Is there any such thing as ‘women’s language’?

[The Unnamable]

The recent discussion about Katherine Anne Porter’s Morning Song on the ‘Poem Of The Week’ thread raised a number of issues relating to feminism. Obviously women are biologically different from men but they also have different physical experiences (childbirth and menstruation) and different cultural and ideological forces shaping them. Does this result in different writing?

In The Semiotic and the Symbolic, Julia Kristeva links ‘feminine’ discourse with the pre-linguistic ‘babble’ of the child before it enters the ‘symbolic’ system of language. I’ve only dipped into Kristeva and Cixous but find the former far more interesting than the latter, whose work seems to focus on challenging ‘phallic’ discourse and producing the same polarity that she finds objectionable about such discourse but this time in favour of women’s bodies.

While flicking through a book of women’s poetry, I came across this poem by New Zealand poet, Fleur Adcock. Is it me or is this not only a fabulous piece of writing but also a kick in the teeth to the likes of Mr John Donne and the Metaphysicals?


The Ex-Queen among the Astronomers

They serve revolving saucer eyes,
dishes of stars; they wait upon
huge lenses hung aloft to frame
the slow procession of the skies.

They calculate, adjust, record,
watch transits, measure distances.
They carry pocket telescopes
to spy through when they walk abroad.

Spectra possess their eyes; they face
upwards, alert for meteorites,
cherishing little glassy worlds:
receptacles for outer space.

But she, exiled, expelled, ex-queen,
swishes among the men of science
waiting for cloudy skies, for nights
when constellations can’t be seen.

She wears the rings he let her keep;
she walks as she was taught to walk
for his approval, years ago.
His bitter features taunt her sleep.

And so when these have laid aside
their telescopes, when lids are closed
between machine and sky, she seeks
terrestrial bodies to bestride.

She plucks this one or that among
the astronomers, and is become
his canopy, his occultation;
she sucks at earlobe, penis, tongue

mouthing the tubes of flesh; her hair
crackles, her eyes are comet-sparks.
She brings the distant briefly close
above his dreamy abstract stare.

Fleur Adcock


Brilliant – exceptionally clever and with a purpose.

[wingedspiral]

Yes, to anwser your first question on there, I do think that if a woman writes then she will write of her own will and experiences. However, this is also true for a man, both will but a little of themselves into what they write, weather male or female.

[subterranean]

I don't know much about language study, but personally I think there are these times, where a woman would say some things, perhaps just in common words, and the opposite sex would consider them as common words, but actually these words are deeply meaningful to her. And this happen only if they are said by woman

[Dark Lady]

I read a book about analysing poetry recently that had a small section at the end about feminism and writing style. It asked the same question and also said that feminists also complain that all language is sexist. If that is (and I'm not saying it necessarally is) the case then surely it is much worse in languages that have masculine and feminine words?

I think there probably is a difference in general, although I have started reading something before and then realised afterwards that the sex of the writer was the opposite to what I had thought. Maybe that makes the point that there is a difference, though, since there was obviously something about the style of writing that made me think it was one or the other?

To go slightly off topic - I'm really glad Unamable posted a poem by Fleur Adcock because out of all the poetry I've studied recently it was one of her poems that really struck me. I haven't had chance to look at any of her other work so it was nice to find that here.

[Virgil]

The recent discussion about Katherine Anne Porter’s Morning Song on the ‘Poem Of The Week’ thread raised a number of issues relating to feminism. Obviously women are biologically different from men but they also have different physical experiences (childbirth and menstruation) and different cultural and ideological forces shaping them. Does this result in different writing?

This is an interesting question. To me it's a no-brainer that women's distinct experiences find their way into the fiction and poetry. But do women, or men as well, write dfferently because of their biological differences? I don't know how you could prove that.



In The Semiotic and the Symbolic, Julia Kristeva links ‘feminine’ discourse with the pre-linguistic ‘babble’ of the child before it enters the ‘symbolic’ system of language.
Now that sounds like babble. :lol:

[Regit]

I hate to categorise, especially writers; but I think that it is definitely possible to draw a vague line here. Simply because of such great differences in experience of life. Though I must shamefully admit that I have never read a novel or a book written by a woman. :eek2: I know, I was shocked myself, when I was going through my bookshelf in search of some kind of argument to post. Thus I don't really have one until I read one book at least. Any suggestions? :)

[jackyyyy]

Harry Potter

[ShoutGrace]

..........

[smilingtearz]

don't the experiences make and the background affect "the language"?

leave out harry potter...

[jackyyyy]

Does this result in different writing?

We might have assumed differences between a female writer and a male writer 200 years ago because of content, and natural biases, but I don't think so because of technique, and nor content anymore. Obviously, a woman's biases can mean a difference in her work to a man's, same as one man's biases to the next man. I am including in this word 'biases', experiences, education, role, work, culture, etc. I think if you had asked this questions 200 years ago adn stook to a single environment, culture, even religion, it would be an easier matter to draw lines. A female writer from 200 years ago stood out because it was not the norm. Also, can you imagine a female version of Milton? Would that have been possible? Or conversely, a male version of Charlotte Bronte? This comment does not reference ALL women either, there are still societies on this planet where women writer's are not so free to express themselves, same as where exist religious biases. While many women 'chose' to write of feminism, and applying their biases, this does not separate technique between women and men. The fact that more women may write about children, the home, etc, is still an environmental bias. Today, a woman's environment can be much more diverse, as a man's, and we'd like to think its common to a man's (and vice versa) so I would expect to see a female version of Milton, and I mean here, without references to nurturing, home, etc, and with more reference to politics and war. I think the best writers of either sex, and even those in the middle, are able to take themselves outside of their biases, be somewhat neutral, and put themselves squarely into the topic at hand. This is not to say the final work is better or worse, just the separation of women's to men's technique, style, etc, does not exist, and probably never did.

[ShoutGrace]

Would that have been possible? Or conversely, a male version of Charlotte Bronte?

Thats funny and true.


think the best writers of either sex, and even those in the middle, are able to take themselves outside of their biases, be somewhat neutral, and put themselves squarely into the topic at hand.

Do you think that male writers have traditionally been the best at this?

[jackyyyy]

Thats funny and true.



Do you think that male writers have traditionally been the best at this?
I can hardly use the word 'best', just more able because of their circumstances and environmental biases. More men went to War therefore were able to relate to it with that perspective, so its natural to see more War poetry by men. Converse being true for women. As I mentioned, today these lines are not so defined.

[The Unnamable]

I can see now that I should have asked the question differently. I should have asked, “Is language gendered?” because most people are considering whether or not the content of women’s writing is different from men’s, which is not what I meant. Virginia Woolf in A Room Of One’s Own suggests that language itself is gendered (and I don’t mean that she complains that critics write ‘he’ when they refer to the ‘reader’). The idea is that female writers have to use a medium that is primarily a male instrument fashioned for male purposes. But, as I don’t think anyone would like to get into that debate, does anyone have anything to say about the Fleur Adcock poem? I bet no one has even noticed that there is a reference to fellatio (for those of you of a nervous disposition, he plays left back for Juventus). I bet some of you will now read it for the first time. :nod:

[jackyyyy]

I can see now that I should have asked the question differently. I should have asked, “Is language gendered?” because most people are considering whether or not the content of women’s writing is different from men’s, which is not what I meant. Virginia Woolf in A Room Of One’s Own suggests that language itself is gendered (and I don’t mean that she complains that critics write ‘he’ when they refer to the ‘reader’). The idea is that female writers have to use a medium that is primarily a male instrument fashioned for male purposes. But, as I don’t think anyone would like to get into that debate, does anyone have anything to say about the Fleur Adcock poem? I bet no one has even noticed that there is a reference to fellatio (for those of you of a nervous disposition, he plays left back for Juventus). I bet some of you will now read it for the first time. :nod:I did wonder the question, then decided to take a stab at it anyway. And, btw, Virginia Woolf always comes to my mind when I consider this question. If I may ask, can you explain, '...use a medium that is primarily a male instrument' ? Where and how is 'a' male instrument? I'm thick today.

And, hehe, Felatio was some Roman uncle fellah, wasn't he? I can't imagine anyone missed that meat. Re the poem, the first thing I noticed is the 4 and 4. Quite a sharp cut at Stanza #5.

[Xamonas Chegwe]

Fellatio? You mean it's not about oral sex? I'm well confused now. :confused:

[subterranean]

The idea is that female writers have to use a medium that is primarily a male instrument fashioned for male purposes.

Is this mean there's something missing in our current language?

[Virgil]

I can see now that I should have asked the question differently. I should have asked, “Is language gendered?” because most people are considering whether or not the content of women’s writing is different from men’s, which is not what I meant. Virginia Woolf in A Room Of One’s Own suggests that language itself is gendered (and I don’t mean that she complains that critics write ‘he’ when they refer to the ‘reader’).
As far as I can tell people make a mountain out of a mole hill on this. Nouns are nouns, verbs are verbs, and adjectives are adjectives. There are a few pronouns that can be gneder sensitive, but like that really makes a big difference.


I bet no one has even noticed that there is a reference to fellatio (for those of you of a nervous disposition, he plays left back for Juventus). I bet some of you will now read it for the first time.
You're right. I didn't read it until you mentioned that. :lol: That will get my attention. ;)

Did you say her name was Fleur Ad-****? :D


The idea is that female writers have to use a medium that is primarily a male instrument fashioned for male purposes.

Even if that was true, and I would dispute it, so what? My wife uses the english language quite well. I don't see any handicap, especially when it comes to four letter words directed at me. :D Plenty of women writers out there doing well. In the U.S. there are now a substantally larger percentage of women college graduates over men

[Shanna]

You're right. I didn't read it until you mentioned that. :lol: That will get my attention. ;) Well..


Even if that was true, and I would dispute it, so what? My wife uses the english language quite well. I don't see any handicap, especially when it comes to four letter words directed at me. :D Plenty of women writers out there doing well. In the U.S. there are now a substantally larger percentage of women college graduates over men
And of course you will profess to be shocked if anyone calls this statement patronizing.

[Virgil]

Well..


And of course you will profess to be shocked if anyone calls this statement patronizing.
Patronizing? Yeah, I would be shocked.

[The Unnamable]

can you explain, '...use a medium that is primarily a male instrument' ? Where and how is 'a' male instrument?
Someone else asked me about this via a PM. It’s far more complex than I can explain here. Nor have I read enough of Kristeva and Cixous to be in any position to do so.

The idea, as simply as I can put it, is that language and our use of it are structured in such a way as to reflect a view of the world as men see it. In simplistic terms, you can see some examples of this in the Language as Control thread:

http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?t=15115&page=1

The bit about gender begins at #7

The idea of gendered content, referred to by so many above, is easy to demonstrate. I hope you agree that men have dominated Literature. Before the arrival of the novel, it was virtually impossible for women to succeed as writers. Even when it did arrive, some had to assume male pseudonyms. Women wishing to move into this world were even less likely to succeed if they rejected the dominant conventions of literary value – so the choice is either accept them (and by doing so, allow your own concerns to be submerged in the male-defined view of what counts as literary merit) or be marginalised as a producer of pretty writing.

The idea that language itself (as a system) is gendered is more difficult to understand, but I’ll try by using Laura Mulvey’s idea of the ‘male gaze’, which relates to films.

In her book, Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, Mulvey “attempts to explain how it is that the spectator's subjectivity (or sense of self) is constructed in the visually pleasurable process of watching films. Her focus is intentional: part of Mulvey's argument is that mainstream films follow a particular format or narrative structure that shapes how we watch films. Her aim is to take that structure apart (or 'deconstruct' it) in order to show how classical narrative cinema, to use Althusser's (1971) terms, hails or interpellates spectators into a "masculine" subject position.”

You can read the rest of this essay here: http://www.gate.net/~dsaco/Female_Gaze.htm

It’s not that long and fairly readable, so if you are interested, have a click. The essay also makes some interesting points about something blp mentioned in his post about Andy Warhol’s films. If you want to see how the ideas relate to specific films, try this http://www.orsonwelles.co.uk/HollywoodWomen2.htm

The reason I mention Mulvey is that I think there is a similarity with what the Feminist Theorists appear to be arguing, albeit on a much more essential level. It’s not difficult to think of the experience of writing a book as being similar to that of making a film but instead of just thinking in terms of theme or content, think about the way meanings are being constructed and the assumptions behind that process.

[Regit]

Harry Potter
Dude, you're joking right?:p

[jackyyyy]

Someone else asked me about this via a PM. It’s far more complex than I can explain here. Nor have I read enough of Kristeva and Cixous to be in any position to do so.

Thank you for the attention to my question, and I will give your recommendations my best attention. I can see its a highly important concept, maybe the answer to many things, outside of literature too.

The spectator sees through the eye of the camera which in turn 'sees' through the eye (or 'I': meaning, the constructed gendered and sexual identity) of the character who does the looking. According to Mulvey, the character possessing the look in classical narrative cinema is almost always marked as 'male'. For this reason, she argues that the 'gaze' in mainstream films is always male. Through this privileged gaze, film viewers, regardless of their actual gender, are treated (and hence re-constructed) as masculine subjects.

[jackyyyy]

Dude, you're joking right?:pI wasn't actually, but I concur to leave it out. After I get my head straightened, I may introduce it.

[Shanna]

But she, exiled, expelled, ex-queen,
swishes among the men of science
waiting for cloudy skies, for nights
when constellations can’t be seen.

She wears the rings he let her keep;
she walks as she was taught to walk
for his approval, years ago.
His bitter features taunt her sleep.

And so when these have laid aside
their telescopes, when lids are closed
between machine and sky, she seeks
terrestrial bodies to bestride.

She plucks this one or that among
the astronomers, and is become
his canopy, his occultation;
she sucks at earlobe, penis, tongue

mouthing the tubes of flesh; her hair
crackles, her eyes are comet-sparks.
She brings the distant briefly close
above his dreamy abstract stare.
How, though? Brilliant, yes, but I'm not sure about the kick in the teeth business. It is not that she desires the astronomers, or any man, for that matter, other than the king who 'exiled, expelled' her. She may seek 'terrestrial bodies to bestride' but it is not for her own pleasure. Her existence is limited, the manner and scope of her living defined within a structure not applicable anymore. As a character - as a woman - she remains highly controlled. Lovely poem though, because of the poet's awareness/perceptiveness/discrimination. (Hence, kick in their teeth..?)

[blp]

it is much worse in languages that have masculine and feminine words?


In German, shreckliche means terrible, which I don't think has any gender connotation, but the opposite, herrliche, wonderful, is said by a German speaking friend of mine to be directly related to Herr - gentleman; Mr.

[Xamonas Chegwe]

In German, shreckliche means terrible, which I don't think has any gender connotation

I dunno about that. He looks pretty male to me! :lol:

http://www.cineclub.de/images/2001/shrek_6.jpg

[The Unnamable]

Someone has actually taken on the poem!


How, though? Brilliant, yes, but I'm not sure about the kick in the teeth business. It is not that she desires the astronomers, or any man, for that matter, other than the king who 'exiled, expelled' her. She may seek 'terrestrial bodies to bestride' but it is not for her own pleasure.
Why do you say this? In my reading of it she is consuming them for her own pleasure. “She plucks at this one or that” – suggests a role reversal – men are usually the ones that ‘pluck’ their next conquests, taking their innocence in their stride. “this one or that one” suggests an indiscriminate approach that is again usually characteristic of male behaviour. The word ‘bestride’ is not that common. The only other use of it that came to mind immediately is Shakespeare’s in Antony and Cleopatra:

“his legs bestrid the ocean”

The description sounds as if she is enjoying herself:

“her hair
crackles, her eyes are comet-sparks.
She brings the distant briefly close
above his dreamy abstract stare.”

Her active physicality is contrasted with the men’s passive dreaminess. She ‘brings them down to earth’, to use the pun the poet seems to be alluding to. She is the flesh and blood physicality right up close. I think men are sometimes (often?) guilty of this – looking into the far off distance for some abstract feminine ideal while all the real fun of physicality and intimacy is right before their eyes – perhaps too real to deal with. (I find Hitchcock’s Vertigo fascinating in dealing with a similar idea.)

I’ll try to explain why I said ‘kick in the teeth’ and why I think this poem is relevant to the question of women’s writing. I think Adcock is writing a modern metaphysical poem, which challenges many of the assumptions and assertions of male Metaphysical Poets and does it by adopting and subverting the very techniques they themselves used.

The opening of the Adcock poem is reminiscent of and could even be a response to George Herbert’s Vanitie (I). The opening stanza of that poem is:

The fleet Astronomer can bore,
And thred the spheres with his quick-piercing minde:
He views their stations, walks from doore to doore,
Surveys, as if he had design’d
To make a purchase there: he sees their dances,
And knoweth long before
Both their full-ey’d aspects, and secret glances.

The difference is very marked (and very unfair to Herbert, who is an unassuming, gentle poet). The gaze of Herbert’s astronomer is penetrating and takes in the whole cosmos; Adcock’s are passive recipients (the traditional role for women). The contrast is between subject and object positions. This poet’s astronomers ‘serve’, they ‘wait upon’ and ‘Spectra possess their eyes’. One of the key characteristics of many ‘learned’ poets is their use of literary allusion. For the Metaphysicals it was extended to include allusion to the world of science. In both cases the point is that the writers are making us aware of their command of a preordained body of knowledge. Their validity as great poets is partly dependent on it. But the majority of this body of knowledge is male dominated. For a woman poet of Donne’s time to have been taken seriously, she would have had to familiarise herself with (and work within) this body of male knowledge. In other words, she would have to adopt the same approach as men, use the same language (not literally the same ‘words’). Any departure from male discursive practices would not only be utterly radical, it would also have been doomed to failure. These are the sorts of things that I meant by the processes of literary creation being gendered. I think that’s it’s ideological but I don’t know that it could be seen as gendered to the extent that the Feminist Theorists claim.

Adcock is displaying metaphysical wit but has turned the tables - not in some stupid anti-men way but cleverly, to suit her own style and purpose. The tactic of inverting the conventional is itself worthy of Donne. These men are merely ‘receptacles for outer space’ – in the more derogatory comments about women, we often hear women described in this way, albeit with far cruder language. Whatever the artistic merits of Sarah Lucas, I can’t help smiling with some recognition of the degree of truth there is in these (which I’ve provided as external links so if you are easily offended, PLEASE DON’T CLICK).

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y73/stonemewhatalife/S_Lucas.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y73/stonemewhatalife/two_fried_eggs_and_a_kebab.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y73/stonemewhatalife/Au_Naturel_Sarah_Lucas.jpg

In those last two stanzas, the woman is the sexual predator reducing men to mere objects. Few men I know would be happy to consider their penises as merely ‘tubes of flesh’ – yet every day women are reduced to a single body part (consider the pun on **** in Marvell’s ‘quaint honour’ from To His Coy Mistress).

The fact that this is not merely a simple reversal of the usual male / female hierarchy is what I like about the poem – you say that ‘her existence is still limited’ and I would agree – she is an Ex-queen and the power she has over men is brief. But that’s far more ‘realistic’ than any idea of a new great age of female domination. It also seems far more indicative of genuine equality.

[blp]

Is it me or is this not only a fabulous piece of writing but also a kick in the teeth to the likes of Mr John Donne and the Metaphysicals?


Can you explain? I don't know enough about the Metaphysical poets to understand.

**edit** scratch that. I've just seen your post above.

[Shanna]

“She plucks at this one or that” – suggests a role reversal – men are usually the ones that ‘pluck’ their next conquests, taking their innocence in their stride. “this one or that one” suggests an indiscriminate approach that is again usually characteristic of male behaviour. The word ‘bestride’ is not that common. ..
The description sounds as if she is enjoying herself:

“her hair
crackles, her eyes are comet-sparks.
She brings the distant briefly close
above his dreamy abstract stare.”Agreed, but while I love the power she holds, while I am tempted to agree with you - I don't feel completely clear about this. I don't think any of it is for herself. What rankled after my first reading of the poem was the bit that goes "She wears the rings he let her keep;/ she walks as she was taught to walk/ for his approval, years ago./ His bitter features taunt her sleep." She is exactly who he made her and no more. Or well - she may be more, and I think this is evidenced by her seeking out the astronomers night after night; she has more vitality than any king could ever desire in any queen of his - it is not enough, what he gave her, what he took away from her. But she still acts within a framework. She is still the source of pleasure for men - "She brings the distant briefly close/ above his dreamy abstract stare" - she does not yet seek it for herself.


She is the flesh and blood physicality right up close. I think men are sometimes (often?) guilty of this – looking into the far off distance for some abstract feminine ideal while all the real fun of physicality and intimacy is right before their eyes – perhaps too real to deal with.I think Adcock radiates that flesh and blood physicality in all her writing, she just can't help it. I came across Against Coupling the other day. Lovely.

'I advise you, then, to embrace it without
Encumbrance. No need to set the scene,
Dress up (or undress), make speeches.
Five minutes of solitude are
Enough - in the bath, or to fill
That gap between the Sunday papers and lunch.'


The gaze of Herbert’s astronomer is penetrating and takes in the whole cosmos; Adcock’s are passive recipients (the traditional role for women). The contrast is between subject and object positions. This poet’s astronomers ‘serve’, they ‘wait upon’ and ‘Spectra possess their eyes’. True. Adcock's astronomers seem frail, fanciful, and for all their knowledge, rather bubble-headed. They cut a sorry figure when placed next to the ex-queen. And in the poem they're the ones to 'just lie there'.

[blp]

I dunno about that. He looks pretty male to me! :lol:

http://www.cineclub.de/images/2001/shrek_6.jpg

Ein sehr unherrlich Witz, XC. You should be truly ashamed. ;)

[Shanna]

The description sounds as if she is enjoying herself:
"..her hair
crackles, her eyes are comet-sparks.
She brings the distant briefly close
above his dreamy abstract stare.”Somehow, you seem to me to be overlooking something here. Enjoying herself? She certainly derives no physical pleasure from this interaction, the way I see it. Something vague to do with sensuality perhaps, but hardly sexual gratification. She gives, but demands nothing back as her due. If there is any pleasure she does find, it would be only from pleasing men, from finding her place in the scheme of things. From doing to other men what she is prohibited from doing to the king anymore.

[The Unnamable]

Agreed, but while I love the power she holds, while I am tempted to agree with you - I don't feel completely clear about this. I don't think any of it is for herself. What rankled after my first reading of the poem was the bit that goes "She wears the rings he let her keep;/ she walks as she was taught to walk/ for his approval, years ago./ His bitter features taunt her sleep." She is exactly who he made her and no more. Or well - she may be more, and I think this is evidenced by her seeking out the astronomers night after night; she has more vitality than any king could ever desire in any queen of his - it is not enough, what he gave her, what he took away from her. But she still acts within a framework. She is still the source of pleasure for men - "She brings the distant briefly close/ above his dreamy abstract stare" - she does not yet seek it for herself.
At first, the ex-queen is introduced as the product of male mistreatment (although that might be too strong a word) but this changes in the next three stanzas, where she is no longer an object of male anything – she seeks, she plucks, she sucks, she brings. Perhaps she isn’t seeking sexual conquest simply for the sake of her own physical pleasure but she isn’t doing it to serve men, either. That they might get some pleasure out of this (although I’m not sure they do from the way they are described in the poem) is probably a by-product of men’s attitude to sex - but I still see them as being mocked, or at least much more a passive recipient than she is. It’s a bit like when men make jokes about being raped by women – implying that they (the men) would probably enjoy the experience. Boys will be boys. I find it amusing that the ‘pocket telescopes’ of earlier are replaced by ‘tubes of flesh’. She is more rooted in physical reality than they are.


Somehow, you seem to me to be overlooking something here. Enjoying herself? She certainly derives no physical pleasure from this interaction, the way I see it. Something vague to do with sensuality perhaps, but hardly sexual gratification.
In all honesty, this is where I find it difficult to say much, being male. Despite many conversations with (often edgy) women about this, I can reach no conclusions about the female attitude to sex. So I don’t know whether she can experience sexual gratification from the way she behaves here. I know men can and can’t see why women shouldn’t be able to (some women I know are perfectly capable of enjoying sex as a purely physical, recreational pastime) but, not actually being female, I doubt I will ever know. She certainly seems full of vitality in those last stanzas and that vitality is cosmic in scale. This is where I find it witty in the metaphysical sense. They used learned allusion to the worlds of science and cosmography to describe human love; Adcock uses it to describe sexual predation – even more unexpectedly, female sexual predation.


She gives, but demands nothing back as her due. If there is any pleasure she does find, it would be only from pleasing men, from finding her place in the scheme of things. From doing to other men what she is prohibited from doing to the king anymore.
It’s interesting that you use ‘doing to’ rather than ‘doing with’. I am back to the unfathomable nature of female sexuality and the question I have will need to be asked via PM as I can’t ask it or expect you to consider it in public.

I think Adcock intentionally leaves things ambiguous and offers no simple resolution. Even in this she is rejecting the usual literary conventions and, by implication (given what I said earlier), patriarchal systems of meaning. She isn’t offering us a feminist utopia – she has no more answers than the rest of us. She is, however, making us more aware of and challenging the assumptions of male culture.

[Shanna]

Perhaps she isn’t seeking sexual conquest simply for the sake of her own physical pleasure but she isn’t doing it to serve men, either. That they might get some pleasure out of this (although I’m not sure they do from the way they are described in the poem) is probably a by-product of men’s attitude to sex - but I still see them as being mocked, or at least much more a passive recipient than she is. I disagree. With the “but she isn’t doing it to serve men either” bit. I think there is something incredibly powerful about her, but that 'something' exists within the restraints of what she has been taught to be. She transcends some of those boundaries easily, unconsciously, but not all. The entire poem is like a single snapshot taken by a single person – we hear no voices, no words spoken directly by the characters. For me, the fact that I don’t hear her speak is what lends her her ambiguity – there is a degree of definition that is avoided in that manner. And the avoidance is probably deliberate on Adcock’s part, like you said. The ex-queen is very earthly, unlike the astronomers, which is really what leads to the little niggling thing in the back of my mind – I start to wonder what she might have to say - if only I could hear her voice, I would know if she is trapped, if she actually struggles with any sort of inability to transcend her condition ("his bitter features taunt her sleep.") – in other words, if her 'condition' is something imposed (by society, by the king or by her own, private grief) – or if she unchallengably and entirely holds the sort of potency the astronomers can never even dream of approaching. The astronomers, on the other hand, despite the fact that we do not hear them speak either, have no such ambiguity about them – they will never be part of the realms she traverses so easily.


They used learned allusion to the worlds of science and cosmography to describe human love; Adcock uses it to describe sexual predation – even more unexpectedly, female sexual predation.I still think it falls slightly short of ‘predation’. Simply because I don’t see her having a single orgasm. As opposed to the men she indubitably, in my opinion, brings pleasure to.


It’s interesting that you use ‘doing to’ rather than ‘doing with’.What else? The men have no participation whatsoever. She is a giant compared to them. They’re saved from absolute inconsequence by her presence, her mere proximity. If any of them dared to touch her, it would be like insect wings – just short of imperceptible to her.

I read somewhere – Adcock talking about the poem – says the king divorced her because she was barren and therefore, useless to him. Will post link tomorrow when I find it.

[Dark Lady]

I don't know how to quote bits of other people's posts (I just tried but computers don't seem to like me) otherwise I'd include a bit from one of Unnamable's posts. After reading the links to the essays on the 'male gaze' I thought that if anything the poem is a great example of this. Unnamable, you talked about the men just gazing at the ex-queen but isn't that what those links were all about? She is described as this larger-than-life sexual being that the men watch.

I agree with Shanna in that I don't think the ex-queen seems to get much sexual pleasure from her conquests. She remainds me slightly of Estella from 'Great Expectations'. She uses men but doesn't gain anything much from it. She has just been moulded by somebody else.

[The Unnamable]

I disagree. With the “but she isn’t doing it to serve men either” bit. I think there is something incredibly powerful about her, but that 'something' exists within the restraints of what she has been taught to be.
Thought you might. ;)
Okay, I can see why you disagree but I think the poem is deliberately complex and difficult because the situation it explores is. Gender politics are complicated. However, I cannot see any evidence that the woman is simply providing men with a sexual service: She actively hunts them. It’s not as if they are particularly interested in sex – she only gets her chance to seduce them (better word than predation implies?) when it’s too cloudy for them to see the stars, their real interest. You could argue that she is a damaged woman who can only feel any sense of self worth by conforming to male ideas about women, so she needs to be a sexual object in order to please men. But she isn’t presented as a sexual object. If Adcock were like some of the other feminist writers I’ve encountered, then what you say would probably be true. But I don’t think the poet is taking that easy option.

If you look at the way the poem is structured, you will notice the pattern ‘They…They…But she…And so…She…She…’. The emphasis is on the contrast between them. The men are the thralls in this poem; they are the servants and receptacles. And what they passively serve is abstract and as insubstantial and non-physical as a dream. She dominates terrestrial bodies: they are dominated by the skies.


She transcends some of those boundaries easily, unconsciously, but not all.
By saying this, it seems to me that you are taking the approach that Adcock has deliberately avoided. Of course the queen doesn’t transcend all boundaries – none of us ever can. Adcock is not offering us some idealised superwoman who will assert herself by breaking free of all aspects of a gender-constructed identity. She doesn’t simply replace male power with female power. Perhaps you would prefer it if she did?


I start to wonder what she might have to say - if only I could hear her voice, I would know if she is trapped, if she actually struggles with any sort of inability to transcend her condition ("his bitter features taunt her sleep.") – in other words, if her 'condition' is something imposed (by society, by the king or by her own, private grief)
I can’t deal with what she might say; I can only deal here with what the poet has given us. Perhaps the ‘And so’ that opens stanza six does carry the suggestion that her past mistreatment provides the reason for her current behaviour but, once again, I don’t think Adcock has simply given us a picture of some vengeful woman getting her own back on men.


I still think it falls slightly short of ‘predation’. Simply because I don’t see her having a single orgasm. As opposed to the men she indubitably, in my opinion, brings pleasure to.
If predation is too strong a word, how do you explain, “She plucks this one or that”? Also, “her hair / crackles, her eyes are comet-sparks” – sounds orgasmic to me! :D Surely the point is that these men look to the skies for comets when they are, in fact, right in front of them, in a much more real and physical form. Are the men really getting pleasure? Their stare remains ‘dreamy’ and ‘abstract’. I think that Adcock is reminding us that ‘tubes of flesh’ are more fun than ‘pocket telescopes’. Think of Donne in this context. Did he write The Flea to seduce an actual woman or did he write it to amuse his mates?


What else? The men have no participation whatsoever.
The point was that using ‘doing to’ to describe sex implies that it’s not something you share but something you either give or receive. And if these men have no participation whatsoever, then how can you say they definitely get pleasure?


After reading the links to the essays on the 'male gaze' I thought that if anything the poem is a great example of this. Unnamable, you talked about the men just gazing at the ex-queen but isn't that what those links were all about? She is described as this larger-than-life sexual being that the men watch.

I agree with Shanna in that I don't think the ex-queen seems to get much sexual pleasure from her conquests. She remainds me slightly of Estella from 'Great Expectations'. She uses men but doesn't gain anything much from it. She has just been moulded by somebody else.
The women are ganging up on me! Now I know how Herbert would have felt.

No, I don’t think she is simply an example of the male gaze. In Mulvey’s argument, the gaze is for the purpose of consumption. No one is consuming this woman as a sexual object. There is no voyeuristic pleasure involved as far as I can see. These men gaze because their attention is elsewhere and they are too preoccupied with the distant and abstract to respond to the physical and close up. As for whether or not she enjoys it, see my comment above where I say that I don’t feel qualified chromosomologically (sic) to decide about women’s sexuality.

[jackyyyy]

If predation is too strong a word, how do you explain, “She plucks this one or that”? Also, “her hair / crackles, her eyes are comet-sparks” – sounds orgasmic to me! :D Surely the point is that these men look to the skies for comets when they are, in fact, right in front of them, in a much more real and physical form. Are the men really getting pleasure? Their stare remains ‘dreamy’ and ‘abstract’. I think that Adcock is reminding us that ‘tubes of flesh’ are more fun than ‘pocket telescopes’. Think of Donne in this context. Did he write The Flea to seduce an actual woman or did he write it to amuse his mates?I agree with Shanna, predation is too strong a term. I think "plucks" refers to the choice, rather like plucking a bottle of Bordeux or Burgundy.. or even simpler, plucking one margarine over another off the shelf in a grocery store. Predation assumes a hunt, has to find it, stab it down for her own consumption, will DIE without it. Whereas here, the men are perfectly willing to be plucked off the shelf. I don't think the men are being lemmings either. Simply, they are too busy looking at comets most of the time, so she patiently awaits the moment when she can be a 'queen' again.

"her hair crackles, her eyes are comet-sparks", eyes darting around in excitement, hair crackles with electricity (when excited) - 'choice' and the 'moment' creates a type of excitement. I sense humility in her voice.


within the restraints of what she has been taught to be.I agree with this from Shanna, and believe it sums up everything going on here.

I read up on the 'male eye' concept, and I would have written up a 50,000 page thesis on that :D , however I was fortunate to reduce it to one word, 'money'. Unnamable sums it up here too, 'consumption'. What I felt interesting about the 'male eye' concept, and I am not really sure Mulvey mentions it or not, is NOT that the male eye is dominant in the production of writing and so forthe, rather, the woman is lenient.

I really don't know how that applies in respect of this poem, its audience/consumer can be either sex. Maybe its news to some. What I find great about this poem, is the 'lack' of ambiguity. Any ambiguity is created by the reader, not the writer. No?

[jackyyyy]

I don't know how to quote bits of other people's posts (I just tried but computers don't seem to like me) otherwise I'd include a bit from one of Unnamable's posts. Computers don't like me either, but thats for other reasons. ;) Cut and paste with your mouse, or hit the quote button then remove what you don't want to quote. There is a 'quote' icon in the 'advanced' mode, so highlight the text and hit the dialog box (quote icon) to quote it. Hope that helps.

[The Unnamable]

I think "plucks" refers to the choice, rather like plucking a bottle of Bordeux or Burgundy.. or even simpler, plucking one margarine over another off the shelf in a grocery store. Predation assumes a hunt, has to find it, stab it down for her own consumption, will DIE without it. Whereas here, the men are perfectly willing to be plucked off the shelf.
Oh dear, unless you are joking, I think you are failing to see the implications of your own words here. Firstly, do you think the act of deciding on a sexual partner is simply another consumer choice? Let’s reverse the gender roles for a moment and say that choosing a woman is no different from picking up a particular brand of margarine from the shelf. Is that how you see it? Would you like to be considered as nothing more than a particular choice from a range of similar products? “You’ll do – haven’t tried you yet.” I bet that makes a person feel special. When, on another thread, I said that women were like different flavours of crisps, I was not being serious (in spite of what very stupid people might have you believe). You sound as if you are serious but I could be wrong. It’s difficult to tell – I have never heard anyone say that they are going to ‘pluck’ a Burgundy/Bordeaux or a tub of margarine.

Secondly, surely the use of the word ‘plucks’ together with ‘this one or that’ in this context has a particular resonance? While it might be appropriate to use the word as in to ‘pluck’ a chicken before cooking it, when the context is referring to choice of sexual partners, it has very different overtones. I don’t think ‘pluck’ simply refers to having a choice but to the grabbing, indiscriminate nature of the person doing the choosing. There is also the expression ‘to pluck a flower’, which I assume the poet is relying on here – an act that has been likened to taking a person’s virginity.


I agree with this from Shanna, and believe it sums up everything going on here.
If she can’t in any way escape the restraints of her male-defined identity, how can she become anything other than what they made her? They made her to be passive and subservient but she isn’t. If it’s “everything going on here”, then why does Adcock set up the very telling contrast? How can she be described as having any power at all?


Any ambiguity is created by the reader, not the writer. No?
Can someone not write a deliberately ambiguous statement?

[blp]

Reminds me a bit of a woman who told me she once slept with a guy because he beat her at chess. Sleeping with him was her way of getting, er, 'one-up' on him after her defeat. She didn't seem to understand that, to the guy, the victory and the sex left him two-up.

Still, I could see her point - and Adcock's - something about the way the immediacy of sexual contact strikes dumb and makes a mockery of more strictly cerebral concerns - even those that have a certain power to induce awe. Nevetheless, a few niggles - which will have to wait.

[Shanna]

Eh. After hearing you out I feel like I may have made some really shoddy arguments in that last post.

Gender politics are complicated. However, I cannot see any evidence that the woman is simply providing men with a sexual service: She actively hunts them. Both, I think. Again, ‘hunts’, I think is too strong a word – I see her wandering somewhat aimlessly about the place until the next cloudy night, and then, when the astronomers have nothing more to distract them, she “is become his canopy, his occultation.” Which is exactly what you said. Now if you pick up a word like ‘plucks’, it is possible to interpret the poem in the sense of the queen going out repeatedly to rape the men for her own gratification. But I would say (again - for the third time, I think) that it is not exactly pleasure she finds, but a sense of things being in some sort of alignment, of finding her place. Incidentally I think the difference between the ways that you and I see her is the same as the difference between kinetic and potential energy. You see her as an active predator, a seeker. I see her as a tightly wound up spring that must once in a while release something into the atmosphere or she will explode – yet something keeps her from seeking pleasure for herself, seeking completion. Most of her ordinary life, for instance in the day, or when she is alone, is carried on at a precarious neutral point between two opposing forces/realities. Badly stated, and at the risk of misinterpreting huge amounts of her history, those opposing forces would be a.) the king/what her people made of her because she was going to be married to the king/whatever she may have experienced while she was a queen – pleasure, luxury, comfort, love (which I doubt), etc – basically amounting to the sum total of her experience before and during her tenure as queen. And b.) betrayal. The sabotaging of her trust by her husband. Being thrown away by a king who no longer desires her, being thrown away in effect by an entire kingdom, after she has devoted her life to becoming – in speech, in manner, in bearing, in dress, in thought, in character – an epitome of some sort, an idealised representative of a vast number of people, and most significantly – his wife. She has been taught not to want things for herself, she has been taught to overlook her own (very potent, very violent, in my opinion) desire, and submit to his, always. And then she has been discarded by the same system, the same person. Which leads to – her current position – one of conflict. Of course half of everything I just said is presumption and the other half is speculation.

You could argue that she is a damaged woman who can only feel any sense of self worth by conforming to male ideas about women, so she needs to be a sexual object in order to please men. But she isn’t presented as a sexual object. No, she isn’t. But she isn’t exactly as clear about what she wants either.


By saying this, it seems to me that you are taking the approach that Adcock has deliberately avoided. Of course the queen doesn’t transcend all boundaries – none of us ever can. Adcock is not offering us some idealised superwoman who will assert herself by breaking free of all aspects of a gender-constructed identity. She doesn’t simply replace male power with female power. Perhaps you would prefer it if she did? God, no.

Perhaps the ‘And so’ that opens stanza six does carry the suggestion that her past mistreatment provides the reason for her current behaviour but, once again, I don’t think Adcock has simply given us a picture of some vengeful woman getting her own back on men. Again, no, that is not where I was going with it. Just that there are traces of some sort of conditioning that she either cannot or has not attempted to free herself entirely from.


If predation is too strong a word, how do you explain, “She plucks this one or that”? I don’t think the word necessarily implies a loss of virginity. I think it is random selection, not random intercourse.

Also, “her hair / crackles, her eyes are comet-sparks” – sounds orgasmic to me!
If you insist. Can’t say that with any degree of certainty though, can you, unlike:
“..she sucks at earlobe, penis, tongue

mouthing the tubes of flesh..”


Surely the point is that these men look to the skies for comets when they are, in fact, right in front of them, in a much more real and physical form. Are the men really getting pleasure? Their stare remains ‘dreamy’ and ‘abstract’. I think that Adcock is reminding us that ‘tubes of flesh’ are more fun than ‘pocket telescopes’. Maybe. I can’t doubt that the men get their pleasure because of “she brings the distant briefly close”, and I am tempted to agree with you here, though I wouldn’t let it change the rest of what I said. Tell me if I contradict myself.


The point was that using ‘doing to’ to describe sex implies that it’s not something you share but something you either give or receive. And if these men have no participation whatsoever, then how can you say they definitely get pleasure?No active participation. They don’t lift a finger. Which I think justifies the ‘doing to’.


The women are ganging up on me! Now I know how Herbert would have felt. About bloody time.

[jackyyyy]

Oh dear, unless you are joking, I think you are failing to see the implications of your own words here. Firstly, do you think the act of deciding on a sexual partner is simply another consumer choice? Let’s reverse the gender roles for a moment and say that choosing a woman is no different from picking up a particular brand of margarine from the shelf. Is that how you see it? Would you like to be considered as nothing more than a particular choice from a range of similar products? “You’ll do – haven’t tried you yet.” I bet that makes a person feel special. When, on another thread, I said that women were like different flavours of crisps, I was not being serious (in spite of what very stupid people might have you believe). You sound as if you are serious but I could be wrong. It’s difficult to tell – I have never heard anyone say that they are going to ‘pluck’ a Burgundy/Bordeaux or a tub of margarine.
No, what I mean is the word pluck, and the difference between predatory and something less pronounced, like plucking from a shelf, and a choice.

[jackyyyy]

If she can’t in any way escape the restraints of her male-defined identity, how can she become anything other than what they made her? They made her to be passive and subservient but she isn’t. If it’s “everything going on here”, then why does Adcock set up the very telling contrast? How can she be described as having any power at all?
I disagree. With the “but she isn’t doing it to serve men either” bit. I think there is something incredibly powerful about her, but that 'something' exists within the restraints of what she has been taught to be. She transcends some of those boundaries easily, unconsciously, but not all.

I think you both are saying roughly the same thing.

[Shanna]

Ahem.. No.

[jackyyyy]

Ahem.. No.Okay. Unnamable is decided on 'restraints of male-defined identity' and lays that out, and Shanna is, restraints of 'what she has been taught' identity, and does not lay out the source. Does Shanna think its restraints of male-defined identity?

[The Unnamable]

Shanna, you didn’t used to be a queen, did you? No reason for asking; I just wondered. ;)


‘hunts’, I think is too strong a word
Okay, I’ll settle for ‘seeks’.


But I would say (again - for the third time, I think) that it is not exactly pleasure she finds,
Saying is not the same as proving, Shanna. :D


But she isn’t exactly as clear about what she wants either.
Are any of us? Besides, in this, she sounds like many of the women I’ve known.


God, no.
I know I have a certain reputation on this Forum but there’s really no need to address me as ‘God’.


there are traces of some sort of conditioning that she either cannot or has not attempted to free herself entirely from.
Again, isn’t this true of all of us?


I don’t think the word necessarily implies a loss of virginity. I think it is random selection, not random intercourse.
It doesn’t have to imply loss of virginity but don’t forget the term ‘deflower’. There is a wonderful example of its use on Dictionary.com:

v 1: deprive of virginity; "This dirty old man deflowered several young girls in the village."

I’m not making that up – that really is the example they use -take a look if you don’t believe me.

The plucking a flower/taking of virginity comparison isn’t that uncommon a use in Literature. I seem to remember something from Venus and Adonis but I can’t recall it – you’ll have to ask Petrarch’s Love. She’s good on sexual stuff from the Elizabethan era. :nod:

What about Blake?

Art thou a flower? art thou a nymph? I see thee now a flower,
Now a nymph! I dare not pluck thee from thy dewy bed!
The Golden nymph replied: `Pluck thou my flower, Oothoon the mild!
Another flower shall spring, because the soul of sweet delight
Can never pass away.' She ceas'd, and clos'd her golden shrine.
Then Oothoon pluck'd the flower, saying: `I pluck thee from thy bed,
Sweet flower, and put thee here to glow between my breasts;
And thus I turn my face to where my whole soul seeks.'
William Blake Visions Of The Daughters Of Albion

I’m not sure what she ‘clos’d her golden shrine’ means. :brow:


If you insist. Can’t say that with any degree of certainty though, can you,
What do you mean, if I insist? :lol: No man can be sure about the female orgasm with any degree of certainty. I’ve seen When Harry Met Sally.


About bloody time.
:lol: :lol: :lol:

[jackyyyy]

Secondly, surely the use of the word ‘plucks’ together with ‘this one or that’ in this context has a particular resonance? While it might be appropriate to use the word as in to ‘pluck’ a chicken before cooking it, when the context is referring to choice of sexual partners, it has very different overtones. I don’t think ‘pluck’ simply refers to having a choice but to the grabbing, indiscriminate nature of the person doing the choosing. There is also the expression ‘to pluck a flower’, which I assume the poet is relying on here – an act that has been likened to taking a person’s virginity.
I heard the OMG, but really, it comes down to the base of your case here, because everything else seems to be stemming from it. I mean, you are basing a lot on her being predatory, so it is important. Yes, it does have a resonance, and 'this one or that' is exactly why 'plucks a choice' works for me. I don't think its indescriminate, nor plucking a flower either, and I don't think I implied that either, rather more the action of plucking (with the sound) from the air, like grabbing a fly with your hand.. but not a fly because that would be indescriminate.

EDIT: You have moved to 'seek'. Okay.

[Shanna]

Okay. Unnamable is decided on 'restraints of male-defined identity' and lays that out..
He is not.

[jackyyyy]

What I find great about this poem, is the 'lack' of ambiguity. Any ambiguity is created by the reader, not the writer. No?


Can someone not write a deliberately ambiguous statement?Yes, "The dog is barking.". Now, you decide if I am being ambiguous here and / or deliberate for reasons, including context. Her statement might become ambiguous, because you yourself (the reader) recode it and you yourself (the reader) decide its deliberate. For example, comets could be comets. No? Ambiguity is where it does 'mean' two or more things. Other than words and phrases being swapped out, I don't sense this type of ambiguity. Btw, I did put '' on the word 'lack' because I knew you'd pick up on it.

[jackyyyy]

He is not.I will read it again.

[Petrarch's Love]

Wow, how have I been missing this discussion altogether?


The plucking a flower/taking of virginity comparison isn’t that uncommon a use in Literature. I seem to remember something from Venus and Adonis but I can’t recall it – you’ll have to ask Petrarch’s Love.

You're absolutely right that plucking a flower is a common (almost cliche) metaphor for taking virginity. Venus and Adonis would be a very interesting poem to bring up in comparison here given that its a poem that so clearly puts the woman in the predatory sexual role. Since I had my copy handy I plucked out a few choice passages in which Adonis is likened to a flower (they're everywhere in the poem). The poem opens with Venus calling him "The field's chief flower, sweet above compare," (ln.7) which is followed a short time later with one of the most famous role reversals in Elizabethan poetry, which I can't help but quote at length:

...Being so enraged, desire doth lend her force
Courageously to pluck him from his horse.

Over one arm the lusty courser's rein,
Under her other was the tender boy,
Who blushed and pouted in a dull disdain,
With leaden appetite, unapt to toy;
She red, and hot, as coals of glowing fire,
He red for shame, but frosty in desire. (ll. 29-36)

Venus quite unambiguously remains unsatisfied in this poem, since Adonis prefers hunting for boar with his boyfriends and gets killed by the boar. Venus rages at his death saying "They bid thee crop a weed; thou pluck'st a flower" (ln. 946), and the passage pretty clearly indicates that she is angry that death did the plucking before she did (his death is highly eroticised in her description of how the boar "Sheathed unaware the tusk in his soft groin" ln. 1116). The poem ends with Adonis transformed into a flower which Venus plucks and swears "There shall not be one minute in an hour/ Wherein I will not kiss my sweet love's flower" (ll.1187-88).

So, for whatever it's worth, there's not only precedent for the use of "plucked" in an aggressive sexual context, but a precedent in which the woman is portrayed as the plucker.

[Petrarch's Love]

As for the Adcock, I've come across this poem before and I have to say I've got mixed feelings about it. I enjoy much of what Unnamable has been drawing out in it, the response to the metaphysicals, the power of the woman's earthy sensuousness. All the same, I've never been entirely satisfied with this poem. Just on a personal level, as a female reader, I would not want to be this "ex-queen." I agree with Shanna that there is something that keeps me from fully embracing this poem. To begin with, I think there is too much of a sense of her motives stemming from the way men in the past have defined and made her rather than her own desires. This aspect of the woman's character makes it a more complex, interesting, and possibly realistic represenation, but it also is the factor that holds me back from unreservedly holding this up as a model of satisfied female sexuality. I think the other point that Shanna hit on is the doing "to" rather than doing "with." I don't sense any kind of real mutuality in the interactions between her and the men. The male gaze is still abstracted, looking through her, not at her, and when he registers her presence at all, it's as the source of physical pleasure that brings the distant close for him, not as another person whom he desires to give pleasure to in return.

In sum, I think this poem works well if you regard it as the same narrative told by the metaphysical poets, but told from the woman's perspective, in which it is revealed that she is the one with the true sensual power while his mind is busy with fleas and compasses. In this sense it's a real "kick in the teeth." What I don't think it does is to describe an ideal relationship in which the interaction between the woman and man is fully satisfying and mutually pleasurable (and, to be fair, I don't think that's what it's trying to do).

[The Unnamable]

Btw, I did put '' on the word 'lack' because I knew you'd pick up on it.
I didn’t respond to that- I responded to the question I thought you were asking. Writers of non-fiction strive to be unambiguous but Literature thrives on ambiguity. The following might not be the best example but at least it’s consistent with the current, sexually charged topic. It comes from Act I scene ii of Antony and Cleopatra:

Soothsayer: Your fortunes are alike.

IRAS: But how, but how? give me particulars.

Soothsayer: I have said.

IRAS: Am I not an inch of fortune better than she?

CHARMIAN: Well, if you were but an inch of fortune better than
I, where would you choose it?

IRAS: Not in my husband's nose.

CHARMIAN: Our worser thoughts heavens mend!

Is Iras here simply referring to a nose? Charmian doesn’t think so. Is the line ambiguous simply because Charmian or the play’s audience interpret it differently or did Shakespeare deliberately intend it to be ambiguous for the purpose of naughty humour?

By the way, a really funny use of ambiguity can be found in Volume 4 of Laurence Sterne’s Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, where discussion of noses is deliberately suggestive of penises, while at the same time denying absolutely that there is any ambiguity. The same novel also includes a digression on digressions. Well, it made me laugh.

[The Unnamable]

Just on a personal level, as a female reader, I would not want to be this "ex-queen."
Are you meant to? I wouldn’t want to be one of the men, either.


I agree with Shanna that there is something that keeps me from fully embracing this poem. To begin with, I think there is too much of a sense of her motives stemming from the way men in the past have defined and made her rather than her own desires.
As I said to Shanna, isn’t this true for all of us? Aren’t we all, to a lesser or greater degree, products of the forces that have shaped us?


This aspect of the woman's character makes it a more complex, interesting, and possibly realistic represenation, but it also is the factor that holds me back from unreservedly holding this up as a model of satisfied female sexuality.
I don’t think Adcock is offering her as that (and neither am I). For me, the key comment from you here is that, “this aspect of the woman's character makes it a more complex, interesting, and possibly realistic representation.” I like the fact that Adcock is giving no easy solutions. I also think that Adcock’s approach is far more effective in challenging male discursive practices than the usual garbage we get from so called feminist writers. The fact that the poem denies us the more palatable and reassuring sense of conclusion offered by many writers might leave us feeling uncomfortable but that’s why I think it’s an effective poem.

“Art disturbs, science reassures;”
Georges Braque

The key thing for me is what I said earlier – Adcock "is rejecting the usual literary conventions and, by implication (given what I said earlier), patriarchal systems of meaning. She isn’t offering us a feminist utopia – she has no more answers than the rest of us. She is, however, making us more aware of and challenging the assumptions of male culture.”


What I don't think it does is to describe an ideal relationship in which the interaction between the woman and man is fully satisfying and mutually pleasurable (and, to be fair, I don't think that's what it's trying to do).
I don’t think there is any doubt that it isn’t. I am a little puzzled, though, by your implicit assumption that there is something more valid/better (?) about describing an ideal relationship.

PS Now I have three females joining forces against me (sorry if you are female jackyyyy, but I’ve just realised that I have no idea if you are male or female). It looks like I’ve activated something here. :lol: Funny, I’ve never seen myself as an agent for feminism.

[Kayak Jack]

I can see now that I should have asked the question differently. I should have asked, “Is language gendered?” ...In my experience, women speak a somewhat different language as a reflection of vastly different thinking processes. It seems to me that most, though certainly not all, men tend to think in a straight forward fashion, progressing logically.

Now, logic is a learned skill, like catching a ball and driving a car. Western culture doesn't seem to do a great job of seeing to it that women learn the skill sets. As a result, most, though certainly not all, women seem to think emotionally. Conclusions are reached in a manner incomprehensible to most men. Appearances have more value than function. It must look pretty, whether or not it works.

All generalities are false, including this one. But, still ...

[jackyyyy]

PS Now I have three females joining forces against me (sorry if you are female jackyyyy, but I’ve just realised that I have no idea if you are male or female). It looks like I’ve activated something here. :lol: Funny, I’ve never seen myself as an agent for feminism.Geepers, can't you tell by my husky typing. :lol: :lol: :lol:

[jackyyyy]

I didn’t respond to that- I responded to the question I thought you were asking. Writers of non-fiction strive to be unambiguous but Literature thrives on ambiguity.Yes, of course, and I strive to write at all. Btw, it was a deliberate ambiguity on my part (Crisps and Dogs).
Thanks for the tips. The issue of 'male eye' is fascinating, eh. Lets see if the posts edge back to that. :nod:

[The Unnamable]

In my experience, women speak a somewhat different language as a reflection of vastly different thinking processes. It seems to me that most, though certainly not all, men tend to think in a straight forward fashion, progressing logically.

Now, logic is a learned skill, like catching a ball and driving a car. Western culture doesn't seem to do a great job of seeing to it that women learn the skill sets. As a result, most, though certainly not all, women seem to think emotionally. Conclusions are reached in a manner incomprehensible to most men. Appearances have more value than function. It must look pretty, whether or not it works.

All generalities are false, including this one. But, still ...
This is interesting – and I think some feminist critics would agree with some of this. You are considering the structures rather than the content and the point of people like Cixous and Kristeva is that the deeply embedded structures of language come from and serve a predominantly male view.

[The Unnamable]

The issue of 'male eye' is fascinating, eh. Lets see if the posts edge back to that. :nod:
Why don’t you start a thread? I’m not sure which category it might fit into, though. I’m glad you find it interesting – it’s not without its critics (it was written a while ago) but I do think it’s worth reading and considering in the light of Literature.

[blp]

My objection to the poem is that the ex-Queen just seems to be razzing the squares. I can't really see what's being critiqued here except the practice of a science that, in its bad old days, was itself subject to persecution from the church. How does this then become an instrument of persecution of women?

As has been said, the argument is hugely complex, especially as it pertains to epistemological questions of what might be a priori to women's thinking vs men's. But the mere possibility of a difference unfortunately opens up the floodgates to a great deal of woolly, mystical, new agey thinking in which science gets the short end of the stick and if you don't get it, hey, you're probably just too rationally male and phallocentric. The poem seems uncomfortably close to this and at risk of repeating the slights and attitudes of the worst, most anti-intellectual male bullies of the past - except that here, in mitigation, the nerds get a shag and a BJ.

[Petrarch's Love]

I don’t think Adcock is offering her as that (and neither am I). For me, the key comment from you here is that, “this aspect of the woman's character makes it a more complex, interesting, and possibly realistic representation.” I like the fact that Adcock is giving no easy solutions. I also think that Adcock’s approach is far more effective in challenging male discursive practices than the usual garbage we get from so called feminist writers. The fact that the poem denies us the more palatable and reassuring sense of conclusion offered by many writers might leave us feeling uncomfortable but that’s why I think it’s an effective poem.

“Art disturbs, science reassures;”
Georges Braque

The key thing for me is what I said earlier – Adcock "is rejecting the usual literary conventions and, by implication (given what I said earlier), patriarchal systems of meaning. She isn’t offering us a feminist utopia – she has no more answers than the rest of us. She is, however, making us more aware of and challenging the assumptions of male culture.”


I think we're not actually disagreeing as much as it might have seemed. I agree with most of what you have to say about the poem above. I also admire the fact that this poem offers no simple solutions and I have to say I also think it is more successful than much of the stuff which tries to be "feminist." I think you're absolutely right that it "challenges assumptions of male culture" and I have no problem appreciating it as a success on these terms.

All the same given that not only I myself but, it would seem, most of the other women who responded to this poem had reservations about it, I was interested in trying to pinpoint what it was that was keeping us from wanting to put an unmitigated stamp of approval on this poem. I think one issue is that there's often a problem of reception when a poem is labelled "feminist." People tend to generalize it, and make it some sort of solution to what women want or to hold it up as some sort of "palatable and reasonable conclusion." I don't think this is what you were trying to say (especially now that I've gone back and examined your arguments more carefully), but it's an attitude I've come across before in relationship to this poem (the professor who taught the class in which I first read it said in his lecture, "see, this is what true feminine empowerment looks like"). So consider some of my comments as not directed to you specifically, but as my attempts to identify where the limitations of the poem lie, and I ought to have made that clearer in my previous post. My sense is that you're appreciating this poem for what it is, a complex and realistically flawed account, and all I was trying to say is that it is precisely on these terms that I think it can be appreciated.


As I said to Shanna, isn’t this true for all of us? Aren’t we all, to a lesser or greater degree, products of the forces that have shaped us?

This is the one point where I remain puzzled. I don't quite understand how you can start a whole thread on the basis of talking about the influence of gendered language structure and the masculine gaze, and then claim that you don't see what I think is a much more straightforward and unproblematic argument than either of these about a reader finding something problematic in a woman's desire being connected to the walk she was taught to walk "for his approval" and his "bitter features" taunting her sleep. I'm not saying it's wrong to bring this up in the poem. I'm not objecting to the fact that the poem raises this issue, or saying it would be a better poem if it didn't. I'm just identifying it as one of the problematic elements that makes the poem more complex than some others. It's lines like these that make it not a "solution" poem, which, as I say, is fine by me provided we recognize that this is not the portrait of a satisfied woman. As long as that's being recognized, then I really don't have a problem with this poem.

[Petrarch's Love]

As for the question posed in the title of this thread, I've been very interested to see that no one so far (unless I missed a post somewhere) has brought up the fact that these forums themselves seem to demonstrate how little difference there actually is between the way women and men use written language. Unnamable just said he couldn't be really certain if Jackyyyy was a man or a woman. I know I've been similarly uncertain before, and I've had at least two people during my time here PM me thinking I was a man. :lol: I was actually surprised when I first started posting, to find how difficult it actually was to tell someone's gender just by the way they write. If we're discussing a poem like this one or if someone lets something slip about the new skirt she just bought it becomes obvious (although there's always Kilted Exile I suppose ;) ), but really, if it's a discussion about philosophy or a more gender neutral text or something, it is almost impossible to tell the female from the male writers. I was surprised, because I think I'd half assumed there would be some obvious difference in style, but I've found it much easier to guess age, nationality, and other things about a person than to guess their gender online. It's not only online. I've known people to make similar errors in judging gender when reading authors and literary critics who use only initials for their first names. In a class just last week we found that half of us had assumed that a critic who went by "C.J." was a man, when it was really a woman, and that most of us had similarly confused another critic as being a woman when it was really a man.

[jackyyyy]

I've had at least two people during my time here PM me thinking I was a man. :lol:


I've known people to make similar errors in judging gender when reading authors and literary critics who use only initials for their first names. In a class just last week we found that half of us had assumed that a critic who went by "C.J." was a man, when it was really a woman, and that most of us had similarly confused another critic as being a woman when it was really a man.Its good to know you've got options. :lol: :lol: :lol:

Shanna mentioned 'education' in her write-up of the Ex-Queen, and I agree with that, but only that (so far). I do not think the Ex-Queen is expressing something shocking, just more colourfully relayed, because it is a poem afterall, and a discussion into the Ex-Queen's social circumstances and biases might be in order.

I know from many women I work with, and including in my own family, the more concrete sequential, the more adept they are at detailing their rationale, 'handling the numbers in life'. Seems to be a good thing and a bad thing at times, thinking in terms of those 'astronomers' in the 'Ex-Queen' poem. Whereas, and this is not to say the non-concrete-sequential cannot derive the same or even a better final rationale, just its arrived at in a more (apparently) 'Brownian' fashion. (I am sure there is a better word for this)

An interesting sidetrack is to consider left-handed people. Why is it they so often come up with the most off the wall (apparently) things? I do not conclude its because they lack concrete-sequential, rather they are simply left-handed, look at it different.

I develop technology, and when I come across people 1000000 miles away, with similar education or interests to my own, I have learn't the hard way to insist on their name at least. I may still have to decypher the name, because it really isn't so evident where Mr or Ms/Miss/Mrs is not present. And, sometimes the Surname comes before the Forename, or they are using a pen name the whole time. The short of it is, being more 'brownian' lets say, than concrete-sequential could be attributed to many women having lacked a concrete-sequential education. This is possibly where the 'male eye' idea has 'a' root. I have no doubts in my head that its based on the tradition of ensuring the male had the education, and talking averages here (culture/circumstances/etc excepted as always) this is still changing today. The person, the brain, will compensate. If deduction fails, he/it will revert to what is a closest fit to the task.

Of course, thats my concrete-sequential side talking. My other half is way ahead of me as always. See you later, brain. :D

[Shanna]

Shanna, you didn’t used to be a queen, did you? No reason for asking; I just wondered. ;) Oh absolutely. I’ve lived in a castle upon a lake for years, and all the rooms in it are identical – vast, glittering, completely empty and incredibly cold. Psst.. wait till you hear of the number of little boys I’ve stolen from their loving, god-fearing families and kept in my castle as slaves for months on end. (I kiss them on the forehead to make them stop feeling the sub-zero temperatures in my immediate vicinity.)

Again, isn’t this true of all of us?Yes, it is, and that was exactly my point. I was trying to say she is not as heroic or unflawed an example of unchallenged feminine power as you seemed to be making her out to be. I have since read your responses to PL and seen that that is not what you meant.

What do you mean, if I insist? :lol: No man can be sure about the female orgasm with any degree of certainty. I’ve seen When Harry Met Sally.All I’m saying is Adcock is not one to shy away from stating things as they are - she’s certainly explicit enough as far as the men in the poem are concerned. Therefore I don’t see why she should leave any degree of ambiguity in telling us what the queen gets out of it, purely for herself, in purely physical terms. Therefore I think, in purely physical terms, she gets – nothing. And I think PL agreed with me on the pleasure issue.

I know I have a certain reputation on this Forum but there’s really no need to address me as ‘God’. Your wit must be failing you lately because I completely saw that coming. (In case you’ve missed it this far, and you can’t have, your reputation on this Forum veers closer to that of some odd sort of Lucifer, than God.)

[Shanna]

P.S. I will come back here when I have dealt with the Poem of the Week thread.

[jackyyyy]

My objection to the poem is that the ex-Queen just seems to be razzing the squares. I can't really see what's being critiqued here except the practice of a science that, in its bad old days, was itself subject to persecution from the church. How does this then become an instrument of persecution of women?

As has been said, the argument is hugely complex, especially as it pertains to epistemological questions of what might be a priori to women's thinking vs men's. But the mere possibility of a difference unfortunately opens up the floodgates to a great deal of woolly, mystical, new agey thinking in which science gets the short end of the stick and if you don't get it, hey, you're probably just too rationally male and phallocentric. The poem seems uncomfortably close to this and at risk of repeating the slights and attitudes of the worst, most anti-intellectual male bullies of the past - except that here, in mitigation, the nerds get a shag and a BJ.I wonder if the Ex-Queen's references to science are mean't to reinforce to us, a difference between herself and the 'astronomers', the educated, the rationals, the non-emotionals, the astronromers/scientists. Adcock is outlining a character with a kind of numbed down emotion, and my question is how/why was it numbed down? Apart from the almost ritual excitement which arrives when the astronomers are, lets say, away from their telescopes, what else is there - she is not an astronomer.

I believe Kayak Jack's post hit the nail on the head with regard to a reason, which makes for a fundamental, 'education'. Could it be, as I think you are edging yourself, Adcock is showing the Ex-Q's new circumstance and situation, by demonstrating the difference that has arrived since the Queen became an Ex-Queen. I think that leads to more questions, like marriage, relationships, and how a union creates a different personna in the individual. I got that sense from the poem anyway, and I like it for this reason.

[jackyyyy]

P.S. I will come back here when I have dealt with the Poem of the Week thread.Shanna, having looked at your Avatar, I would hope to be dealt with as efficiently. :lol:

[The Unnamable]

And I think PL agreed with me on the pleasure issue.
When it comes to Literature, I am a commentator rather than a producer. When it comes to female pleasure, it’s the other way around.


In case you’ve missed it this far, and you can’t have, your reputation on this Forum veers closer to that of some odd sort of Lucifer, than God.
What do you mean, ‘odd’?

I like you, Shanna; you’re nasty. ;)

[The Unnamable]

This is the one point where I remain puzzled. I don't quite understand how you can start a whole thread on the basis of talking about the influence of gendered language structure and the masculine gaze, and then claim that you don't see what I think is a much more straightforward and unproblematic argument than either of these about a reader finding something problematic in a woman's desire being connected to the walk she was taught to walk "for his approval" and his "bitter features" taunting her sleep.
Not so puzzling. I was asking a question where, for once, I don’t have any answers. Also, I assume that the woman has changed in those last three stanzas, so she is no longer the simple creation of male wishes. She hasn’t completely escaped that male defined identity but she is no longer limited to it.

[jackyyyy]

All I’m saying is Adcock is not one to shy away from stating things as they are - she’s certainly explicit enough as far as the men in the poem are concerned. Therefore I don’t see why she should leave any degree of ambiguity in telling us what the queen gets out of it, purely for herself, in purely physical terms. Therefore I think, in purely physical terms, she gets – nothing. And I think PL agreed with me on the pleasure issue. I quoted this bit because you say it better than me. I am in agreement with this, and though to be fair, she might get 'something', but she is certainly not placing a lot of value on it. She is not a wolf in stockings.

[Dark Lady]

In my experience, women speak a somewhat different language as a reflection of vastly different thinking processes. It seems to me that most, though certainly not all, men tend to think in a straight forward fashion, progressing logically.

Now, logic is a learned skill, like catching a ball and driving a car. Western culture doesn't seem to do a great job of seeing to it that women learn the skill sets. As a result, most, though certainly not all, women seem to think emotionally. Conclusions are reached in a manner incomprehensible to most men. Appearances have more value than function. It must look pretty, whether or not it works.

All generalities are false, including this one. But, still ...

I hope that works - I haven't managed to quote from someone else's post before.

I just thought I'd say that in a couple of the philosophy books I've read recently the point has been made that we tend to hold 'the black and white way of thinking that tries to produce logical principals that can be applied to any problem' up as the best way of dealing with everything. But why do we consider this the most sophisticated approach? Because men have always said it is.

However, women tend to look at things case by case and like to talk things out so that everyone is happy. Who's to say that this isn't at least as good a way of thinking? Or maybe a combination of the two.

So perhaps it is not just that women haven't learnt this skill but that men haven't seen the value of women's natural skill.

[Chava]

Wasn't there a study recently, where hords of books were typed into a database, and the computer scanned for certain words, and it turned out that with a fairly good accuracy was able to spot male from female author?
as far as i recollect, it had something to do with using pronouns, or emotional words.

[jackyyyy]

I just thought I'd say that in a couple of the philosophy books I've read recently the point has been made that we tend to hold 'the black and white way of thinking that tries to produce logical principals that can be applied to any problem' up as the best way of dealing with everything. But why do we consider this the most sophisticated approach? Because men have always said it is.I am sure psychologists can answer this better than me, but certainly, being strictly black and white does help playing Draughts (checkers), xoxo, and Dominos. :lol: I even wonder what its place is in art. Maybe thats it, it would produce only black and white art - pretty boring, eh. I think its the more 'practical' with respect to 'handling the numbers in life', because, after all, there are numbers in our lives. And, thats not about women or men, rather women and men.


However, women tend to look at things case by case and like to talk things out so that everyone is happy. Who's to say that this isn't at least as good a way of thinking? Or maybe a combination of the two.

So perhaps it is not just that women haven't learnt this skill but that men haven't seen the value of women's natural skill.I think you got it right there, a combination of the two. I am sure we all have a combination anyway, to greater or lesser degrees. I just happen to have more women in my family that are great with Math and Science. They can, however, be absolutely bandy when it comes to being sensitive at times. We laugh about it a lot, but it shows the point. A question being asked in this thread is, is language gendered? Unnamable demonstrated it, and then as Petrarch's Love pointed out, where we cannot see the other person, we are simply text, and a pen name/avatar cannot be relied upon, and in my attempt I was trying to point out, people here reacting in the same ways due to similar education and interests, we seem at times incapable to tell the difference. Biases might be another criteria.

If any men have not seen the value of it, that might be because they've been too busy playing Draughts to notice. :lol:

Interesting thoughts, thanks.

[jackyyyy]

Wasn't there a study recently, where hords of books were typed into a database, and the computer scanned for certain words, and it turned out that with a fairly good accuracy was able to spot male from female author?
as far as i recollect, it had something to do with using pronouns, or emotional words.I recall reading something of that. It does make sense that a computer would be able to filter on habitually used words, terms and expressions, and then be able to evaluate the sex of the writer, and it would be interesting to note what those filters actually were. I guess the computer would need a reasonable amount of text to work on to increase it chances of success. Seems, in a formal environment, where people are talking away from gender biased topics, its a lot harder to detect with a fair level of certainty. As I was trying to point out earlier, if I am talking computers with someone, there is often no reference to male/female, just 'it'. Apart words, phrases, etc, that might be used more frequently, I wonder if a sentence was shaped differently. For example, and off the top of my head, is a female sentence typically longer or shorter than a male sentence? Does a male writer use less adjectives or more verbs of 'a type'. Is a male writer typically less polite in his construction. Or, as Dark Lady, pointed out, men might apply more 'black and white' to their style. Comments?

[The Unnamable]

I wonder if a sentence was shaped differently. For example, and off the top of my head, is a female sentence typically longer or shorter than a male sentence? Does a male writer use less adjectives or more verbs of 'a type'.
I don’t know but I do remember reading some research article about the fact that many women append their statements with questions – so they say things like, “It would be wonderful to go there, wouldn’t you say?”

[jackyyyy]

I don’t know but I do remember reading some research article about the fact that many women append their statements with questions – so they say things like, “It would be wonderful to go there, wouldn’t you say?”Whether more women say that than men, I don't know either, and it could be regional. "wonderful" tells me its a woman, but.... Thinking of the context, if it was a woman, the context would be one thing, for a man, another. Add a second clue, we'd possibly also know where they are on the globe. I'm interested to see more examples ????

[Chava]

actually about the sentence length. I think i recollect that the female sentences were genreally longer then men's. The men were more factual, more concise.