How we cite our quotes: (Part.Section.Paragraph)
Quote #1
A MANUFACTURER OF CARS FROM LEEDS (genteelly): I hear so much about the New Feminism here in America. Surely it's not necessary, is it? (He beams with the delighted air of someone who has just given pleasure to a whole roomful of people.) (3.2.44)
It's a remarkable fact that no male characters in The Female Man ever go on angry, argumentative, anti-feminist rants. For them, it's simple enough to dismiss the movement by making jokes.
Quote #2
"I would suhtinly like," said Saccharissa with great energy, "to see all those women athletes from the Olympics compete will all those men athletes; I don't imagine any of these women athletes could even come neah the men." (3.2.112)
Like most of the women at the party on Riverside Drive, including Joanna herself, Saccharissa is deeply invested in patriarchal norms. Her opinion of women is as low as those of the men whom she's working so hard to impress.
Quote #3
He leaned forward confidentially. "What do you think of the new feminism, eh?"
"What is—" (she tried again) "what is—my English is not so good. Could you explain?"
"Well, what do you think of women? Do you think women can compete with men?"
"I don't know any men." She's beginning to get mad.
"Ha ha!" said Sharp Glasses. "Ha ha ha! Ha ha!" (He laughed just like that, in sharp little bursts.) "My name's Ewing. What's yours?"
"Janet."
"Well, Janet, I'll tell you what I think of the new feminism. I think it's a mistake. A very bad mistake." (3.2.122-28)
Like the Car Manufacturer from Leeds, Ewing assumes that dismissing the feminist movement—and expounding upon Manhattan's rape statistics while he's at it—is a great conversation topic, and a good way to pick up women. Why, dude?
Quote #4
Burned any bras lately har har twinkle twinkle A pretty girl like you doesn't need to be liberated twinkle har Don't listen to those hysterical bitches twinkle twinkle twinkle. (3.5.1)
As in earlier sections featuring Ewing and the Car Manufacturer from Leeds, this passage satirizes men's supposedly "sociable" dismissals of the feminist movement. By assuming that attractive women couldn't possibly have feminist values, these characters reiterate the stereotype that feminism is only for women who can't get men.
Quote #5
Why does she keep having these dreams about Whileaway?
While-away. While. A. Way. To While away the time. That means it's just a pastime. If she tells Cal about it, he'll say she's nattering again; worse still, it would sound pretty silly; you can't expect a man to listen to everything (as everybody's Mother said). (6.1.2-3)
Although Jeannine disapproves of Janet initially, and is horrified by Whileaway, over the course of the novel, her feelings change. Her dreams about Whileaway are a clue that she is starting to develop a feminist consciousness (however faint it might still be).
Quote #6
Jeannine, who sometimes believes in astrology, in palmistry, in occult signs, who knows that certain things are fated or not fated, knows that men—in spite of everything—have no contact with or understanding of the insides of things. That's a realm that's denied them. Women's magic, women's intuition rule here, the subtle deftness forbidden to the clumsier sex. (6.1.3)
Here we have one of the novel's subtle refutations of gender essentialism. Until the last chapters of the novel, Jeannine is a flaky and naïve character—not a person we'd be wise to trust about things like "women's magic" and "women's intuition." The omniscient narrator's satirical tone suggests that all of this stuff is hogwash, and about as sensible as the rest of Jeannine's moony fantasies.
Quote #7
FIRST WOMAN: I'm perfectly happy. I love my husband and we have two darling children. I certainly don't need any change in my lot.
SECOND WOMAN: I'm even happier than you are. My husband does the dishes every Wednesday and we have three darling children, each nicer than the last. I'm tremendously happy.
[…]
ME: You miserable nits, I have a Nobel Peace Prize, fourteen published novels, six lovers, a town house, a box at the Metropolitan Opera, I fly a plane, I fix my own car, and I can do eighteen push-ups before breakfast, that is, if you're interested in numbers.
ALL THE WOMEN: Kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill. (6.5.1-6)
Through satirical scenes like this, The Feminist Man argues that patriarchy is most effective when women buy into it too, and when they learn to regulate one another's behavior by turning against any women who refuse to conform.
Quote #8
In my pride of intellect I entered a bookstore; I purchased a book; I no longer had to placate The Man; by God, I think I'm going to make it. I purchased a copy of John Stuart Mill's The Subjection of Women; now who can object to John Stuart Mill? He's dead. But the clerk did. With familiar archness he waggled his finger at me and said "tsk tsk." (7.1.3)
Liberal feminism argues that patriarchy will be overthrown when women are represented equally in positions of power (politics and business especially). In passages such as this, The Female Man suggests that liberal feminism won't cut it. Although Joanna has gained social status and wealth through her career, she is still condescended to by the men she meets at parties and out in public.
Quote #9
You will notice that even my diction is becoming feminine, thus revealing my true nature […] I am putting in lots of qualifiers like "rather," I am writing in these breathless little feminine tags, she threw herself down on the bed, I have no structure (she thought), my thoughts seep out shapelessly like menstrual fluid, it is all very female and deep and full of essences, it is very primitive and full of "and's," it is called "run-on sentences." (7.1.21)
This is another of the novel's satirical depictions of gender essentialism. Throughout the 1970s, a number of feminist artists and scholars argued that women really are essentially different from men, and that their art should reflect those differences. Joanna Russ wouldn't have had much of a chance to read Hélène Cixous's essay "The Laugh of the Medusa" before The Female Man was published (in fact, the two texts were published the same year), but if you give it a look, you'll get a good sense of what Russ is lampooning.
Quote #10
Let me give you something to carry away with you, friend: that "plague" you talk of is a lie. I know. […] Whileaway's plague is a big lie. Your ancestors lied about it. It is I who gave you your "plague," my dear, about which you can now pietize and moralize to your heart's content; I, I, I, I am the plague, Janet Evason. (9.7.22)
Spoiler Alert! For anyone who goes through the novel believing that Janet is the best and most practical example of feminist engagement with the world, it will probably come as a shock to learn that the novel's feminist utopia was founded on Jael's warfare. What does this suggest about the novel's stance on violence?