided (and we'll get to that), her intentions are good. She also speaks out about aging and ageism, particularly for women and how it's treated differently. Her passion for feminism is intersectional and lifelong. Her insights on writing (and her own writing) are fascinating.
And the lyrical, beautiful way she writes about feminism is frequently nothing short of staggering.
In my youth I fought for equality. I wanted to participate in the men's game. But in my mature years I've come to realize that the game is a folly; it is destroying the planet and the moral fiber of humanity. Feminism is not about replicating the disaster. It's about mending it. As a result, of course, it confronts powerful reactionary forces like fundamentalism, fascism, tradition, and many others. It's depressing to see that among the opposition forces are so many women who fear change and cannot imagine a different future.
The patriarchy is stony. Feminism, like the ocean, is fluid, powerful, deep, and encompasses the infinite complexity of life; it moves in waves, currents, tides, and sometimes in storms. Like the ocean, feminism never stays quiet. (pg 12)
I learned that anger without purpose is useless and even harmful; I had to act if I wanted change. (pg 32)
My three [feminist journalist] colleagues and I wrote with a knife between our teeth; we were a scary gang. (pg 32)
The author Eduarado Galeano said that "In the end, women's fear of men's violence is a reflection of men's fear of women without fear." Sounds good but the concept seems confusing to me. How could we not be afraid if the world colludes to scare us? There are very few fearless women, except when we get together. In a group we feel invincible. (pg 106)
Patriarchy has not always existed. It is not inherent to the human condition, it is imposed by culture. We have kept a record of our presence on the planet since the invention of writing, around five thousand years ago in Mesopotamia; that's nothing compared to the more or less two hundred thousand years of Homo sapiens' existence. History is written by men and they exalt or omit facts according to their convenience. The feminine half of humanity is ignored in official history. (pgs 159 and 160)
Every morning when I wake up, after greeting [deceased daughter] Paula, [deceased mother] Panchita, and other present spirits, when the room is still dark and silent, I call back my soul, which is still roaming in the land of dreams, and I give thanks for all I have, particularly for love, good health, and writing. And I also give thanks for the rich and passionate life I have and will continue to have. I am not ready to pass the torch and hopefully I never will be. I want to light the torches of our daughters and granddaughters with mine. They will have to live for us, as we lived for our mothers, and carry on with the work we didn't have time to finish. (pgs 166 and 167)
We want a world of beauty, not only that which the senses appreciate, but also the beauty perceived by an open heart and a clear mind. We want a pristine planet protected from all forms of aggression. We want a balanced and sustainable civilization based on mutual respect, and respect for other species and for nature. We want an inclusive and egalitarian civilization free of gender, race, class, and age discrimination, and any other classification that separates us. We want the kind of world where peace, empathy, decency, truth, and compassion prevail. Above all, we want a joyful world. That is what we, the good witches, want. It's not a fantasy, it's a project. Together we can all achieve it. (pg 170 and 171)
She also takes on age and aging:
And yes, I use the word old, which seems to be a pejorative. I do so on purpose because I am proud of my age. Every year I have lived and every wrinkle I have tell my story. (pg 33)
Any sixty-year-old grumpy guy with a beer belly feels that he deserves a woman twenty or thirty years younger, as one can see all around, but an older woman with a younger man is still considered obscene. (pg 61)
She also reflects that as she is in her seventies (she'll be eighty in less than a month of this writing! ¡Feliz cumpleaños!), such a man requiring a much younger woman in her case would have to be over hundred (it's happened!).
Nowadays, ageism is politically incorrect, as sexism and racism have been for decades, but nobody pays any attention. There's a monumental anti-aging industry, as if aging were a character flaw. (pg 78)
We'll overlook the use of the term "politically incorrect" (it's a reactionary phrase that is beyond outdated) and instead perhaps substitute "frowned upon". But she is absolutely correct that ageism is still more or less openly considered acceptable.
In the past, adulthood arrived at twenty, middle age at forty, and old age at fifty. Today adolescence lasts until past thirty or forty, maturity comes around sixty, and old age starts at eighty. This is the baby boomers' achievement. Over the last half century they have redefined many cultural aspects for their convenience. (pgs 78 and 79)
She's partially right (and I'm aware she's being glib), but it's also a longer lifespan and increased awareness of psychology and how our brains function. Your brain isn't even completely formed until you're in your thirties.
All in all, the book reads like an intensely enjoyable conversation with one of the greatest authors alive on a variety of subjects. Who wouldn't want that? What a nice way for a reader new to Isabelle Allende to find she can easily do both fiction and nonfiction, and do them well.
Notable:
There's blessedly a lot of talk about intersectionality these days, in feminism and other justice movements. What does that mean? Coined by activist Kimberlé Crenshaw, "intersectionality" refers to the intersections of oppression, how various marginalizations combine.
For example, a Black heterosexual cisgender woman experiences a different kind of sexism than a heterosexual cisgender white woman, and a Black Queer woman experiences a different kind of sexism from either of them. It's understanding how oppression works and how we can work together to stop it.
So it's a delight to see that Allende falls firmly (as if there were any doubt) into the best kind of feminism, the intersectional feminist category:
My anger against machismo started in those childhood years of seeing my mother and the housemaids as victims. They were subordinate and had no resources or voice-- my mother because she had challenged convention and the maids because they were poor. (pg 5)
The worst discrimination was against the poor-- it always is (pg 17)
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Allende relates an unfortunately familiar story about being warned off from feminism:
My mother begged me to be more discreet. "I don't know where you got those ideas. You will acquire a reputation of being butch," she told me once, without explaining what that word meant. (pg 6)
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I freely admit, I was incredibly nervous about how Allende would treat trans and Queer issues as a whole. Famous cis women claiming to speak for feminism have been extremely disappointing to flat-out dangerously violent lately, particularly in light of the Roe v Wade travesty. Given that this book was written in the 2020s, ignorance isn't much of an excuse. Fortunately, she makes her position clear relatively early on.
And what is my definition of feminism? It is not what we have between our legs but what we have between our ears. It's a philosophical posture and a uprising against male authority. It's a way of understanding human relations and a way to see the world. It's a commitment to justice and struggle for the emancipation of women, the LGBTQIA+ community, anyone oppressed by the system, including some men, and all others who want to join. Welcome! The greater our number the better. (pg 12)
But that doesn't mean she gets everything right. I hesitate to call these out, because I do believe that Allende's heart is truly in the right place, and also there's the fact of the matter that English is not her first language and nailing down the correct terminology can be tricky even to native speakers. But fair is fair, so I'm going to mention these.
The more I live, the happier I am with my gender, particularly because it enabled me to give birth to [my children] Paula and Nicolás. That transcendent experience, which men still can't have, defined my existence. (pg 33)
Men can absolutely get pregnant. Gender is not sex. All genders can give birth to children. (I am also fairly sure if this misstep was pointed out to Allende, she would've corrected it.)
I didn't always like being a woman; as a girl I wanted to be male because it was obvious that my brothers had a more interesting future than I did. But my hormones betrayed me. Around the age of twelve I got a waist and a couple of plums appeared on my chest. Then I started thinking that even if I couldn't be a man, I was going to live as one. I achieved it with tenacity, effort, and luck. (pg 34)
I get what she meant: she's saying that she was going to live with the freedom she perceives men as having versus the restricted way women and femmes were (and still are) required to live.
But there had to be a better way to put that.
I asked several female friends and acquaintances if they were happy with their gender and why. It's a tricky question because we have to understand the concept of gender is fluid, but for simplicity's sake I will use the terms woman and man. Though this was admittedly an unscientific and small sampling, the responses were incredibly interesting.
The women said they liked being female because we have more empathy and solidarity than men and we are more resilient. As we give birth, we bet on life, not on extermination. We are the only possible salvation for the other half of humanity. Our mission is to nurture; destruction is masculine. (pgs 34 and 35)
This is both great and not so great. Gender is indeed fluid! And systems of oppression (like forced birth enthusiasts) don't recognize trans or nonbinary people, and do seek to control "women's bodies."
And it's true women (and femmes) are encouraged and socially conditioned to have more empathy and solidarity with one another and resiliency. But again, not all women give birth and not all those who give birth are women. And tying motherhood to any kind of womanhood is troublesome anyway, as there are women who do not wish to be mothers.
The "femininity nurtures, masculinity destroys" principle Allende supports with the fact the greatest predators are men, and "ninety percent of violent crimes are committed by men" (no stats on that are offered). She goes on that in every circumstance, in war as in peace, men impose themselves by force and they bear the most responsibility for this culture of greed and violence in which we live. To be fair, she reflects elsewhere in the book that there are women who seek to achieve power by this method as well and how flawed and dangerous this is.
But the situation is a lot more nuanced than she's making it out to be. This binary type of thinking can erase the role that women with privilege have in contributing to the values of patriarchy and oppression (white women perpetuating racism, rich women perpetuating classism, cis women perpetuating transphobia, straight women perpetuating homo/biphobia, et cetera) and is contrary to the values of recognizing intersectionality.
One woman in her forties referenced testosterone, which generates impulses of aggression, competition, and supremacy. She told us that her gynecologist prescribed her that hormone in a cream, to be rubbed on the belly to increase her libido. She had to stop because she grew a beard and drove her car with an intention of running over the first pedestrian who crossed her path. She concluded that it's preferable to live with less libido than to shave and live furious. (pgs 35 and 36)
The myth that testosterone leads to aggression and sexual desire is debatable, at best. Recent research has found no conclusive evidence that testosterone level predicts aggression, sexual desire, strength, nor athleticism (source: "Testosterone: an Unauthorized Biography by Dr Katrina Karkazis and Dr Rebecca Jordan-Young).
(Incidentally, I get that shaving/hair removal can be a pain, but the idea and beauty standard that women have to be hairless and maintain that hairlessness is rooted in white supremacist patriarchy. Shave if you want or you don't feel like putting up with social pressure! It's okay! But acknowledge where it comes agree.)
Fortunately, sexuality is no longer subject to as many rules and classifications. My grandchildren assure me that they are nonbinary. When they introduced me to their friends I now ask each one about their preferred pronouns. It's not easy for me to remember them. I live in California and English is my second language.
This questioning of pronouns started in the former Yugoslavia, which after terrible wars between 1991 and 2006 was divided into six republics: Slovenia, Croatia, Bosina-Herzegovina, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia. In that environment of war and hypermasculinity, patriotism was made up of a mixture of nationalism, patriarchy, and misogyny. Masculinity was defined by power, violence, and conquest. Women and girls from one's own group had to be protected-- and impregnated to provide children for the nation. Those on the enemy's side were systematically raped and tortured, both to impregnate the women and humiliate the men. The most conservative estimate is that twenty thousand Bosnian Muslim women were raped by Serbians, but the number could be much higher.
At the end of the conflict, young people questioned gender division imposed by ultranationalism, refused to be classified as male or female, and rejected the use of gender-based pronouns in favor of nonbinary ones. This practice arrived in Europe and the United States several years later.
Language is very important because it can determine the way we think. Words are powerful. Patriarchy benefits from classifying people; it makes it easier to exert control. We automatically accept being placed in categories based on gender, race, age, etc. But many young people are challenging these divisions. (pgs 53 and 54)
Okay. While it sounds like nonbinary identification is a political stance by this particular group of people affected by war, that's not where the concept of nonbinary genders originates (up until comparatively recently in human history, the concept of gender binary was new) and people in the 2020s don't identify as nonbinary as a political stance (although sadly it's become one, given the attacks on trans and Queer rights as a whole), they identify as nonbinary because they are nonbinary. That is their gender identity. I can't speak for Allende's grandchildren, but it may be she's conflating one with the other.
Also, again, her heart is absolutely in the right place, but it's not "preferred pronouns", it's just "pronouns." Calling them "preferred" sounds like a luxury, a nicety, rather than a requirement. If you were to misgender, say, Ben Shapiro ("Ben Shapiro! What's her problem!"), Shapiro would not see being referred to as he/him as his preferred pronouns, he would see them as his mandatory pronouns, which they are. People's pronouns matter, even then they are used by violent bigoted transphobes. Just say pronouns, not preferred pronouns. Words are absolutely powerful. And while patriarchy benefits by classifying people, people can benefit from choosing how they themselves classify.
Apparently traditional male and female roles have gone out of style; now one can choose among several alternatives according to one's frame of mind. Unfortunately, I am fatally heterosexual and that limits my options. It would be more convenient to be bisexual or lesbian because women my age are more interesting and age better than men. You think this is an exaggeration? Take a look around. (pgs 54 and 55)
Firstly, what's considered traditional is highly subjective and something about the second sentence makes me twitch a bit. All partnerships should be free of such restrictions; and eschewing "traditional" gender roles isn't some new thing, not even for Allende's generation. It's certainly accessible in heterosexual relationships.
Also, I appreciate that straight women mean well when they say that things would be easier for them if they were bisexual or lesbian. I really do. And I get that Allende is saying the standards are higher for women (and femmes). But saying that life would be easier/more convenient if they were bisexual or lesbian is pretty harmful to actual lesbians and bisexual women whose lives are already hard enough, thank you, particularly as our rights are always up for debate.
Again, I get that Allende was saying this I assume to point out different gender standards, but there's a better way of doing that.
My grandchildren have tried to explain to me the numerous forms of love that young people practice today. When they mentioned, for example, polyamorous relationships, I told them that they have always existed. When I was young in the 1960s and 1970s it was called free love, but they assure me that's not the same thing, because many of them are nonbinary-- masculine/feminine-- and the combinations of partners and groups are much more interesting than in "your time." I hate it when they talk of "your time." This is my time! But I do admit that, unfortunately, I have passed the age in which I would venture into the terrain of modern polyamorous nonbinary relationships. (pg 59)
I agree that so many concepts today that we think are new have always existed. Did you know Wonder Woman's creator was in a loving polyamorous relationship and credited the creation of Wonder Woman to his wife and their girlfriend?
But polyamorous relationships are not the same as "free love" (which at its consensual best, sounds like mutually open relationships to comfortable promiscuity). It has nothing whatsoever to do with the gender of the participants and everything to do with the expectations of the relationship. I've met poly people that were just like a two person couple only they had three. I've met poly people that were open to having different relationships but had "main" or "primary" relationships. All of this is upfront and discussed and agreed upon ahead of time, and it has absolutely nothing to do with gender. People of all orientations (including asexual, although obviously with them it's a romantic relationship rather than sexual usually) can be poly, same as people of all orientations can decide it's not their thing.
I get Allende's frustration with having her "time" dismissed; as though it's time for her to step aside and her contributions aren't current, and that's a great example of ageism that we may not appreciate.
The last line made me cringe. You can be nonbinary at any age, because nonbinary isn't a choice (although identifying that way, particularly publicly, is). You can be poly at any age if you decide that's right for you. Conflating the two, when one isn't a choice and one is, is harmful. Treating nonbinary like it's a modern trend is also harmful. I'm going to hopefully chalk this up to translating the terms.
And again, this terminology can be tricky even when you're a native English speaker and within the Queer community. So much of our language is binary and the concepts outdated that breaking new ground to better accommodate our understanding of gender and sexuality is a huge task, and a hard one (witness all the weird rage about the use of singular they, and of saying "person with a uterus"). So while Allende may not have all the terminology down and makes a few errors, she also is clearly in not just favor but support of Queer rights and liberation, so I'll cut her slack.
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I side-eyed the previous testosterone bit, but that wasn't the only suspect passage in the book.
For us women, sexual passion diminishes or even disappears as we age unless we are in love. Apparently that's not the case with men. I read somewhere, although it might be a myth, that men think about sex an average of once every three minutes, and they cling to their erotic fantasies up until their death, even if some of them can't remember what an erection is. I wonder how they can get anything done under those circumstances. (pgs 60 and 61)
I don't think this is true. I think this is another myth that people have accepted to be true. For one, this doesn't involve trans women or nonbinary people, for two, it's only been within the last fifty years or so that Western science was convinced women and femmes were interested in sex in the first place.
I suppose all of it is useful because we now live thirty years longer than our grandparents. But living longer doesn't mean living better. In fact, a prolonged old age exacts a huge social and economic cost on both individuals and the planet. (pg 76)
This sounds an awful lot like the myth of overpopulation. The planet and people are not being exploited by people living longer, they're being exploited by the increasing hoarding of wealth, land, and resources by the ultra wealthy.
However, not all news is bad. Pollution has diminished, the water in the Venetian canals is clear, the sky in Beijing has turned blue, and birds are singing among the skyscrapers of New York. (pgs 169 and 170)
I probably don't need to tell you that this was written in the early days of the pandemic. Over two years on, we don't want to remember and some of it's been blocked by trauma, but in our desperation to find something positive, some clung to the fact when less people went less places, those places were cleaner. This led to the meme of "nature is healing" which is not only not true, it again points to the overpopulation myth (that all people are the problem, instead of very specific people).
But again, given when this was published, and the fact that concept was born out of desperation for any kind of upside, I'll correct it but cut the author slack.
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In Nazi Germany abortion was punished with prison for the woman, and death for the practitioner. Women had to produce children for the nation. The mothers of eight or more children were awarded a gold medal. (pgs 141 and 142)
Steve King, a congressman from the United States, proposed abolishing the right to abortion even in the case of rape or incest. "What if we went back through all the family trees and just pulled those people out that were the products of rape and incest? Would there be any population of the world left if we did that? Considering all the wars and all the rape and pillage that's taken place... I know I can't certify that I'm not a part of a product of that." In summary, a defense of rape and incest as natural and normal. Eighty-four congressmen from the Republican Party signed this proposal. (pgs 142 and 143)
Just some timely horrific quotes.
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Allende dedicates her book to "good witches" but what kind of witches does she mean?
I would like to have Sophia Loren's full breasts and long legs, but if given a choice, I prefer the gifts of several good witches I know: purpose, compassion, and good humor. (pg 83)
Men fear feminine power. That's why laws, religion, and strict mores have been imposed for centuries-- all kinds of restrictions on women's intellectual, economic, and artistic development. In the past, thousands and thousands of women accused of witchery were tortured and burned alive because they knew too much; they had the power of knowledge. (pg 108)
I'm going to assume she's using "witch" as a general term that was once derogatory for women and still has a rich literary context.
Final Grade: A-
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