How we cite our quotes: (Part.Section.Paragraph)
Quote #1
"Baby?" He was pulling her arm. Come for a cup of coffee. But she couldn't. She had to learn Greek (the book was in the reserve desk). There was too much to do. He was frowning and pleading. She could feel the pillow under her back already, and Mr. Frosty stalking around them, looking at her with his strange blue eyes, walking widdershins around the lovers. (1.2.9)
The concept of "enthusiastic consent" is unheard of in Jeannine's world. How does Cal's "frowning and pleading" compare to the more outwardly aggressive actions of men like Ginger Moustache, the Host of the party on Riverside Drive, and the Manland Boss?
Quote #2
Do you want to banish sex from Whileaway? Sex, family, love, erotic attraction—call it what you like—we all know that your people are competent and intelligent individuals, but do you think that's enough? Surely you have the intellectual knowledge of biology in other species to know what I'm talking about. (1.7.33)
Remarkably, it doesn't even occur to the Television Interview that Whileawayan women might be sexually attracted to one another. How does his attitude compare to those of Manlanders like Lenny and Boss?
Quote #3
My mother thinks that I don't like boys, though I try to tell her: Look at it this way; I'll never lose my virginity. I'm a Man-Hating Woman and people leave the room when I come in it. Do they do the same for a Woman-Hating Man? Don't be silly. (4.11.6)
Before Laura begins her love affair with Janet, she doesn't consider herself a lesbian. Instead, she says simply that she couldn't endure a relationship with any of the guys she's dated, because none of them have really respected her.
Quote #4
I've never slept with a girl. I couldn't. I wouldn't want to. That's abnormal and I'm not, although you can't be normal unless you do what you want and you can't be normal unless you love men. To do what I wanted would be normal, unless what I wanted was abnormal, in which case it would be abnormal to please myself and normal to do what I didn't want to do, which isn't normal. (4.11.9)
Laura and Joanna both grow up in a world where lesbianism is stigmatized, and both go through serious internal struggles before they act on their desires. How does Janet enable each of them?
Quote #5
Love is a radiation disease. Whileawayans do not like the self-consequence that comes with romantic passion and we are very mean and mocking about it; so Vittoria and I walked back separately, each frightened to death of the weeks and weeks yet to go before we'd be over it. We kept it to ourselves. (4.16.18)
The social conventions surrounding sexuality expression on Whileaway are very different from those in Jeannine's, Joanna's, and Jael's worlds. In Jeannine's and Joanna's worlds, romantic passion is associated with beauty, attraction, possession, and the "thrill of the hunt." What kinds of sexual expression do Whileawayans value?
Quote #6
No man in our world would touch Elena. In Whileawayan leaf-read pajamas, in silver silk overalls, in the lengths of moony brocade in which Whileawayans wrap themselves for pleasure, this would be a beautiful Helen. Elena Twason swathed in cut-silk brocade, nipping a corner of it for fun. (7.4.36)
This passage marks a turning point for Joanna/the omniscient narrator, who ran screaming from the room when Janet and Laura first went to bed. As she begins to explore her own attraction to women, why does she make a point of noting that no man in her world would touch Elena?
Quote #7
Things will get better. I suppose I'm just late in developing. Do you think if I got married I would like making love better? Do you think there's unconscious guilt—you know, because Cal and I aren't married? I don't feel it that way, but if it was unconscious, you wouldn't feel it, would you? (7.5.2)
The novel makes it clear that Jeannine dislikes having sex with Cal. Are there any suggestions that Jeannine may be attracted to women rather than (or as well as) men?
Quote #8
After we had finished making love, he turned to the wall and said, "Woman, you're lovely. you're sensuous. You should wear long hair and lots of eye make-up and tight clothing." Now what does this have to do with anything? I remain bewildered. (7.5.4)
The Female Man suggests that sexual desires are shaped by social conventions, are aren't wholly dependent on individual preferences. Joanna's lover wants her to conform to a feminine "ideal," one that has been presented to him through visual media like movies, advertisements, and maybe even pornography.
Quote #9
All real-men like the changed; some real-men like the half-changed; none of the real-men like real-men, for that would be abnormal. Nobody asks the changed or half-changed what they like. (8.7.2)
References to "abnormality" are always tinged with irony in The Female Man, because the word is always used to refer to sexual relationships between equals. How does this usage contribute to the novel's discussion of sexuality and sexual identity overall?
Quote #10
[…] bringing my fantasies into the real world frightened me very much. It's not that they were bad in themselves, but they were Unreal and therefore culpable; to try to make Real what was Unreal was to mistake the very nature of things; it was a sin not against conscience […] but against Reality, and of the two the latter is far more blasphemous. (208)
Joanna/the omniscient narrator never believes that her feelings for her Laura are morally wrong. All the same, she feels that it would be impossible to act on them. Is Joanna's society holding her back, or are her own fears to blame?