September 24, 2003
Screwed-up Women
"So, the guy jumps down off of his camel, picks it up, and throws it at the charging enemies!" -Jared, talking about the ridiculous fantasy book he just finished.
The Halfling's Gem, third in the Icewind Dale Trilogy by R. A. Salvatore, is a book that should only be read by those willing to suspend their disbelief. And I am very glad to finally have the trilogy behind me. Now I can get that huge book out of my backpack and quit lugging it around everywhere. Thing was about to give me back problems . . .
I can also forge ahead with my 40+ other reading projects (and these are just the ones I have planned at the moment). I'll start small . . . I now have four books going, but one of them is the book for Inklings.
I also finished The Taming of the Shrew today. I thought at first that this play was basically a chauvinists dream, but as it grew more and more disturbing, I changed my mind. For perfect example of what I mean, please refer to the following (rather long) quote from the play. It's kind of funny. This is the Shrew herself speaking her closing monologue, lecturing her fellow women after seeing the error of her ways:
"Fie, fie! unknit that threatening unkind brow,
And dart not scornful glances from those eyes,
To wound thy lord, thy king, thy governor:
It blots thy beauty as frosts do bite the meads,
Confounds thy fame as whirlwinds shake fair buds,
And in no sense is meet or amiable.
A woman mov'd is like a fountain troubled,
Muddy, ill-seeming, thick, bereft of beauty;
And while it is so, none so dry or thirsty
Will deign to sip or touch one drop of it.
Thy husband is thy lord, thy life, thy keeper,
Thy head, thy sovereign; one that cares for thee,
And for thy maintenance commits his body
To painful labour both by sea and land,
To watch the night in storms, the day in cold,
Whilst thou liest warm at home, secure and safe;
And craves no other tribute at thy hands
But love, fair looks, and true obedience;
Too little payment for so great a debt.
Such duty as the subject owes the prince,
Even such a woman oweth to her husband;
And when she's froward, peevish, sullen, sour,
And not obedient to his honest will,
What is she but a foul contending rebel,
And graceless traitor to her loving lord?
I am asham'd that women are so simple
To offer war where they should kneel for peace,
Or seek for rule, supremacy, and sway,
When they are bound to serve, love, and obey.
Why are our bodies soft, and weak, and smooth,
Unapt to toil and trouble in the world,
But that our soft conditions and our hearts
Should well agree with our external parts?
Come, come, you froward and unable worms!
My mind hath been as big as one of yours,
My heart as great, my reason haply more,
To bandy word for word and frown for frown;
But now I see our lances are but straws,
Our strength as weak, our weakness past compare,
That seeming to be most which we indeed least are.
Then vail your stomachs, for it is no boot,
And place your hands below your husband's foot:
In token of which duty, if he please,
My hand is ready; may it do him ease."
Husband's reply: "Why, there's a wench! Come on, and kiss me, Kate. We'll to bed." (Act V, Sc. II)
Now, when you get the men doing this kind of thing in the plays, it's fairly comical, but when a woman (who was full of spirit and vivacity at the beginning of the play) is this cowed, it's just disturbing. My perceptions also might have something to do with witnessing the way she arrived in this state. Starved and deprived of sleep by her husband, jerked around by the nose (metaphorically speaking) . . . Wow. It was just an impressive display all around.
And now, the latest Rigoberta Menchu news . . .
Newsflash: Two Great Addle-Brains Put Heads Together
French President, Jacques "Chucklehead" Chirac, held a historic meeting with Rigoberta "The Face That Brought a Thousand Ships to a Screeching Halt" Menchu on Sunday. Chirac is said to have officially surrendered to the Guatemalan political activist, saying "I thought I'd never have to see her again after we met last year. I just couldn't take it anymore."
Jared "The Guatemalan" Wheeler called the French president yesterday to inform him that he and his organization were 100% behind this. "Just keep her," he said. "In fact, if you send her back, I'll invade."
Anyway, whatever . . . I could do that better, but I find myself in need of bed. Again. The link has a great picture of the two sitting together, but the article, I am sorry to say, is in Spanish. Reading over the Menchu archive on this site, (and there is at least one entry for every two weeks or so), I noticed one thing in particular. The woman is a menace. Half of the articles are about her announcing that she'll be suing someone new for war crimes or something. Someday, when I am president, she will have to be dealt with. And that is my anti-Menchu rant of the day. Hasta maņana, y'all.