Simone de Beauvoir and My Angst

It is not the actual male authors Simone de Beauvoir mentions in her piece “Myths” that are the point; it is the fact that their ideas are oppressing, even though they did not realize it. These men feel that they are doing women a favor by saying lovely, nice, pretty things about them, such as Stendhal. He felt that women could do MORE things than men, sounds good right? Nope. What he goes on to say that women can do and men cannot is open their hearts and create a shelter: essentially be more oppressed. He does not do women a favor what so ever with this statement. He may as well have said that "women can do things men can not, and that’s scrub floors really really well, and cook very good spaghetti. I mean, I can sort of do these things, it's just that women do it better." Why couldn't he have just said that men and women are equal or something along those lines? He's not breaking any stereotypes by saying that women can open their hearts, so what is the point him saying it? To make women feel better? Thanks Stendhal, I can rest well now that I know that there is at least one thing I can do that a man cannot, and that is create shelter. (I'm being sarcastic by the way...)

Montherlant – We know he is a transcendent from our text. He is obviously an antifeminist author, and finds great pleasure is findings ways that men are greater that women. What was interesting to me was that he would purposely and consciously put women in a place lower than he, and then relish the fact that he was superior. Montherlant’s cycle of novels he wrote entitled “The Girls” involves a man who is adored and admired by women, yet he is always rejecting them. It speaks out against feminine possessiveness as well as for male dominance.

Breton – Felt the exact opposite of Montherlant. He felt that women brought peace. He feels that women tear him from his subjectivity. He was very interested in eliminating the differences between dream and reality, subject and object, sanity and insanity.

Stendhal – Simone de Beauvoir felt that Stendhal was distinctive in demonstrating the understanding his women as actual human creatures who are like men. He felt that they were destined for mediocrity because they were female. He feels that there are some things that women can do that men can not, one being the fact that she can open her heart to him and shelter him.

Claudel – Claudel viewed women as “soul-sisters” and felt that they should give as much as men do in terms of love, and they should be just as devotional. He seems to feel that women are a possibility for either salvation or temptation. He is one of the least arrogant out of the many authors she discusses.