Date: Mon, 4 Mar 2002 22:39:47 +0800 From: Carol Ryles Subject: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Dear BDG members, I first read this book about four weeks ago, and I've been looking forward to listening to and taking part in the discussion ever since. Were there any FEMSF members who had read this story around the time it was first written, and how do you think it compared with earlier feminist utopias? The women living in Women's Country sacrifice much to meet the expectations of their society. How do these sacrifices and expectations compare with those that women face in the here and now and/or in the past? What is your opinion of the methods that the councilwomen use to create their utopia? What are your thoughts about the characterisation and actions of: 1) The women 2) The warriors 3) The servitors 4) The gypsies What do you think this book is saying? Cheers, Carol. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Mar 2002 19:15:47 -0000 From: Steve & Carol Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Hi I really want to comment on this one, but it has been a long time since I read the book - I'm going to try and reread it again soon, so hopefully will catch up with the discussion then. As I remember, there was quite a lot of controversy over the book when it was published in some fanzines and apas, but can't remember any details now. I may still have some info, but if so it will be in the attic, and might take some time to find. Carol Hull E Yorks UK www.geocities.com/steve_kerry_uk ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Mar 2002 15:19:02 -0800 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 07:15 PM 3/6/02 +0000, Steve & Carol wrote: >As I remember, there was quite a lot of controversy over the book >when it was published in some fanzines and apas, but can't >remember any details now. I may still have some info, but if so it will >be in the attic, and might take some time to find. Among other things, it roused considerable comment from lesbians, since one of her off-hand comments on the natural relations of the sexes is that homosexuality is due to some sort of hormonal imbalance during pregnancy and an aberration. This not only puts all the blame on the mother, even if it isn't her fault, about the hormones and all, it also allows her to avoid explaining why, among a huge group of women who see "real men" only during sporadic festivals while being served by contemptible "pansies," there are apparently *no* lesbians. Yeah, right. Her depiction of the warriors as "manly men" is also deeply flawed, since in any *real* all-male society homosexual attachments form quickly and often violently. Presumably, the warriors spend a lot of time jerking off in the bathroom with the warrior equivalent of Hustler in this oddly skewed future society, and rarely (if ever) look at other men "that way" even after battle when testosterone levels are high and the fear of death makes men horny. Other than that, she's ripped off traditional lesbian scifi/fantasy shamelessly, as the two societies are otherwise eerily similar in form to that of the Hadra, as depicted by Diana Rivers, or a mort of other Separatist fantasies. One can even see glimmers of the quasi-fascist lesbian feminist state of Katherine V. Forrest (Daughters of a Coral Dawn) in the privileged information held by a few elite women and male "servitors" and *withheld* from the unreliable masses. I don't think it's one of her best novels. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Mar 2002 22:20:44 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Although I read this book first years ago, probably when it came out, I realized in the rereading I had totally confused it in my memory with the Suzy McKee Charnas Motherlines trilogy. So I began to remember it better as I read it, but I can't remember very well at all how I responded to it on first reading years ago. I don't think this is a 'utopia' in any sense. It's a post apocalyptic novel, and the premise that genetic selection can create a society where there would be no more war (not yet achieved in their society) as well as better female/male relations, is very questionable. Still it's one of those thought experiments that are interesting in making us think about what would work and what wouldn't, but not as a prescription. Personally I don't remember the particular controversy about homosexuality, but I don't see that as any more controversial than the whole idea that genetics is the foundation of the type of society. (Just a sidenote: I do think there's reference to homosexuality among the warriors, but it's denied/repressed or grudgingly allowed as a kind of prerogative of the powerful males, which is common in 'warrior' groups. Among the women it's pretty much ignored, even more so because reproduction is the principle issue. Not that lesbians couldn't reproduce in this society, for all we know, they did exist and did reproduce - but in retrospect, only a few people know who the real fathers of the children are, so since that's a secret, lots more may be. ) The nature nurture debate about what makes people as they are, or what makes womanness and maleness, is not going to be settled anytime soon. However, I think a basic premise of feminism is that genes or biology aren't the most important determinants (to use a pretty icky word) in human society; rather, we think women and men learn to be women and men. In that sense, I'd say I'd have to question whether this is a feminist book. OTOH, assuming the author is kicking around the idea to make us think about those issues, then it is feminist to that degree. We don't learn about the eugenics til the end (we have some clues of course before then), so the bulk of the story involves various conflicts and critiques of feminine/male roles and behaviors, and much of this is feminist in content. None of it is perfect, and that's a good thing in terms of being at all believable. The storytelling was pretty damn good, and using the Greek myth/neodrama based on it, as well as the nice little revelation of the confidence game the women were practicing with the warriors, was done without too much of the artifice and tying up of loose ends which I often dislike in these types of stories. The vision here is pretty bleak though, when you come right down to it. Willingness to allow- even encourage- widespread carnage in order to select a certain society is draconian, and the only thing that remotely justifies it is that this is postapocalypse. But for anybody who believes in the transformative power of consciousness and political debate and struggle, which is at the core of feminism as well as most movements for social change, this society, or the premises the author bases the society on, is pretty far removed, even antithetical. The women and the men, except for a select few, really are not engaged in transformation in any political sense. No one is challenging the warriors' behavior directly, the women are encouraged to do many things but not openly challenge the social rituals, the 'servitors' have 'hidden powers. Of course, it may be that all this secrecy is necessary to prevent the rebellion of the warriors. But that's only true if one really accepts the idea that the warriors are genetically incapable of being transformed. If the warriors weren't perforce a separatist group, and the boys not forced to be socialized within it, would there be the need for such ruthless culling? OTOH, if we look at the warriors and the servitors and the women in a symbolic way, perhaps we are being encouraged to see the limitations of all these roles, even in the supposed interest of making a better world. Whether carried out by men or women. The Iphigenia play probably deserves a little closer analysis than I've given it so far, in looking at the various ironies of the roles reversed and otherwise. Personally, what I'm thinking about now, and I haven't worked it through all the way, is a comparison between this kind of vision and the one of, say, Picnic on Paradise (or even Whileaway, in the Female Man). In Picnic (I HOPE I'm remembering the right story, unlike what I remembered of Gateway before rereading), a woman goes about killing off the survivors of their interstellar wreck, because she can see the men coming up with all kinds of visions of survival which wouldn't work, but would require women to go into full reproductive mode in the attempt. Her response is ruthless, even nihilistic, but it's a refusal to accept a desperate attempt at survival which would mean useless degradation. In Gateway, the women are having lots and lots of babies, along with all the other work they do, but they do control the conditions of their work, so to speak. They are determined to survive, not to end the whole thing, and they come up with a scheme they think will make life better in the long run. But their scheme is eugenic , and hidden. I would guess, if you played this novel out in a series, the writer would have to start poking holes in the eugenics, and also the rather static quality of the social structure. The breath of fresh air in this novel is the traveling groups, especially the magician and his family. OTOH, Russ' Female Man, if I remember correctly, doesn't posit any genetic determinism (although some of her alternate societies may believe in it), but the ruthlessness directed in her Whileaway utopia against certain individuals is because of social demands, rather than genetic determinism. Well, I take it back, if memory serves, one thing they may be trying to select for is intelligence. Whether that makes any more sense than trying to select for nonaggression, I'm not sure, but I think it was a conscious decision, made throughout Whileaway society, not a secret agenda. Gee, I'd have to reread that book to really see where all these comparisons lead. Okay, this is enough for the moment.-Joy Martin ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Mar 2002 00:08:39 -0800 From: Sharon Anderson To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU I love Tepper's work.I read the book when it fist came out in paper, and I re-read the same copy. I have always had the visceral response to Tepper's work that "this woman knows what she is talking about." I was surprised at my reaction a few years ago at Wiscon, when I heard her speak. As I recall, the gist of her talk seemed to be "this country thinks itself safe from the horrors in the rest of the world. It isn't. Because men still run things, we are going to ---- in a handbasket. Rapidly." (and she had figures to back this up.) "Women need to change things. And the only way to do this is to take control of reproduction. It's your responsibility; take it!" I remember the speech made me a little uncomfortable. It was a little blunter than I was used to. Still, not as grim as Octavia Butler, who is a little too much for me. Not as grim as Susy Mckee Charnas. (I had trouble finishing Motherlines when it first came out.) The anti-lesbian issue in Gate did and does make me uncomfortable. I have no answer for this. Except to say that I had strong suspicion about the twins, and was hoping that this was Tepper's under-the-table acknowledgment. (I have nothing specific to justify this hope.) --s ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Mar 2002 03:24:43 -0800 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 12:08 AM 3/8/02 -0800, Sharon Anderson wrote: >gist of her talk seemed to be "this country thinks itself safe from the >horrors in the rest of the world. It isn't. Because men still run >things, we are going to ---- in a handbasket. Rapidly." (and she had >figures to back this up.) "Women need to change things. And the only >way to do this is to take control of reproduction. It's your >responsibility; take it!" I remember the speech made me a little There are ample reference sources, such as Men Are Not Cost-Effective by June Stephenson, but she didn't exactly do that in Gate. She has an elite cabal of women and men who conspire to deceive the vast majority of the population, with people being brought into the conspiracy only when they prove "worthy." Logically, at least some women and quite a few men might quibble with the logic of this, since the same qualities of ruthless aggression they quail at in men would be absolutely necessary in women in order to keep this secret safe. Presumably, any male guessing the secret and not instantly committed to the cause is murdered out of hand or sent into battle with the likelihood of being slaughtered, as they arrange to do for one group of men a little too close to the secret for their comfort. Similarly, any woman who retained her "adolescent" attachment to the manly men and objected when she discovers that they are being drastically culled "for the good of the herd" would have to be done away with lest she tell other women, or worse, men. So the same Eugenics that has them selecting for non-violent men has them selecting for murderous women, and indeed the ruling caste is even more skilled in martial arts and dealing death than are the men. So the whole enterprise seems contradictory and doomed to failure; the more successful the women were in breeding out aggression and violence in men, the less resolute they would be in their pogrom. Assuming, that is, that women share most of their genetic heritage with men and are not a completely different species who happen to inhabit the same planet. And there is a crypto-racism inherent in her scheme, since it would be easy to demonstrate that young African-American males are responsible for a disproportionate share of violent crime and might therefore have to be culled even more drastically. She completely ignores the fact that sometimes rage, or even war, is an appropriate response to socially-imposed violence or genocide. In fact, her "final solution" for the men is genocide, with violent cultures of both men and women being necessary (if unstated) targets of particular deadly intention by the "less violent," by which we can safely assume that one or two particular cultures would mean people like themselves. So anyone with the gumption to rise up and overthrow their oppressive slavemasters or colonial rulers would be marked for death, and the end result of this breeding program would seem to be a world in which people can be safely treated like cattle, since the rebellious and untamed are quickly slaughtered. We might remember that Swift modestly proposed a similar solution to the "Irish Problem," and the end result was a tasty addition to the culinary range of the English table. >The anti-lesbian issue in Gate did and does make me uncomfortable. >I have no answer for this. Except to say that I had strong suspicion >about the twins, and was hoping that this was Tepper's under-the-table >acknowledgment. (I have nothing specific to justify this hope.) I doubt it. Her rejection of lesbianism was far too pat and "scientific." We can more likely believe that lesbianism is being bred (or tweaked) out of the race as well, since the people in charge of reproduction are also in charge of covert mind control. Don't forget that the young "breeder" women are encouraged (and subtly coerced) to admire the most brutal men so their enthusiastic mating with them becomes the reward for the most suicidal excesses of male violence. So the ruling caste are whore masters as well as death camp overseers. While I'm, sure there might be some possible feminist analysis of female brothel keepers as "liberating," please pardon me if I find it hard to swallow. Doubtless, from the viewpoint of the women in "Women's Country," this is all easily seen as being for our own good so our later discovery of the fact that we've been lied to and coerced into having sex with essentially random men later elicits our acquiescence and cooperation. It would seem that not only men but women are being bred for docility and other useful traits quite valuable in farm animals. Her scheme just doesn't hang together at all when examined closely. She's ripped off Lesbian Separatism while trying to incorporate men in it as co-rulers and retain compulsory heterosexuality as the social norm. This is not, and cannot be, tolerant of lesbianism in practice, since the philosophical coherence of Separatism demands it and she denies it a priori. And it's now known that sporadic mating with men is potentially fatal for women, as the rates of pre-eclampsia and other serious complications of pregnancy, including spontaneous abortion, rise sharply when the female reproductive system (and it is a system) is exposed to "strange" sperm. Our immune systems are part of our total reproductive biology, and it is hubris to assume that we can fool around with this very complex system without consequence. The safest and most successful pregnancies (on average) are those involving a man with whom the woman has had a long and exclusive intimate sexual relationship. This is not to say that in vitro, sperm donor, and other reproductive techniques don't work, or that they are not appropriate in some situations, but Gate turns the system on its head, allowing for *no* normal pregnancies and making artificial techniques the standard procedure. And when we discover that the young women are being tricked by their "betters," and that what they think are their own reproductive choices are being covertly denied to them and the "correct" choice made secretly on their behalf, with pregnancies by the "best" fathers being forced on them while unconscious, at what we know (outside the novel) is considerable risk to their lives and health, by the ruling cabal, we really ought to be shocked. This is the same institutionalized rape system as that enforced by men in the Handmaid's Tale or the Charnas world, just run by women. Does that make it better? Is rape and forced pregnancy ok when women do it to other women? Is murder ok when women do it? Is it permissible for *any* small group to control the lives of the majority? Are we expected to identify with the majority of women in the novel? Or do we secretly rejoice in the fact that *we* are among the few cognoscenti, the movers and shakers who control the destiny of the human race through trickery and murder? I think we are so meant to do, and that the implications of her total society are not fully realized by Tepper. It's so seductive and flattering to be taken into the inner circles of power that when a writer invites us, even in an imaginary world, we most of us find it easy to become co-conspirators and collaborators. Milgram's classic experiment involving our obedience to authority, even when we seem to be harming others, shows that this disturbing tendency is universal, and that we are just as likely to become part of the problem in real life as we are in this deeply flawed novel. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Mar 2002 08:04:10 -0800 From: Sandy Cronin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU > So the same Eugenics that has them selecting for non-violent men has > them selecting for murderous women, and indeed the ruling caste is > even more skilled in martial arts and dealing death than are the men. OK, first I must say that I haven't re-read GATE yet, but I wanted to comment on this. To me, I can see a distinction between ruthlessness (being able to do tough, even violent, things when they're necessary), and the violent aggression that they're trying to weed out of the men (short-fuse violent tempers; a tendency to solve any problem with physical violence). If you've read the Belisarius books (David Drake and Eric Flint; the Free library at baen.com got me hooked on them), it seems to me that Belisarius' temperament is what they're going for in this society; people CAPABLE of violence and ruthlessness, but very much in control of their tempers and aggression. Doesn't seem all THAT contradictory when looked at like that, to me, at least. > So the whole enterprise seems contradictory and doomed to failure; > the more successful the women were in breeding out aggression > and violence in men, the less resolute they would be in their pogrom. > Assuming, that is, that women share most of their genetic heritage > with men and are not a completely different species who happen > to inhabit the same planet. If some of the "acceptable" men are in the cabal, though, then they have to be just as ruthless as the women, so that selection isn't going strictly along gender lines... > And there is a crypto-racism inherent in her scheme, since it would > be easy to demonstrate that young African-American males are > responsible for a disproportionate share of violent crime and might > therefore have to be culled even more drastically. But this isn't addressed in the book, and it seems to me that each case was decided individually, by the boy himself, rather than by society at large or based on any demographic...unless you mean something different by "culled" than "decides to stay in the men's camps rather than come back into the city with the women"... Like I said, though, it's been a while since I read the book. :) -Sandy ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Mar 2002 12:02:36 -0500 From: Dave Belden Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Tepper has been a favorite author of mine in the last decade, but Lee Ann's demolition job on Gateway is extremely convincing. I hadn't realized Lee Ann's point that they were also selecting for female murderousness; nor that successfully breeding only from gentle men would eventually reduce the murderous ability of the women running the program and thus subvert it; but this is clearly correct. I guess I never saw the story as a call to arms, and am somewhat shocked to learn that Tepper saw it that way. I thought it was a book riding on feminist anger against the murderousness of males, certainly. But beyond that I just enjoyed the Machiavellian quality of the story (as I enjoyed Dune, for example, at least for the first book or two) and the cleverness with which she told it and revealed the twist in the tail of the story. Maybe I enjoyed it because it was a kind of reverse of male sf, a murderous conspiratorial tale in which the women came out on top, without really realizing that this in itself is a 'male' template? Assuming it's more male to murder. Of course, if aliens attacked, the women would be all too happy to have those murderous male warriors defend them, wouldn't they? How much of male murderousness has in fact been bred into them by the choice of their mothers down the ages, to mate with warriors, in order to improve their (the mothers' and their children's) survival? On nature/nurture, eugenics, biology, a lot has changed even since Tepper wrote the book. Lee Ann's point about the poor health consequences for women of multiple partners is very new, for example, (at least I only read of it in the last month) so Tepper can't be faulted for condemning her breeders to that - although of course the far more damning point that they are effectively being raped still stands. Perhaps counteracting the point about poor health outcomes of having multiple partners, is the finding that females in many species, including ours , routinely practice deception: e.g. bond with the gentle, committed Daddy type to get ongoing help raising the kids, but secretly go to the wandering, sexy adventurer (or warrior) for sex, to get tougher genes for the kids. Bird species, previously thought to be monogamous, do this a lot, it turns out, and there is strong evidence humans did too in the ancestral pre-civilized environment (not to mention today, as DNA surveys of apartment blocks have shown somewhat startlingly). Not that that justifies the elite in Gateway... So much has come down the pike on biological differences between men and women, what testosterone does, etc. in the last decade or so, that many feminists would have a little difficulty now with Joy writing that > I think a basic premise of feminism is that genes or biology aren't the > most important determinants (to use a pretty icky word) in human society; > rather, we think women and men learn to be women and men. In that sense, > I'd say I'd have to question whether this is a feminist book. Not that even the most enthusiastic sociobiologists think that we do not learn to be men and women - they would say we do, but that the genetic and ongoing hormonal/biological influence is very great. In fact, it seems that feminism, which at one point practically had it as an a priori belief that culture was the culprit, now has no choice but to take into account biology. Not that biology has to be destiny: but if there are in fact significant biological differences between men and women, then we have to learn differently, as men and as women, how to deal with our biology, in order to achieve a more feminist society. This actually makes learning and choice even more important. But it requires first a clear-sightedness about what biological realities we are dealing with in ourselves (and obviously we have a lot more research to do on that). Tepper's call to arms, then, may later be seen as more like an early feminist attempt (made when it was still unfashionable in feminist circles) to come to terms with biological difference. A wild and unconvincing approach, but then, that's partly what sf is for. Please forgive me gabbing on, but I can't resist adding this. In my men's group last night we had this conversation: Do most men in our culture not cry easily because we are taught not to? (This is the theory I had been going on for 25+ years). Or is it in part because testosterone inhibits crying? (Viz. an article in the New York Times last year about a woman who had a sex change, who was amazed to find that the more testosterone she took, the more her tears dried up - involuntarily, as she experienced it). I suggested that if testosterone promoted crying, crying would have a great deal of respect in a male-dominated culture. (On the same lines as the saying "If men could give birth, abortion would be a sacrament"). Because testosterone in fact seems to inhibit crying, and that creates a difference between men and women, then men's culture may value non-crying and exaggerate it. The biology may predate the culture, or may have co-evolved with it; and so we may have to create a culture that, for example, doesn't put boys and men down simply because they aren't crying ("you're so repressed!"), but which still helps them access their feelings. This is the same thing many feminist parents have discovered in trying to control their children's play: in my son's small daycare in San Francisco, which may have been the most feminist-nurtured on the planet, with kids exclusively from feminist/liberal families, and a good number of the kids having two mommies or two daddies, it was uncanny how much the two and three year old boys rushed around killing things while the same-aged girls came behind healing them. No parent in that daycare could escape the sense that something biological was going on, and that our hopes of creating a more feminist world depended on recognizing that. Dave ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Mar 2002 14:18:45 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU >Tepper has been a favorite author of mine in the last decade, Mine too. >but Lee Ann's demolition job on Gateway (pardon my nitpicking, but it's Gate to Women's Country not Gateway - somehow I think the word gateway alters the meaning -apologies if my correction offends) >is extremely convincing. I hadn't realized Lee >Ann's point that they were also selecting for female murderousness; nor that >successfully breeding only from gentle men would eventually reduce the >murderous ability of the women running the program and thus subvert it; but >this is clearly correct. Oh my, I really don't agree at all. How could anyone think of Morgot as murderous considering she only did what she did when forced to do so to protect herself or the women of Women's Country. The martial arts she knew were a secret, obviously because they were not used frequently. It's not like she went around showing them off, as the men in these novels probably would have given the way they are written. And she herself admitted that among themselves the women on the council called themselves "the damned few". They are not thrilled with what they do, but they believe it is important that if there is any way to eliminate that part of the human character that believes that honor can be found in repeatedly going to battle over things that aren't important, then they are going to try to achieve that end. Remember, these are people who have descended from survivors of what was most likely a nuclear war. They have seen the worst in their own history and they are damned sick and tired of it and sure as heck don't want to give anyone, male or female, the chance to have it happen again. They are in a different place than we are and thus have different perspectives on what is REALLY important. There is also the whole section in the play where Hecuba bemoans the fact that she could have killed Talthybius, because she had hidden the knife in her skirt, but then she felt that if she killed him she would be killing some woman's son and that woman would end up grieving over him. Instead she and her daughter-in-law end up watching him throw the baby, Astyanax, off the cliff wall, so she feels that she is damned for not having saved her grandson and would have been damned if she had killed Talthybius. Either way she is damned, so shouldn't she work toward what might have been a better future rather than not acting at all? I really think that the play is truly the key to understanding the novel, and I have found that it takes several readings to see what she really put in there. I am sure that I am still missing quite a bit, and I have read it all so many times that I feel as if I ought to have it memorized. (It is one of the books I am using for my Master's Thesis) Yet each time I go to look something up I see relationships in the text that I hadn't quite understood previously. And there are parts that I definitely drew the wrong conclusions from in the first few readings. How could they be selecting for female murderousness? The majority of the women, who would also be the majority of the mothers, were not members of the council, and therefore were not murdering anyone. And as far as the sexuality goes, obviously Tepper has a problem with anything that is not heterosexuality. I will admit that that does present a problem for anyone who is even remotely sensitive to alternative possibilities in relationships, so that is a drawback to the book, but you have to admit that given the times she was writing in a few years back her inclusion of the carnival weeks was a reflection of the liberated behavior that was pretty much a norm for many people. What was far more peculiar is the fact that these people are doing with out sexual contact for months out of the year. That I think is rather unnatural, and I was left wondering what about her relationship with Joshua and Stavia's with Corrig? There is never any mention that there was any sexual contact between them at inappropriate times, yet they live together. Are women's Country children so well behaved that they never walk in on their "parents". I also had a problem from that point of view with the way she wrote that in Women's Country it wasn't polite to ask about one's father, it just wasn't done, which I believe was meant to portray a rejection of patriarchy and patriarchal influence. Fine. Except that what does her central character have but the equivalent of the typical family because Stavia is Joshua's daughter, and lives with her Mother and her father, unlike probably most of the other children in Women's Country, who live with their mother and a servitor, who may or may not be their father. I found that disturbing, that Tepper would advocate for something that was supposed to be feminist because it was a new way of thinking about relationships, and then turn around and have the family she wrote about most be a typical family in disguise. >I guess I never saw the story as a call to arms, >and am somewhat shocked to learn that Tepper saw it that way. She does seem to be of that opinion given the interviews I have read with her. It just seems to be her perspective on what's wrong with the world, to which she certainly is entitled. >I thought it >was a book riding on feminist anger against the murderousness of males, >certainly. But beyond that I just enjoyed the Machiavellian quality of the >story (as I enjoyed Dune, for example, at least for the first book or two) >and the cleverness with which she told it and revealed the twist in the tail >of the story. Maybe I enjoyed it because it was a kind of reverse of male >sf, a murderous conspiratorial tale in which the women came out on top, >without really realizing that this in itself is a 'male' template? Assuming >it's more male to murder. Of course, if aliens attacked, the women would be >all too happy to have those murderous male warriors defend them, wouldn't >they? How would those warriors stand a chance against aliens? I think I'd rather side with the servitors and the council women given their skills at subterfuge etc. >How much of male murderousness has in fact been bred into them by the >choice of their mothers down the ages, to mate with warriors, in order to >improve their (the mothers' and their children's') survival? > >On nature/nurture, eugenics, biology, a lot has changed even since Tepper >wrote the book. Lee Ann's point about the poor health consequences for women >of multiple partners is very new, for example, (at least I only read of it >in the last month) so Tepper can't be faulted for condemning her breeders to >that - although of course the far more damning point that they are >effectively being raped still stands. This part I don't quite understand. They chose the men they had sex with during carnival and then they unknowingly submit to artificial insemination - that's rape? They participated in carnival, they were admitting that they wanted to try to get pregnant. As Myra says, "I might as well start sometime". >Perhaps counteracting the point about >poor health outcomes of having multiple partners, is the finding that >females in many species, including ours , routinely practice deception: e.g. >bond with the gentle, committed Daddy type to get ongoing help raising the >kids, but secretly go to the wandering, sexy adventurer (or warrior) for >sex, to get tougher genes for the kids. Bird species, previously thought to >be monogamous, do this a lot, it turns out, and there is strong evidence >humans did too in the ancestral pre-civilized environment (not to mention >today, as DNA surveys of apartment blocks have shown somewhat startlingly). Interesting - where did you read of that? Rose By the way I found your theory that it might be physiological that men do not cry as much interesting. It certainly seems plausible. -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Mar 2002 13:03:24 -0800 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 08:04 AM 3/8/02 -0800, Sandy Cronin wrote: >> So the same Eugenics that has them selecting for non-violent men has >> them selecting for murderous women, and indeed the ruling caste is >> even more skilled in martial arts and dealing death than are the men. > > OK, first I must say that I haven't re-read GATE yet, but I wanted to > comment on this. To me, I can see a distinction between ruthlessness > (being able to do tough, even violent, things when they're necessary), > and the violent aggression that they're trying to weed out of the men > (short-fuse violent tempers; a tendency to solve any problem with > physical violence). If you've read the Belisarius books (David Drake and > Eric Flint; the Free library at baen.com got me hooked on them), it > seems to me that Belisarius' temperament is what they're going for in this > society; people CAPABLE of violence and ruthlessness, but very much in > control of their tempers and aggression. I haven't read the Belisarius books, but have read SciFi books such as the CoDominium series by Jerry Pournelle, and the Soldier Ask Not thread of Gordon Dickson, which would appear to have somewhat similar themes based on what little I gleaned from your post. In both, the profession of warrior is a noble one, properly engaged in and without malice or anger, which is exactly what Krishna Vasudeva said to Arjuna in the Bhagavad Gita section of the Mahabharata. Indeed, the horror and malaise which surround the "victory" of the Pandavas in the climactic war was precisely what is missing in Gate. Somehow, the men sent out to die deserve death in Gate, where the finest and best of the men, as well as the worst, perish in the ancient Sanskrit text. And the war of the Pandavas and the Dhartarashtras was a "just" one (on the Pandava's part at least), not the mindless and futile slaughter of the Warriors at the prompting of the Women's Country ruling cabals. Not the cold-blooded murder with little, if any, thought to grieving for these men, foolishly giving their lives for a cause they *think* is just, but which is just a pretext for death and gore. These women are the real Furies, the foul Harpies who revel in death and pain, who punish the men for the sins which they themselves thrust upon them with their curses. Does their cozy "arrangement" strike you as in any way similar to the three Great Powers in George Orwell's 1984? The intention is the same, at very least, to control the "masses," and if the women have the added purpose of a breeding program, why, who can believe them? They lie to everyone else in their world; why should they tell the truth to us, the mere readers? We can easily suspect the program to be fraudulent, since the success of it would run contrary to what we know of genetics and be folly besides, since who knows what necessary parts of what makes us human are bound up in which genes and the RNA which elaborates them? And certainly the real *effect* of their program is that a few men have many wives in their unwitting harem, and they father legions of children. Tepper doesn't actually look at this, through a trick of perception, but one knows tyranny by its fruits, not what it says about itself. We're left with a system of selective breeding in which the great majority of women are treated like cows in a herd, in which a few "bulls" and "alpha cows" rule while the "steers," the impotent (or at least infertile) male warriors are led to slaughter. After much thought, this cozy arrangement has pierced me to the heart with its denial of love, of the deep tenderness possible in both men and women, and of our common humanity. The real effect of this breeding program, this inane tinkering with the very basis of our human lives, is quite likely to be ruin for us all. We don't understand it. We don't understand life at all, and our arrogance and ignorance are as capable of destroying us with DNA as with atomic bombs. It's certainly true that our DNA doesn't contain near enough information, not by an order of magnitude at least, to account for the genetic variation within our own species, much less that between the whole of life. So every gene seems to do multiple things, mediated by unique sequences of RNA and cellular proteins that don't obey the laws of Mendelian inheritance. That's probably why animals bred for certain characteristics most often exhibit genetic flaws as well, like deafness in some blue-eyed cats. So who knows what horror these women, and their male lap cats, are unwittingly unleashing upon their world? > Doesn't seem all THAT contradictory when looked at like that, to me, > at least. When I first read the book, I rather liked it as well. It was only after worrying at the holes in her story, which nagged at me like a missing tooth, that I began to see the decay at its heart. As I said, she stole most of her story from a common heritage of Lesbian Separatist myth and storytelling, so it was at first familiar to me. And since it struck a chord, since I saw the possibilities of affirmation in the work, I thought that it was there, lurking just out of reach. >> So the whole enterprise seems contradictory and doomed to failure; > > If some of the "acceptable" men are in the cabal, though, then they have > to be just as ruthless as the women, so that selection isn't going > strictly along gender lines... Of course. That's why I said that the process was doomed, but you can bet that the breeding program would go on, and that the rulers have already been corrupted by their power. That's the way of things in totalitarian states. >> And there is a crypto-racism inherent in her scheme, since it would >> be easy to demonstrate that young African-American males are >> responsible for a disproportionate share of violent crime and might >> therefore have to be culled even more drastically. > > But this isn't addressed in the book, and it seems to me that each case > was decided individually, by the boy himself, rather than by society at > large or based on any demographic...unless you mean something different > by "culled" than "decides to stay in the men's camps rather than come > back into the city with the women"... By culled, I mean that the men they want to kill are sent, like Uriah, into the thick of battle and are so destroyed. In our present society, young African-American men are often denied the sources of pride and achievement that make them feel good about themselves. They often hang out with other, similarly-situated young men, and fall into the same traps of crime and violence. In the Gate world, these men would be sent into the thick of battle and eliminated. We send them to prison, where they make up a disproportionate percentage of the prison population, and they come out broken men, for the most part, and never escape the cycle of crime and prison, with violence all around them, that now blights the lives of many. It's true what you say, that the ones who are bullied by the other boys and men, who are cowed, and who opt out of male society to the taunts and jeers of the "real" men and boys, are spared. But are these the fathers we want for our *real* children? Men who would run away in the face of any *real* threat? I think not. While we may well be fooled by individual men, and we may be utterly stupid in our youth, by and large we look for the qualities of intelligence, initiative and courage that say, "This man would be a good father to my children." I say "we" collectively, and in solidarity with my heterosexual sisters, since I am childless in my own body. While it's true that we *also* value gentleness in men, the number of men incapable of gentle behavior is fairly small, I think, and based on many years of my own close observation. And there are few men as contemptible in the sight of most women as a coward, one who runs away in the face of danger, like the man who thought that Sharon Whipple was being raped and hid downstairs while she was mauled and killed by vicious dogs outside her San Francisco apartment because he thought the imaginary rapist might hurt him as well. Feh! But men who are abused, as well as women, experience irrevocable changes in their brains and behavior that make them antisocial, make them perpetually sick in their hearts and minds, and leads them to violence and the perpetuation of a violent culture. The only way to cure that is to eliminate social and family abuse and injustice, which we are as unwilling to do as are the rulers of "Women's Country." In fact, the Women's Country women do just the opposite. They set up every young boy to be viciously abused, in full knowledge of what the best, most gentle, of the boys will endure, and somehow manage to fool us into thinking that good men will come of such an upbringing. This is "spare the rod and spoil the child" with a vengeance and a fury beyond anything imagined by Suzy Charnas or any lesbian writer I know of. Perhaps it takes a heterosexual woman to hate and despise men quite as deeply as she seems to, since the only other work I've seen containing a similar rage was Helen Zahavi's Dirty Weekend, a sort of fantasy in which a woman is suddenly given the power to kill men whenever she wants to, and she does want to, oh yes, she does. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Mar 2002 13:47:44 -0800 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 12:02 PM 3/8/02 -0500, Dave Belden wrote: >Please forgive me gabbing on, but I can't resist adding this. In my men's >group last night we had this conversation: Do most men in our culture not >cry easily because we are taught not to? (This is the theory I had been >going on for 25+ years). Or is it in part because testosterone inhibits >crying? (Viz. an article in the New York Times last year about a woman who >had a sex change, who was amazed to find that the more testosterone she >took, the more her tears dried up - involuntarily, as she experienced it). I I think so. I lived in Utah for several years and had the valuable experience of seeing Mormon men in their natural habitat, as it were. They highly value emotion and are openly emotional in the "Testimonies" they often give of the centrality of their religion in their lives, in the importance of their families, and other deeply personal subjects that most (many?) men would avoid like the plague, around women at least. But I read a similar story, written by a female to male transsexual, who mentioned the difference she felt in her feelings and sexuality after taking male hormones for a while. Not only did her tears dry up, she became more easily angered, and horny as all get out almost all the time. In particular, she (and I apologize for the word "she" but she was talking about how she experienced this as a woman, now living as a man, but from a woman's perspective) also said, and I particularly remember this, that her attitude toward love changed as well. It wasn't that she didn't believe in love, or didn't think it was important, but that it now took a secondary place to sex. After sex, she might think about love, but sex came first. This admission astonished me, and made me think. Based on these two experiences, I'd say both things happen. Boys are taught to "control" their tears and testosterone makes it easier. But this also destroys much of the premise of Women's Country. If men can be taught to be sensitive, but not "too" sensitive, what purpose does the breeding program really serve without simply castrating all the men? To be sure, the male servants *behave* a bit like castrati, and seem to be *assumed* by the warriors to be so, since they never express jealousy of their 24-hour access to the women, and the warriors behave like bulls, but are castrated by proxy, since they can have no offspring despite their frequent ruts. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Mar 2002 19:04:03 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/8/02 11:02:56 AM Central Standard Time, davebelden@EARTHLINK.NET writes: << Not that even the most enthusiastic sociobiologists think that we do not learn to be men and women - they would say we do, but that the genetic and ongoing hormonal/biological influence is very great. In fact, it seems that feminism, which at one point practically had it as an a priori belief that culture was the culprit, now has no choice but to take into account biology. Not that biology has to be destiny: but if there are in fact significant biological differences between men and women, then we have to learn differently, as men and as women, how to deal with our biology, >> It's obvious there are biological differences between men and women, but it still is a basic premise of feminism, and any political movement, that biology is not destiny, that differences do not mean one group has a natural right to oppress another or a 'natural' role to play, and in the particulars of this case, that eugenics is not a means to social change and engagement of people in defining their own destinies. It is in the context of eugenics as a premise for social change that I specifically situated my remarks. 'Taking control of reproduction', another key feminist tenet, is not likely to happen, whatever the technology available, without strong political will and organization to do that. But political strength and will is not the same as subterfuge by an elite. Or, sure , that can be done , but it's not a particularly feminist or democratic strategy. It might make some sense for the shortterm in the type of setting where this novel takes place, but at great costs (as the novel actually makes pretty evident) that are probably not going to create, in the long term, the kind of society that I (and other feminists) would want or consider 'feminist'. See another post I'm sending for other thoughts on the 'control of reproduction' issue.-Joy Martin ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Mar 2002 19:04:05 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/8/02 1:34:39 PM Central Standard Time, rreith@RACORES.COM writes: << I really think that the play is truly the key to understanding the novel, and I have found that it takes several readings to see what she really put in there >> I think you are right, and that's why I said in my first post about this, that I would need further rereading to really see how it all fits together. The women in the novel do indeed feel great sorrow for their sons. Right now I think there's something of a logical flaw in the story itself, in that the women are sending their sons to the warriors at possibly the worst time in their development to do so, and the only reason is, because of the eugenic program that is revealed at the end of the book. OTOH, it's not a logical flaw in the story IF Tepper is trying to make us think about how the women, in pursuit of removing highly aggressive behavior, are in fact falling prey to a fallacy. That's why I said, if this was the first of a series, I think there'd be more development of this idea, and we'd find some of the downside of their strategy showing up in later plot development. Or, we'd have them realizing they have made some error, or we'd have outrage among women who find out what has been done; also, this society is not a democracy, and as the immediate pressures to rebuild population in a postapocalyptic world lessen, and as people move and society opens up more, I think more 'democratic' struggles would ensue. Really, I think Tepper has set the stage for further developments, which so far she has not written, that I know of. It would be interesting to see what would happen if she ever does.-Joy ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Mar 2002 19:04:07 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Some other thoughts, instigated by various points in this discussion: I always have enjoyed Tepper's work, and still do, and I think this novel was not necessarily taking a stand on how women should do anything (as I think I said, I don't think it's prescriptive, or, it does not need to be read as such, although the women in the novel have decided on how they want to deal with their postapocalyptic world- they, or some of them, have decided on a prescription) controlling reproduction or otherwise, but setting up a situation to highlight some problems. You don't have to agree with the idea of eugenics in the novel, to enjoy the way Tepper has brought a lot of ideas together to jostle our ways of thinking about things. Right now, I think this novel has made me think a lot more about separatism as an idea which was very big at the time it was written. (I don't think it's accurate to say she was unaware of homosexuality as an issue. This novel was copyrighted in 1988. Separatism, lesbian and otherwise, had already come into full flower, by that time. ) I'd say it's more of an indictment of separatism than I realized the first time I read it. Not because it presents the women as evil or murderous, which it does not, IMO (it presents them as doing what they must, as they see it, to protect themselves and make their world different from the one before it). But because separating the men and women by deliberate choice seems to lead to moral and ethical dilemmas that are possibly as bad or worse than the problems they are trying to avoid. (Of course there is not complete separatism; there are the servitors, and there are other groups besides women country.) By putting this society in in a postapocalyptic setting, we are encouraged both to consider the very real dangers of our own society, and also to consider how various changes in women's power may still be wanting in actually arriving at the kind of society we want. Also, in a postapocalyptic society, to reach a sustainable population, you'd have to do a lot of reproducing. That's why it brought to mind Picnic on Paradise for me, because that was a situation where the men wanted to try to start a lot of reproduction, but there was no way, given the handful of people they had left, that it would work. In Gate to Womens Country, evidently there were enough survivors to make it work, but still women were going to have to have a lot of babies. The women managed to make reproduction in that circumstance as palatable as possible, they controlled the way they lived and worked and shared childrearing etc. The novel doesn't go overboard in all the details, but we can gather enough to see that the women are relatively satisfied with the work/childbearing arrangements. Childcare etc is relatively equitable. I think it's useful to see a different vision of how a social group would survive with all that childbearing, without having the women turned into total slaves, as happened in the group that captured Stavia. And those Father worshippers weren't succeeding in sustaining their population either, they were having to resort to capturing 'outside' women. The eugenics, thrown in at the end, gives a disturbing twist. I think it's a rather bleak one. I would like to think Tepper did it to make us think, and perhaps to set up further plot development later. OTOH, in some of her novels, I've noticed she has a problem resolving the plot elements at the end, and perhaps this ending comes a little bit from that. It works, in that we can see how the story fits together with it, and it also has controversial thought provoking elements, so it also works in that way. But it may also have been a way to tie things up, that could have gone in some other direction. Dunno. Stories have a way of going where they want to go, once they are started, and she may not have felt, once she got into it, she had much choice in the matter. And that leaves us looking at the good, the bad and the ugly in this society, with a lot to gnaw over. And in that sense, it's a good novel. If the women were all perfect and the ending was some niceynice thing, I'd actually feel a bit ripped off, I think. -Joy Martin ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Mar 2002 22:57:51 +0800 From: Carol Ryles Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: Gate Comments: To: Feminist SF/Fantasy and Utopia Literature ON TOPIC To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU > These women are the real Furies, the foul Harpies who revel > in death and pain, who punish the men for the sins which > they themselves thrust upon them with their curses. I recently read the book "The Lucifer Principle" by Howard Bloom. By exploring the relationships between genetics, human behavior, and culture, he argues that evil is a by-product of nature's strategies for creation and that it is woven into our most basic biological fabric: An interesting and disturbing book, that disturbed me all the more with the following generalization: "Women encourage killers. They do it by falling in love with warriors and heroes. Men respond with enthusiasm. The Crusaders marched off to war with ladies' favours in their helmets all the while thinking of how the damsels back home would admire their bravery." It read like a scene from Gate to Women's Country! >We don't understand it. We don't understand >life at all, and our arrogance and ignorance are as >capable of destroying us with DNA as with atomic bombs This led me to compare rather than contrast the Holylanders with Women's Country. While the Holylanders' fundamentalism was destroying them, so too, I think will the fundamentalist behaviour of the councilwomen. When there are no men left, will the "common woman" be able to turn to the servitor, who she has been taught to consider "asexual(?)". The women can't turn to each other because Lesbianism has been eliminated. So they have only themselves. As Wendy Pearson points out in her article *After the (Homo)Sexual: A Queer Analysis of Anti-Sexuality in Sheri S. Tepper's The Gate to Women's Country* (In Science-Fiction Studies, Vol 23 1996 Montreal): "What is left at the end of the novel is the vision of a world that contains only heterosexual women and a kind of oddly desexed male population, often referred to in the novel as eunuchs -- a psychological if not a physiological truth -- and thus, finally, a vision of a world without any sex at all. "There is no f***ing in Hades." (As the 11 year old Stavia noted in the play) And yet are the servitors really able to control their violence? Joshua's explanation for killing Michael adds fuel to my doubts: "I needed to do it. In Women's Country we learn not to have jealousy . . . And yet, despite it all I did," said Joshua with a shamed face. Carol. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Mar 2002 12:03:07 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: [*FSF-L*] To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 10:57 PM +0800 3/10/02, Carol Ryles wrote: >This led me to compare rather than contrast the Holylanders with Women's >Country. While the Holylanders' fundamentalism was destroying them, so too, >I think will the fundamentalist behaviour of the councilwomen. When there >are no men left, will the "common woman" be able to turn to the servitor, >who she has been taught to consider "asexual(?)". The women can't turn to >each other because Lesbianism has been eliminated. So they have only >themselves. Interesting, this viewpoint certainly works with the part where Stavia is described as touching herself in bed at night and not feeling guilty about it because it meant that she was "normal" and "womanly". So perhaps the ultimate intent is to eliminate sexual intercourse, and eventually transition to a world where women become pregnant through artificial insemination and work side by side with the men in a more neutral scenario with out all the angst of emotion involved in sexual relationships. >As Wendy Pearson points out in her article *After the (Homo)Sexual: A Queer >Analysis of Anti-Sexuality in Sheri S. Tepper's The Gate to Women's Country* >(In Science-Fiction Studies, Vol 23 1996 Montreal): > >"What is left at the end of the novel is the vision of a world that contains >only heterosexual women and a kind of oddly desexed male population, often >referred to in the novel as eunuchs -- a psychological if not a >physiological truth I don't recall the servitors being referred to as eunuchs, except as an assumption of the warriors who of course had to believe that or they might have begun to question their own situation. It makes sense though that most of the women would have assumed that, since otherwise they might have blabbed to the warriors during carnival. > -- and thus, finally, a vision of a world without any >sex at all. "There is no f***ing in Hades." (As the 11 year old Stavia noted >in the play) Ahh, this is one of the things that I struggled to work out, and I have to admit, never got so succinctly as Wendy seems to be pointing out - "There is no f***ing in Hades.", is one of the quotes from the book and the other that struck me but I didn't see the connection until now, "Hades is Women's Country". I struggled to understand what that meant, and figured it really only had to do with the fact that for the warriors, they were never going to be able to abuse the women, but I wonder now if what that really means for the future of Women's Country is that there will be no sex. >And yet are the servitors really able to control their violence? Joshua's >explanation for killing Michael adds fuel to my doubts: > >"I needed to do it. In Women's Country we learn not to have jealousy . . . >And yet, despite it all I did," said Joshua with a shamed face. I suppose Tepper might have included this facet of Joshua's character so close to the resolution of the story in order to show that the servitors would still be man enough to take over the emotional tasks of manhood from the warriors when the time came for them to do so??? It certainly seems as if she were conflicted about having different ways of living anyway. Tepper tries so hard in this novel to make a world where women have most of the things that they were demanding here in the real world, the medical care, the education, the right to feel safe walking in the streets, etc. And frankly from that point of view I thought Women's Country was a pretty good place. It's only after you've really thought about the lies and deception that go with the medical care, and the other things that the women have to do to achieve their goals that it becomes harder to appreciate what Tepper did manage to write for them. I suppose a talented critic could actually argue that Tepper is not feminist because she set up a story that makes a mockery of the women getting what they had asked for prior to the devastation that made their world possible. Was her real message be careful what you ask for, you just might get it? Rose Reith -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Mar 2002 13:26:49 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/10/02 11:15:27 AM Central Standard Time, rreith@RACORES.COM writes: << servitors would still be man enough to take over the emotional tasks of manhood from the warriors when the time came for them to do so??? >> I think what Tepper is showing is that, at least at that point, the male servitors still acknowledge they have some of the 'old' feelings and motivations, and it has not been 'bred' completely out. (And probably won't be for some time, if ever.) Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Mar 2002 13:26:51 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU << When there >are no men left, will the "common woman" be able to turn to the servitor, >> (sorry, I can't find the original email to quote from) - I wouldn't say there'll be no men. There will be 'new' men, the servitors or their descendents, if the eugenics works. And possibly fewer men, at least for a while. As far as I can tell, it's an open question what might happen in terms of sex once the aggression is 'bred' out (again, assuming for the sake of argument the eugenics would work). I'm not even convinced there is no sex between the servitor men and the women, anymore than I am convinced that there is no sex between women (expressions of 'horror' at homosexuality notwithstanding. That one expression was in the context of discussing a male warrior who was suspected of forcing himself on boys as well as girls.). I very much doubt the servitors are sexless in their feelings. I don't remember reading anything saying they didn't have sexual feelings.(In fact, in the quotation where Joshua admits shame for his jealousy - the inference there is that sexual feelings are at its base.) One would infer, based on their other behavior, that servitors' sexuality would be/is far less aggressive, one way, than the warriors', and probably sublimated greatly in other interests. And masturbation is definitely sex, just not reproductive sex. The only thing being specifically disallowed is reproduction from sex with warriors. I just don't think Tepper spelled out everything, and it's not a requirement of any novel to spell out everything. But we can speculate about the implications of course, whether spelled out or not. Would the women (who now don't know about the eugenics) be able to love the 'new' men, or at least feel sexual feelings toward them? They are apparently conditioned to see the servitor males as asexual. Or perhaps it's just a taboo, but made to be broken. I see the goal of the eugenics as eliminating the warrior type of male, and thus the need for war.[Actually, this assumes women never would make war. Again, another false assumption (IMO).] Does that mean eliminating sex or the interest in sex? Doubtful, even if we agree on the questionable assumptions that the eugenics would work. Conditioning isn't eugenics. And of course, I don't even know if it's successful conditioning. It's the socially acceptable way to mate, it seems, in the current Women's Country. For what that's worth. I'd also say some of the 'asexuality' of the servitors - or women's feelings towards the servitors - has a lot to do with the incest taboo, the general abhorrence of sex between family members . Not that there aren't violations of the incest taboo, but it does put a damper on sexual feelings for the majority of people. (Just as an aside: the incest taboo appears to have some kind of biological basis.) For adult females in the houses where servitors are newly arrived, this wouldn't hold. But for children growing up with servitors, it would hold. I also thought there were hints that Stavia and Corrig might have some growing sexual interest in each other (esp once she'd been shorn of her infatuation with Chernon). So much of this is hints - not spelled out in the story (and if it was, god knows how long the book would have been), but nevertheless, included enough to make us wonder. It's definitely true at the time of this novel, this society is emphasizing a great deal of childbearing, in order to build the population to sustainable levels (also partly because they keep killing off so many warriors in the semiartificially induced wars, which they feel is necessary for their society's future). But there are also beginning population pressures, esp. if starting new cities a. involves new encounters with other, possibly hostile like the Holylanders, populations, b. if the ability to produce certain goods with limited resources is making it difficult to meet the needs of the current population (referring to the sections describing difficulties in producing enough antibiotics, etc.),and c. if habitable land is very limited (depending on the extent of the radioactive desolations). So soon enough we would see some conflict over the amount of reproduction, one would expect. And the values underpinning that amount. The women do have the ability not to reproduce, so they will be able to stop. The problem, from the novels perspective, or the setting of the novel, is or might be, how the need to slow down reproduction will conflict with the need to keep up the subterfuge with the warriors (and the women who don't know about the eugenics and the values they have about reproduction) and how that will impact the eugenics program (and how long the eugenics is likely to take to be effective). Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2002 22:59:47 +1100 From: Julieanne Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 02:18 PM 8/03/02 -0500, Rose Reith wrote: >There is also the >whole section in the play where Hecuba bemoans the fact that she >could have killed Talthybius, because she had hidden the knife in her >skirt, but then she felt that if she killed him she would be killing >some woman's son and that woman would end up grieving over him. >Instead she and her daughter-in-law end up watching him throw the >baby, Astyanax, off the cliff wall, so she feels that she is damned >for not having saved her grandson and would have been damned if she >had killed Talthybius. Either way she is damned, so shouldn't she >work toward what might have been a better future rather than not >acting at all? > >I really think that the play is truly the key to understanding the >novel, and I have found that it takes several readings to see what >she really put in there. I agree that the play is critical. I have now read Gate 3 or 4 times, the first time just after it came out. The 2nd time some years later, was just after reading/studying a feminist analysis of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey and it was then I recognised Tepper's play in the Gate, as being loosely based on the Iliad & the women characters. I must admit I found the Iliad a rather bleak and horrifically gory story...Freddy Kruger eat your heart out:) The constant raping and murdering of the women characters, with these long monologues of glory to their own deaths etc...is rather nauseating. And that's interspersed with even longer detailed scenes of Achilles sadistic violence on the battlefield... But the women's fate in the Iliad is often glossed over, and beatified - the rape, murders etc are nearly always without exception accompanied by the women's own voices extolling the virtues and 'honour' and "sacred blessedness" of having been "chosen" for being killed, raped and enslaved etc .....Briseis (who is only briefly mentioned in Tepper's play) was taken as captive ( war 'booty') after the death of her husband at the hand of Achilles - and she is passed around Achilles camp, and in the middle of being gang-raped declares at great length her love for her master Achilles...and how "ennobling" it is to be a slave of such a great man!....The storyline goes on and on about how great her 'loyalty' to Achilles was, (and scholarly treatises for millennia have extolled the story of Briseis as exemplary of great 'loyalty'.....( doesn't mention that as a kinless woman and enslaved war captive her very survival depended on pleasing master......) In Tepper's version, Iphigenia says to Achilles when he mentions Brisies's "loyalty" - says something like "perhaps she was begging for mercy and her life, and not speaking of love, lust or loyalty at all"... Iphigenia for example, is often skipped over by classic literary boffs because she is a "minor character" - she is the 14 yr old daughter of Agamemnon who is tricked, lied to (as well as her mother) and then quite horrifically 'sacrificed' by her father to placate some wind goddess or other, so the Greek ships which had been becalmed, could sail again to the war at Troy. The blood & guts is very detailed...but like sadomasochistic pornography ..... Iphigenia is presented in the story as having "wanted" such a fate. There is a pages and pages long speech by Iphigenia about how honoured and blessed she feels by being sacrificed in this way, how her 'loving sacrifice' will win the war for the Greeks....and she is the "true heroine" etc etc - indeed, classic scholars mention a minor religious cult for some centuries based on Iphigenia as the ultimate Virgin Goddess..... According to the Iliad, the only good woman is a dead woman, and one who went "willingly" to her fate.... As Iphigenia says in Tepper's play in the Gate " ...they say we wanted it....and the poets help them do it"... In the Iliad, Iphigenia was sacrificed for the Greeks, signifying the beginning of the Trojan War with the launching of Greek ships. Polyxena is Iphigenia's Trojan counterpart. Polyxena, however, was sacrificed in Troy, signifying the end of the war. Achilles was apparently so smitten with the young maiden princess Polyxena that he told Priam (the Trojan King, her father) that he would try to form a peace between Troy and Greece in return for Polyxena. However, Achilles stated that Helen would still have to be returned to the Greeks. Priam refused to give up Helen, but stated that if Achilles could make a peace, he would give him Polyxena. Polyxena sent for Achilles and asked him to meet her and her brother, in the temple and she assured Achilles, they would complete the marriage arrangement there. Achilles came and Paris, (her brother) shot Achilles in his vulnerable heel. As he died, he asked his fellows to sacrifice Polyxena at his tomb after Troy was defeated, in order to "complete the marriage in the afterlife".... Just like Iphigenia, Polyxena is tricked and lied to in order to get her to go to the sacrifice willingly.... and again, Polyxena waxes forth lyrically at great length about her wondrous fate....I prefer her description of her death in Tepper's version about loosened bowels and urine-stained legs and begging for her life... My personal favourites of the Iliad were Cassandra and Penthesilia, the latter not mentioned in Tepper's version, and the former only as a minor character. Cassandra was sister to Polyxena and a priestess I think....anyway, she was approached by Apollo for a quickie or whatever and Cassandra said No... to a God no less:) For that crime against Man/God she was punished with the "Curse of Apollo"... being that she was cursed to "forever to speak the truth, but never to be believed"...hence as we see in Tepper's version (as in Homer's Iliad and others) she does prophesy *ad nauseam* about holocausts and wars etc...and was considered a madwoman.... Penthesilia was the Amazon Warrior Queen...and fighting on the side of the Trojans in the war, and most accounts have Penthesilia and her amazon bands as decisive warriors in the Trojan war, with long, long detailed epics of the battle between Penthesilia and Achilles... She was eventually defeated, but according to the Iliad ... Achilles was so besotted with her beauty, that he spent several days performing public & ritually ceremonial necrophilia on her body... ironically, its presented as "love" and 'honour'...its really bizarre...I've always found it strange that the Iliad and similar horrific sado-masochistic epic stories have been claimed as "Classic Great Literature' for millennia.... But anyway...back to Tepper and the play in the Gate.... my take on the theme and why it was performed every carnival, was the points around all women being sisters, and all equally damaged under male domination and "eagerness" for violence, it didn't matter whether you were Greek or Trojan, (as it doesn't matter if you live in Marthatown or Tabithaville etc) ..doesn't matter if you are a Queen or shepherdess, an honored wife or maiden daughter, a warrior or sacred priestess, loyal to menfolk or betrayer... and secondly that death is far better than living in the "living hell" that is created under male domination.... in other words, Women's Country is Hades, because just like death, it is the only place free of male domination and male violence. Achilles can hurt no one in Hades/Women's Country. But one of the few things I liked about Gate, is that Tepper shows how the majority of people just don't "get it"...and think its just a cute comedy etc... just a carnival ritual entertainment, up there with puppet shows & dancing dogs etc. For so much time had passed, the meaning had been lost to most. Like modern day Easter eggs and Xmas trees, we also have for the most part, forgotten the significance of these symbols, but continue to practice them anyway:) But its obvious it is important to Stavia's personal story - with her flashbacks, relating the themes of the play to her experiences with Chernon and the Holylanders, and so on. Susannah's suicide note saying she wanted death because she didn't want to be "hit no more".... she went to the only "women's country" she could access. >>On nature/nurture, eugenics, biology, a lot has changed even since Tepper >>wrote the book. Lee Ann's point about the poor health consequences for women >>of multiple partners is very new, for example, (at least I only read of it >>in the last month) so Tepper can't be faulted for condemning her breeders to >>that - although of course the far more damning point that they are >>effectively being raped still stands. The health consequences of multiple sex partners on women's sexual health has been known for some decades, but not widely publicised. Particularly in relation to cervical cancer & some other conditions, much of which is caused by sexually transmitted disease - eg. HPV infections. Its just that as a communicable disease, something like 80% of women have no symptoms with HPV or such mild symptoms that they never know they were infected, and resulting conditions may take decades to appear. So by the late 60s when condoms went rapidly out of fashion as a contraceptive, (replaced by oral contraceptives), the rates of cervical cancer (previously extremely rare) sky-rocketed. To the point, where most Western countries today have massive publicly funded cervical cancer screening programs. In Tepper's Gate, I personally didn't have a problem with the secret artificial insemination in conjunction with the carnival sex rituals...I saw it as a part of the whole...ie. the need for secrecy was paramount, and its this need to "keep the secret" at all costs that gives Stavia and Morgot and others such grief, the need to "keep up appearances" and lie to their friends and their daughters. I don't think they liked encouraging young girls to be sexually active, and reproductive....but it wasn't "forced" in any way...it was just encouraged, strongly perhaps - but no woman was ever forced. And they had to declare their intention of wanting pregnancy or not, hence the contraceptive implants etc. And it may not have been emphasised by Tepper, but there was a lot of variety in terms of sexual activity. Some women weren't very sexually active, (and if they'd known they were to be artificially inseminated anyway, they might have chosen to forgo the carnival sex rituals!) or even remained faithful to just one partner for years, some didn't like carnival and didn't bother except when they wanted to get pregnant, or skipped several in a row...and although Stavia was unusual, she wasn't an exception in leaving it rather later than average. As she mentions in her student years in Abbyville, she had joined in the merrymaking in the taverns at several carnivals, but never found one that took her fancy. Until such time as their weeding out of the worst males was achieved, it was absolutely necessary to keep the secret and have everyone "live the lie" so to speak - my heart went out to Morgot, the 'special' servitors and all the others 'in the know' more than the unwitting masses, because it was absolutely necessary for Morgot to go through carnival and "play the part" with Michael etc - and for the 'special' servitors to "play their part" at all times... without fail..... I could even see the council women discussing such things, like who would 'play the part' of the nympho changing partners every 2 hours during carnival, who would play the part of the faithful partner loving her one man for life, or pretending to curry favour with the more powerful men in the garrison and so on...and as Morgot mentions to Stavia, the need to keep up appearances with other women, by having friendships outside the council, no matter how much it hurt to keep "living the lie" for the good of all... And drama was considered an important art to have for the council women...and Stavia throughout talks about how the "actor Stavia" had to take over from time to time. This is another theme I see with the carnival play, always presented by the council women etc. But at some future point (if they succeeded) - the secret would be no longer necessary, and the women could choose as they will, both who sired and how they sired their kids...... and also the men 'servitors' would no longer have to 'play their part' either - there would be no need for them to 'pretend' anymore. One of my quibbles with Gate relate to the stereotyping of characterisation, a common dislike I have in many of her novels.... her characters are often very shallow and implausible to me. Like the gypsies were so stereotyped, cartoon cut-outs of the frolicking giggling hookers etc...*blech*.... And particularly the servitor characters, they weren't drawn very well, and we see too little of them. One clue that resonated with me, was when Stavia agrees to meet Chernon and tells him he has to "pretend to be a servitor, and do as I tell you, especially when others are around".... and we see the servitors constantly acting out parts, the 'special' ones with telepathy or other talents etc - were constantly having to play the part of gentle pansy or basically "whatever it took" to keep the secret safe etc......but its unfortunate they weren't drawn in more detail, to see them relaxed when alone and without the need to 'play the part' in order to 'keep the secret'. >> Perhaps counteracting the point about >>poor health outcomes of having multiple partners, is the finding that >>females in many species, including ours , routinely practice deception: e.g. >>bond with the gentle, committed Daddy type to get ongoing help raising the >>kids, but secretly go to the wandering, sexy adventurer (or warrior) for >>sex, to get tougher genes for the kids. Bird species, previously thought to >>be monogamous, do this a lot, it turns out, and there is strong evidence >>humans did too in the ancestral pre-civilized environment (not to mention >>today, as DNA surveys of apartment blocks have shown somewhat startlingly). This is common amongst mammals - males are the redundant gender. Mammals, by definition, bear live but very immature young, which require long periods of continual infant care - which make that investment of adult energy absolutely mandatory for species survival. One mother with infant(s), will not be able to care for herself & offspring alone. Even two adults would find it impossible. Mammals, with only a handful of exceptions, are "herd" beasts, they clump together -safety in numbers. Monogamous pairings are rare amongst mammals, and life-long monogamous pairings are rarer still. Monogamous pairings for mammals is often species suicide. The fact that female mammals are built and designed to be primary carers of offspring, means they are also built and designed for far better survival rates than males. Amongst mammals, that's the "natural" trade-off for high sexual dimorphism. The natural gender ratio amongst most mammalian species is weighted very heavily towards females over males, usually around 60:40 to 75:25.....In mammals, males are meant and designed by Nature to die off in far greater numbers. Nature is wasteful, producing far more males than needed for species survival - as a 'Back-up Plan B" - a redundancy mechanism - when the species or population group's survival is threatened amongst mammals, the natural over-production of males becomes useful and necessary to repopulate quickly with a diverse gene pool. This can be seen in populations which become in-bred and are in danger of dying out. One of the first signs of too much in-breeding over generations, is an over-production of males. Many cat and dog breeders know this, when they get more well-endowed males than usual in a litter, they know they have to start breeding out. In human studies of isolated in-bred populations, these are also often abnormal males - these boys are sexually precocious reaching puberty very early, short and stocky in stature, low IQ, poor sight/hearing etc .....but HUGE testes of healthy normal sperm, producing 5 times the average. Nature's last ditch back-up plan B - or redundancy mechanism - when a mammalian population group is threatened with extinction due to in-breeding (or other things like massive die-off or sterility), produce mobile sperm-banks with few brains, compact energy-efficient bodies, the minimum necessary to maintain physical life and no more, with all biological energy funnelled into huge sexual organs maturing at an early age, designed for no other purpose than breeding through a relatively short life-span - But during non-emergency times, there are many mechanisms around for this Natural 'culling' of "excess" males. Male-dominance fighting, often to the death, is the most well-known, but 'exile' is often practised in Nature too. These 'loser' males tend to hang on the fringes of the typical mammalian 'group' social structure. They are opportunistic, constantly watching and "waiting for the right opportunity", they are aggressive, self-interested more than socially co-operative, existing very much grab-as-they-can whether food, warmth, shelter or quickly mating with females when the opportunity arises, when the alpha males aren't looking or busy elsewhere I guess:) Again, they are Nature's 'back-up' to prevent in-breeding, a few alpha males siring all offspring would cause in-breeding problems. It is in the female's biological self-interest (and the population or group as a whole) to have offspring by different sires, so yes, it is common for females in Nature (usually those who already have one or more offspring) to gravitate to the fringes and mate with one of the "loser" males - for the good of all:) These males in Nature often have short and desperate lives, given the need for opportunism in their 'exile' from the 'core' group or social structure. Since males, being naturally expendable, tend to die off in larger numbers- mammals tend to be majority adult females with some young. Also, mammals tend to be of low fertility - not all female mammals get pregnant every season or on every opportunity - there is often a portion of adult females who never bear young, or even mate. They never tell you this on Discovery Channel though. Can't have women thinking that remaining childless is not only natural but biologically sensible. Elephants are interesting for this sort of social construction, as an adaptation in response to the mammalian natural gender ratio imbalance. They like other mammals have around 20-30% of females as non-young bearers, who are primary herd/community defenders, not the far fewer adult bulls. They are long-lived and also have post-menopausal females. The myths of bands of amazonian warrior-women are a natural extension of what is common in nature. Homo sapiens was a very weak species, and still is, in a purely biological sense. Evidence suggests that our species came close to being erased on several occasions, our numbers were very low until after the last Ice Age. Early societies during the long Ice Ages, were not exactly well-fed, with relatively short lifespans, conception rates low, miscarriage rates high, and infant mortality very high and probably a significant number of female adults were temporarily or permanently barren. In-breeding would have been a serious problem with such low population numbers and being geographically isolated by the bitter climate etc. Its also been suggested that our higher rates of fertility compared to other primates, were an adaptation to the crushing conditions of the Ice Ages in the non-tropical regions - whereas they are higher in tropical regions because of the heavy disease toll. All able-bodied adults would by sheer necessity be involved in sustaining the whole community, including childcare, foodsource maintenance, & defence. Monogamy would have been death for us all.... and we wouldn't be here to argue about it. Cooperative behaviour is selected for, you chose to cooperate, or fuck off and die alone:) When you have a natural gender imbalance weighted to favour females, its females who tend to be the most cooperative in such situations. But also, such crushing environmental conditions would have meant that 'culling' of males was naturally counter-productive, as all able-bodied adults were necessary for group survival under harsh conditions. Behaviour adapts to environment. The post-Ice Age period with warmer, better climates, and the introduction of permanent crops etc meant huge population increases - our higher fertility selected for in harsher climes, was now a liability, and a return to the natural over-production of males. A return to culling excess males, or "exile" or "exclusion" from the reproductive gene pool was probably re-instated but perhaps not very successfully? The adaptive Goddess was replaced by the God, who valued sons for all men perhaps? In humans, many societies have also adopted methods of exiling, or excluding young men - temporarily or permanently just ways of removing the natural "excess" I guess - a social adaptation to a natural event. Some societies send their men off for weeks, months, sometimes even years. I can see them now, these poor exiles sitting around their lonely camp-fires - of course, its all Mum's fault, (or Nature, or the Goddess etc). Some societies have mock battles, small-scale ritual wars, or games, and competitions to 'cull' the males. Some have even speculated that infection rates from ritual circumcision would have ensured some deaths, or at least infertility within the male population. Greer speculates that all-male celibate priesthoods, and male warrior castes, the medieval idea of 'Journeymen' in trade and merchant Guilds, unable to mate for many years etc - originated in this concept of exile or exclusion of "excess" males from the community, as a kind of socially constructed 'role' or a 'place' for these 'excess' males. Civilised people don't send members off to die anymore, or live on the fringes forced to a grab-as-can (sex or food etc) existence. With plenty to go round - but well..we have to give these individuals *something* - so we give them a socially constructed role to give them a reason for existence and continued community support. By voluntarily removing themselves from the reproductive pool, their 'sacrifice' for the sake of the communal good etc - they were given community support, food, shelter and some level of social status, privileges of access to females, and social recognition in return. One scenario, is that over time, these once-exiled 'loser' or 'excess' males grew in number, being designed by Nature to be 'emergency back-ups', designed to be opportunistic, aggressive and survival oriented, no longer dying off, they not only grew in number, they also grew in social status, expanded their social privileges and power bases, and evolved these male socially constructed institutions and social systems over the centuries as bastions of male supremacy. Tepper doesn't show it very well, but it wasn't just relating male aggression to the war-machine she was discussing, but the whole power-trip of "control" of all natural resources, women, children, food production etc, that the warriors (and the Holylanders) were interested in, the men would have wanted more steel production for example - if they were in power they would have pushed for such resources, at the expense of say, for example- the women's gardens, or arts and crafts etc - and Tepper showed this common element in those two major bastions of male supremacy, the religious and warrior guilds/castes. Tepper also takes this biological scenario to a naturally logical, (if somewhat unpalatable to most of us) conclusion - if Natural mechanisms of 'culling' the natural excess of aggressive control-freak males no longer exist, then women, (and their male supporters) will have to do it instead. Enough of my soapbox! Cheers - - Julieanne:) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2002 08:48:52 EST From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/12/02 7:13:39 AM, jalc@OZEMAIL.COM.AU writes: << The 2nd time some years later, was just after reading/studying a feminist analysis of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey and it was then I recognised Tepper's play in the Gate, as being loosely based on the Iliad & the women characters. >> It is helpful to read Euripides' play Iphigenia in Aulis. I think Tepper used the play more than Homer. best, phoebe w ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2002 10:36:05 -0800 From: Saille Warner Norton Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 08:48 AM 03/12/2002 -0500, you wrote: >In a message dated 3/12/02 7:13:39 AM, jalc@OZEMAIL.COM.AU writes: > ><< The 2nd time some years later, was just >after reading/studying a feminist analysis of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey >and it was then I recognised Tepper's play in the Gate, as being loosely >based on the Iliad & the women characters. >> > >It is helpful to read Euripides' play Iphigenia in Aulis. I think Tepper used >the play more than Homer. Well, I'd think so, since the play didn't exist in Homer's day and age. ;) It's more likely that Euripides based his play on Homer's works... I'm interested in reading the feminist analysis of Homer that's mentioned here. Can you post details of this work? Thanks, Saille ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Mar 2002 14:45:54 EST From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/12/02 1:35:21 PM, saille@SWNGRRL.COM writes: << Well, I'd think so, since the play didn't exist in Homer's day and age. ;) It's more likely that Euripides based his play on Homer's works... >> Yes, but he gives it a twist or two. best, phoebe w ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 08:38:41 +1100 From: Julieanne Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 10:36 AM 12/03/02 -0800, Saille Warner Norton wrote: >I'm interested in reading the feminist analysis of Homer that's mentioned >here. Can you post details of this work? I'm sorry Saille, it was a one semester study class run as evening classes at my local University on Women in Classical Literature, most of the reading material was hand-outs, translations, discussion notes, references etc prepared by the course presenter. It was some time ago now too - in 1991. But we looked at the stories of Iphigenia and Helen and Cassandra *et al* in various versions over time, starting with Homer and moving through to Shakespeare. But, the main point was that whilst details of the stories changed over time, for example, the heroes became more heroic & noble albeit with flaws that become major themes in later retellings of the epics, the worst of their cruelty and the gory details were removed, and Polyxena for example is sometimes presented as sneaky betrayor of Achilles, other times as innocent dupe of her brother (and Penthesilia disappears altogether very early) - no matter the twists or variations on the theme, the women still all die horrible deaths or other equally damned fates, and are often presented making long pretty speeches about how terrific ( or *deserved*) the experience was:) As Tepper's version mentions - I think its Hecuba saying "Damned if we do, Damned if we don't".... - J ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 00:51:36 -0500 From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: [*FSF-L*] BDG: The Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU I first read *The Gate to Women's Country* in 1989, less than a year after it was published. It was a revelation. Perhaps because I was unhealthily preoccupied with my own romantic disappointments at the time and had as yet read little feminist SF, I ignored the problematic elements of the book, focusing instead on the authorial drubbing of men who so clearly deserved it, in the book if not in reality. Call it catharsis. I'm in a very different place now than I was then. I didn't expect to like the book this time. It so clearly stacks the deck, its biological determinism is ridiculous and yes, it erases homosexuality almost entirely. It had served its purpose once; it was history. But I was wrong. Upon rereading, I found it disturbing, but more despairing than angry, more doubtful than righteous. The Council have good reason to do what they do, Morgot and Stavia are sympathetic characters, but in Tepper's fictional world there are only two paths open to them: death or damnation. It's a bitter, but compelling world view, at least to me. Which isn't to say that the book's faults are unimportant. In fact, they may be its most interesting features. The handwaving explanation of how homosexuality has been eliminated, for example, makes the book's anti-sex agenda very clear. "There is no fucking in Hades," Iphigenia says in the canonical Women's Country play, the final line of which is, "Hades is Women's Country." (A curtsey to Carol and Rose, who already pointed this out.) This is a story of romantic desolation, betrayal and unhappiness. I was struck this time by how much of the book is about Stavia's doomed relationship with Chernon. The reader is shown early on what a rotter he is, but Stavia is left in the dark for the most part until her horrifying experience in Holyland, when it is finally made plain that without the strict social controls of Women's Country, Chernon would be just as monstrous as the Holyland Elders. The progress of their relationship is like a slow-motion car wreck, the opposite of a romance. And very significantly, the sex, when it finally comes, is bad. The message seems to be that "infatuation" and sexual feelings are irrational and dangerous, that women must learn to turn them off or face destruction. There is a complication, though. At least some members of the Council, if not all, have special relationships with their servitors. These men, far from being eunuchs, struck me as almost comically idealized romantic figures. They are strong, smart and sensitive -- to the point of being psychic! -- and have passed the most rigorous test of commitment possible: against all odds, they have come back to Women's Country. In light of all this, I expected there to be more investigation of how these exceptional men fit into the women's lives, romantically as well as economically. But there was very little, so little that some readers don't even notice the sexual aspects of these relationships. (I refer doubters to Chapters 5, 19 & 34 regarding Stavia and Corrig, and Chapter 34 for Morgot and Joshua.) Why is this? I think the answer is that it would have upset the author's purpose to directly portray *any* romantic fulfillment, homosexual or heterosexual. The focus here is disappointment, the bad relationships that scar you, psychologically, and in Stavia's case physically, forever. This is Hades. Let us not forget it. The play is crucial to this understanding. Julieanne and Phoebe mentioned *The Iliad* and *Iphigenia at Aulis* as source material, and both are applicable. But the closest match is *The Trojan Women* by Euripides. The setup is the same: the Trojan war is over and the women of the city wait outside its broken walls to be assigned as slaves to their new Greek masters. The sacrifice of Polyxena on the tomb of Achilles, the murder of the infant Astyanax, and the assignment of Cassandra and Hecuba, respectively, to Agamemnon and Odysseus, occur in both plays. Euripides' version, no less than Tepper's, is an indictment of the atrocities of war, particularly as it affects women. But the ghost of Iphigenia, Tepper's invention, argues much more baldly than any of Euripides' women the responsibility of men for these horrors, and the kinship of all women in the face of it. And Hecuba, in her version, carries a knife in her skirts. The problem is clearly stated for all who are in the know: we, as women, understand that men are the perpetrators of these ghastly crimes, that they brought about the desolations; we, as women, must act to ensure that they can never do so again, even if it means our own damnation. And it does. The Council call themselves "the Damned Few" and stage the Iphigenia play every year to remind themselves of their purpose and the danger of becoming what they abhor -- and to grieve for what they have done. In some respects, they have simply reversed the power dynamic. Women are now the architects of every man's fate, and horrible bloodbaths are orchestrated on a regular basis. The key difference is that the women make their decisions rationally rather than passionately, and they feel guilty afterward. I agree with Sandy and Lee Anne that this is similar to the portrayal of officers in much military fiction, not to mention movies, television, etc. It is a major weakness of *Gate* that Tepper does not acknowledge that war, as waged by men, is often quite as calculated and removed from the experience of the front line as the Council's version. Instead she presents as a case study the Trojan war, perhaps the most ridiculous and wasteful conflict ever recorded, which in its particulars is likely almost complete fiction! Not exactly the most ironclad evidence for the impetuous bloodthirst of men. Of course, there are also the actions of Chernon, his mentor Michael, and the despicable Barten to prove the case. But here we come up against another weakness of the book. These men are conditioned to be warlike and aggressive throughout their most formative years. How responsible are they, really, for the way they turn out? Suzy Charnas in *Walk to the End of the World* and Ursula Le Guin in "The Matter of Seggri" are much more nuanced and humane in their treatments of this question. But given the eugenics theme of *Gate*, I guess personal responsibility isn't much of an issue. Each man is in essence a dove or a hawk, and his time in the garrison proves which he is. It is all a matter of Fate. And Fate, in turn, applies to the women as well: "Myra's leaving Morgot's house had been inevitable from the moment Myra met Barten. Not that Barten had intended it or Myra foreseen it or Morgot known it would happen. No one knew, but it was inevitable just the same." (chp. 6) This book is a tragedy, all right. For men, for women, for everyone. And, appropriately enough, it ends in tears. ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/ Listening to: Tool -- Lateralus "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 21:31:39 +0800 From: Sherlyn Quek Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: The Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Hi, I'm a new member to this list. ^_^ So please forgive any strange newbie behavior I might exhibit. ^_^; I'm doing this book for my college s/f course, and just finished it a few days ago, so it's been an insightful experience reading some of the responses about the book on this list. I enjoyed reading TGTWC. Although the beginning was slow, the pace started picking up, and the twist at the end, although somewhat predictable, was interesting. Since my tutors haven't started lecturing about it, I'm a bit lost and would appreciate any help/explanations. Some questions I would like to ask/discuss: 1) What are the special institutions and ordinances in Women's Country? The novel does mention certain ordinances such as forbidding "women's" knowledge to the men, but never really seems to discuss them in depth, something which I would like to have seen explored. I suppose the whole "sending males to the garrisons" could be considered a special institution, as well as the Councilwomen ... are there any others that I missed? 2) I would also like to have some opinions about how the Iphigenia play relates to the main plot of the novel. How does it parallel certain events in the story? (eg. men justifying their oppression of women as "they wanted/deserved it") The whole idea that "Hades is Women's Country" because women don't have to make choices between "dead and damned" because "there's no love and nothing to betray" ... how true is that? The Council women are still "damned" for their eugenic tinkering which infringes on individual rights ... the line women "can't be killed again" because they're "already dead" is somewhat paradoxical in its message about women gaining freedom from the terrible treatment of men. Yes, women are freed from being "touched" any more from men ... but that's only because they have suffered to the point that they're already "dead" ... There doesn't seem to be any solution to the problem ... I'm a bit slow today ( full day at school :P ), so anyone who'd help me connect the dots would be greatly appreciated. ^_^ - Iris the New Newbie ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 17:44:22 EST From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: The Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/14/02 8:42:17 AM, vanilla_waffles@HOTMAIL.COM writes: << ) I would also like to have some opinions about how the Iphigenia play relates to the main plot of the novel. How does it parallel certain events in the story? (eg. men justifying their oppression of women as "they wanted/deserved it") >> Seems to me there was a discussion of this a year or so ago on this list. It may be in the archives. best, phoebe ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 09:15:25 +0800 From: Sherlyn Quek Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: The Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Thanks for the information, but I searched the archives (in previous Tepper novel discussion) and couldn't really seem to find anything. (Anything more specific would be greatly appreciated.) Anyway, I would still like to have some response about my questions ... maybe about the first one (on ordinances and institutions in TGTWC) if the second has already been discussed. :) - Iris The New Newbie >From: Phoebe Wray > >Seems to me there was a discussion of this a year or so ago on this list. >It may be in the archives. >best, >phoebe ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 21:31:46 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: The Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Iris, if you read the novel there are parts where Stavia talks about having to memorize the ordinances, and about what is forbidden. It seems pretty much that you need to infer from the reading what is in the ordinances, since they are never explicitly spelled out. There is definitely an ordinance against giving men books on women's subjects; that's a big part of the plot early on. Another ordinance(s) must have had to do with the way the education is organized, I.e. the memorizing of various ordinances that had to be rewritten from memory with all the punctuation perfect for example, along with the rules about each woman (or citizen if we include the servitors) having an art, a craft and a science. The section in which Stavia talks to the gypsy prostitute, Vonnella, has some info on the ordinances, as does the section about Stavia's education when she and Myra are talking about the upcoming carnival weeks still being months away. There is allusion to the rules of the ordinances in the section where Stavia and Morgot are riding in the wagon with Joshua and they see the badlands in the distance. And even at the end there are allusions to the ordinances when the whole story is resolved, so to speak, while Stavia is recuperating. As far as the Iphigenia play, in one of my readings I focused on reading the piece of the play and then checking for how it mattered to the previous or the next part of the story, because I wondered if the play was foreshadowing the story or vice versa. For the most part it seemed that the play did the foreshadowing, but I seem to recall there were also some parts where the story foreshadowed the play. One significant part is pointed out in the text when Stavia breaks down at play rehearsal when she is supposed to speak the lines about "they killed him too", which are in the play but are also spoken a few pages later (5 or so) by Myra referring to Barten's death. As I said in one of my earlier posts, it really helps to read the novel multiple times to pull out the specific little tidbits that make it so remarkable. Luckily it's a fairly short novel, and Tepper's writing is fairly straight forward - she says what she means, and means what she says - so it's easy to read and reread. Another thing I did to help understanding was to go back and read the play all of one piece, omitting the novel between the parts. That made a difference in understanding the way the parts of it hung together, and how Hades is Women's Country. Rose -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 21:57:44 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU ><< When there > >are no men left, will the "common woman" be able to turn to the servitor, >>> (sorry, I can't find the original email to quote from) > > - I wouldn't say there'll be no men. There will be 'new' men, the servitors >or their descendents, if the eugenics works. And possibly fewer men, at least >for a while. As far as I can tell, it's an open question what might happen in >terms of sex once the aggression is 'bred' out (again, assuming for the sake >of argument the eugenics would work). I'm not even convinced there is no sex >between the servitor men and the women, anymore than I am convinced that >there is no sex between women (expressions of 'horror' at homosexuality >notwithstanding. That one expression was in the context of discussing a male >warrior who was suspected of forcing himself on boys as well as girls.). I >very much doubt the servitors are sexless in their feelings. I don't remember >reading anything saying they didn't have sexual feelings.(In fact, in the >quotation where Joshua admits shame for his jealousy - the inference there is >that sexual feelings are at its base.) One would infer, based on their other >behavior, that servitors' sexuality would be/is far less aggressive, one way, >than the warriors', and probably sublimated greatly in other interests. And >masturbation is definitely sex, just not reproductive sex. The only thing >being specifically disallowed is reproduction from sex with warriors. I just >don't think Tepper spelled out everything, and it's not a requirement of any >novel to spell out everything. But we can speculate about the implications of >course, whether spelled out or not. Thank-you, you've said this far better than I seem to be able to articulate. This is far more like what I got from the book. There will still be male - female relationships, but the men of their future will be men who have goals and interests that are far more compatible with the women's goals - safety, health, education etc. Not power and glory based on triumph in battle over guys from other towns and villages. In a way I suppose Tepper's story is rather simplistic in its assumptions about how much the warriors will fall for with respect to sending them out to fight warriors from other towns based on rumors of attacks, especially since the men are also talking to each other back channel through spies and the cooperative groups they use to travel about the country side - like the group that are despatched so efficiently by Morgot and Joshua on their return from the meeting with the women of Susantown, that was made up presumably of men from each of the other garrisons plus the Marthtown man who got away to go back and tell Michael and Stephon of the women's secret weapons. It seems bizarre that the warriors can be manipulated to go out and kill themselves in war so easily. But she is using the Greeks and Trojans as a model, and they were all too willing to run out and fight for the defense of their idea of honor, so there is something of a point to that belief. >Would the women (who now don't know about the eugenics) be able to love the >'new' men, or at least feel sexual feelings toward them? They are apparently >conditioned to see the servitor males as asexual. Or perhaps it's just a >taboo, but made to be broken. I see the goal of the eugenics as eliminating >the warrior type of male, and thus the need for war. Well that is specifically a goal - Morgot and Stavia discuss how "there will be no more wars, no wars at all... no trumpets, drums and ... no penis worshipping ( In reference to the "erection suitable for a parade ground" - the monument upon which blooded warriors swear their oaths). The goal is to eliminate war, and the assumption (I guess) is that women would not choose to wage war if they were removed from the influence of men. I guess we are supposed to assume that Myra would not have been turned if she had not been influenced by Barten at the request of Michael and the other commanders. But we are also told that Myra's father turned out not a suitable sperm donor, and was probably also Chernon's father, so we know his influence from beyond the womb (genetic donation) so to speak was not a good thing. >[Actually, this assumes >women never would make war. Again, another false assumption (IMO).] Does that >mean eliminating sex or the interest in sex? Doubtful, even if we agree on >the questionable assumptions that the eugenics would work. Conditioning isn't >eugenics. And of course, I don't even know if it's successful conditioning. >It's the socially acceptable way to mate, it seems, in the current Women's >Country. For what that's worth. I really think that eventually the society is supposed to be one of decent women and decent men whose goals are the well being of all members of society. I guess the problem is that that's also a rather plain, somewhat boring or neutral - vanilla sort of society. Chances are without great passions they will not have great art. Or perhaps Joshua's partially uncontrolled streak of jealous rage toward Michael is supposed to represent the idea that we can have people who control themselves most of the time and only become dangerous when they truly need to, need being more than just to defend some arbitrary notion of honor... need being more related to safety of the larger group?? >I'd also say some of the 'asexuality' of the servitors - or women's feelings >towards the servitors - has a lot to do with the incest taboo, the general >abhorrence of sex between family members . Not that there aren't violations of >the incest taboo, but it does put a damper on sexual feelings for the >majority of people. (Just as an aside: the incest taboo appears to have >some kind of biological basis.) For adult females in the houses where >servitors are newly arrived, this wouldn't hold. But for children growing up >with servitors, it would hold. I also thought there were hints that Stavia >and Corrig might have some growing sexual interest in each other (esp once >she'd been shorn of her infatuation with Chernon). So much of this is hints - >not spelled out in the story (and if it was, god knows how long the book >would have been), but nevertheless, included enough to make us wonder. Yes, to the point that for me I don't wonder, I think they do have a full fledged relationship. He holds her in his arms when she is hugely pregnant (how does she describe her self?? like a huge jenny ass?, I think she says). When she returns from the Holylanders he tells her they will have 2 other children besides Chernon's son Dawid. One will be named Susannah for the woman who tried to protect her... I definitely thought those children were theirs together, although because of the feminist influence, or I should probably say, the anti-patriarchal influence, paternity cannot be acknowledged. And there I suppose is something that I would have problems with (because I am so thoroughly an old fuddy duddy) - Stavia really seems to love Corrig at the end there, and yet in order to have those children she would have had to participate in carnival for intercourse for intercourse's sake in order to justify the pregnancies to the outside world - the other women in women's country who believe that that is how it happens. After all, I would think that if Stavia did not participate someone would notice if she subsequently became pregnant. Tepper never talks about that, and I would think that that actually would be difficult to do when you are not a hormone crazed teenager any longer. Actually after all the pain Stavia has endured, it seems to me that it would be truly challenging to make the effort to do what needed to be done to get an assignation set up etc... though I suppose with enough beer maybe it would be easier??? Gee, from my own perspective I think I have finally found something I can't justify with feminism or "just because Tepper wrote it that way".... Rose, who apologizes for the delay between when this reply was begun and when it was actually finished and sent to the list. I have been really busy - obviously. However I am really enjoying this discussion because of having read the book so many times, and because it was the first of its kind that I read. I really liked the idea of women making an effort to start over and try to make a different world from the one the men run. -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 00:36:09 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/14/02 8:59:06 PM Central Standard Time, rreith@RACORES.COM writes: << I guess the problem is that that's also a rather plain, somewhat boring or neutral - vanilla sort of society. Chances are without great passions they will not have great art. >> I don't think I'd even go so far as to say that. It's interesting to me, actually, how much we- meaning everyone who has been discussing this - thinks that there will be this blandness, or that the men won't be men, or...well, the longer we discuss it , more examples come out. Leaving aside all the questions of would the eugenics work, is it right or wrong, etc., what's interesting to me is that this keeps coming up - the notion that if men weren't so aggressive, if women weren't in conflicted relationships with men, and so forth, life would not be very interesting. To me life seems plenty interesting without that, and in fact, all that stuff makes it really difficult to fully realize all the other parts of our lives. In particular, making art, at least in the heroic individual artist championed in Western civilization, has been so much more difficult for women, and also many other types of cultural accomplishment, because of having to spend so much time and energy dealing with male aggression, role conflicts, etc etc. (Not to mention just the time and energy spent in all the traditional forms of women's labor, which men didn't participate much in.) Anyway, not to harp too much on this, but it's interesting to see how much anxiety still exists at the idea of a more egalitarian society. I'm not talking particularly about the criticisms of the difficult ethical questions in the world Tepper has created, but the little leaps we keep making from her text, to various things we read into it. Or into the world we imagine as likely to come after her setting. Why would we think it would be bland? Why would we think there wouldn't be men? Why would we think there wouldn't be sex? I don't even think it would be 'without great passion'. It's as if we're assuming that passion comes from oppression, or at least unequal relations. I felt the story was bleak, at least on my second reading. They are still throwing the babies over the wall, so to speak. How can that not be bleak? But they are also at the dawn of a new civilization. City states, only one of which we are introduced to in any detail (I was really curious about what the industrialized city - Annaville I think it was- would have been like.), and all the parallels to the early foundation of Western civilization in the Greek citystate. What comes next would be a very open question. On the one hand, the foundation in the eugenic policies could be the worm in the core of the apple. On the other hand, well, if the eugenics worked and created new people, who knows? In a way I think the eugenics is kind of a red herring. Similarly I think the elimination of war is kind of a red herring. But that's partly because I think you create new people by creating different social and power structures, not by genetics. Or, genetics seems extremely iffy to me, because of the complexity of humans; you don't really know what you are selecting for, and so, it is simplistic. But on another level, and the play really makes this seem like the better reading to me, the genetics is just a kind of symbol for the creation of something new (not a real scientific argument for it). The play's the thing here, I agree, and the idea of reading the play separately is one I've thought to do, but have no time to yet. One thing that keeps niggling at me is the line where one character says to another, "it's SUPPOSED to be a comedy", chiding the other (I think it was Stavia being chided) for taking it so seriously. Of course we learn most people don't know all the secrets of Women's Country. But the play is not about the secrets. The play is about the horrors women suffered at the hands of men, and their only refuge had been death. Their only freedom was in death. But now, the play is supposed to be a comedy. It's satirizing the former world, the very stories that the former world told themselves. Well, there's more there, which I haven't totally excavated yet (and won't til I reread the play, I think). But is the joke on the former world ? the present world? Or both? Or...well, as you say, there's lots in that play. And the interweaving of the play and Stavia's story, past and present, is not only a nice structure for the book, but also what creates the message (the medium is the message to some extent). Or at least, that's the direction I'm thinking. Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 00:36:12 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/14/02 8:59:06 PM Central Standard Time, rreith@RACORES.COM writes: << Stavia really seems to love Corrig at the end there, and yet in order to have those children she would have had to participate in carnival for intercourse for intercourse's sake in order to justify the pregnancies to the outside world - the other women in women's country who believe that that is how it happens. Aft >> Yes, it seems like this is where her new self will be rubbing up against Women's Countries traditions. But it may be she could fake an assignation, especially since she's one of the council who knows what's going on. Still, what about other women who have the same feelings but aren't in the know on the secret? Also, other people have figured out what's going on with the secret. The magician had it figured out, mostly. No one tried to get rid of him, although he was of course keeping the secret. But you are right, we're asked to believe that most people will not figure out what is going on, that the warriors won't figure out they are being manipulated, etc. Not terribly convincing. The main reason we are convinced at all is because the story is really Stavia's story of personal growth and change. Because we are focused on her story, interspersed with the play, we suspend disbelief longer than we probably would have otherwise. Another thing that didn't really convince me was when they tell Stavia they've decided to let her in on the secret (in so many words) 'because she's been through so much' (or something to that effect). Well, no actually, it's because Tepper wants us, the readers to know. The more I think about this eugenics twist, the less I like it. Not just because of arguments about its ethical or scientific validity, but because of the way it resolves the plot. It feels forced. But it does give people a lot to argue about. :>) Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 22:10:38 -0800 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 09:57 PM 3/14/02 -0500, Rose Reith wrote: >>of argument the eugenics would work). I'm not even convinced there is no sex >>between the servitor men and the women, anymore than I am convinced that >>there is no sex between women (expressions of 'horror' at homosexuality >>notwithstanding. > >Thank-you, you've said this far better than I seem to be able to >articulate. This is far more like what I got from the book. There >will still be male - female relationships, but the men of their >future will be men who have goals and interests that are far more >compatible with the women's goals - safety, health, education etc. It seems clear that one of the reasons that Joshua felt jealousy was that, if there is in fact, heterosexual love, it would necessarily have to be closeted, since seeing servitors and women in a compromising situation would destroy the basis of the society. Not everyone is in on the secret, so heterosexual love between servitors and women would be, in this version of the world, "the love that dare not speak its name." That being the case, Joshua might well have felt like a lesbian might feel seeing her girlfriend being squired around by a male "date" for social reasons. Even though she might know that there was "nothing going on," the fact that the "boyfriend" was privileged with societal approval, the hearty congratulations of all, and the pleasure of sharing a special moment might well give rise to jealousy not specifically sexual, but perhaps more like envy. I well remember, and with considerable bitterness, being shunted aside when my first real girlfriend "had" to go to a Rainbow Girls dance. So I got to see the dress, help her get dressed, and then drive home alone while she went off to the dance with some guy. It was not a pleasant feeling. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 22:27:02 -0800 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 09:57 PM 3/14/02 -0500, Rose Reith wrote: > Chances are without great passions they will not have great art. That seems unlikely, since anguish is a far more potent source of art than love. As Richard Eder once said, "Art grows out of what you can't recover from." ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 03:44:38 -0500 From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 8:59:06 PM on 3/14/02, Rose Reith wrote: >Stavia really seems to love Corrig at the end there, and yet in order to >have those children she would have had to participate in carnival for >intercourse for intercourse's sake in order to justify the pregnancies to >the outside world - the other women in women's country who believe that that >is how it happens. And at 12:36 AM on 3/15/02 -0500, Joy Martin replied: >Yes, it seems like this is where her new self will be rubbing up against >Women's Countries traditions. But it may be she could fake an >assignation, especially since she's one of the council who knows what's going >on. Still, what about other women who have the same feelings but aren't in >the know on the secret? The new Stavia is all about playing roles, though, isn't she? The first chapter is one extended meditation on how she has split herself into "actor Stavia" and "observer Stavia" because there are things she must do as a woman and a Council member that her innocent child self would find impossible. In this light I find it highly unlikely that she would ever fake an assignation. Just as her mother met up with Michael every carnival, playing the part of his devoted lover while secretly despising him, I see Stavia doing her duty and paying what she sees as an unpleasant but necessary price for the Council's long-term plan. Joy again: >Another thing that didn't really convince me was when they tell Stavia >they've decided to let her in on the secret (in so many words) 'because she's >been through so much' (or something to that effect). Well, no actually, it's >because Tepper wants us, the readers to know. The more I think about this >eugenics twist, the less I like it. Not just because of arguments about its >ethical or scientific validity, but because of the way it resolves the plot. >It feels forced . But it does give people a lot to argue about.:>) I don't agree about that particular scene. It makes sense to me that Morgot would explain the eugenics plan at this point because Stavia has shown that she is bright and responsible but that she does not respect the letter of the law; perhaps an understanding of its spirit and underpinnings will bring her into line. (And it does. Of course, the death threat probably helps too.) There was another scene I found clumsy in the extreme, however: Morgot and Joshua's ambush of Michael and his cronies. The amount of exposition spouted at these guys who had mere minutes to live not only verged on cliche, it completely undermined the pacifist message of the book, in a way that the similar scene in chapter 10 did not. In the earlier incident, Morgot and Joshua were truly acting in self-defense and finished off their attackers with grim efficiency. None of this gloating over how stupid the greedy murdering men are, how they are no one's fathers, etc. It just seemed gratuitous and nasty. Intentional on Tepper's part? An indication of the failings of this would-be utopia? Or an unfortunate lapse? I'm not sure, but it really rubbed me the wrong way. ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/ Listening to: Tool -- Lateralus "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 09:22:31 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/15/02 2:36:38 AM Central Standard Time, jdawley@BELLATLANTIC.NET writes: << There was another scene I found clumsy in the extreme, however: Morgot and Joshua's ambush of Michael and his cronies. >> Yes, this also has a bit of deus ex machina, by the writer, in it. I kind of reverse my sentiments from yours, I guess; I find this scene less unconvincing (I think because I can see Margot wanting to get the last word in, esp. after having to assignate with Michael all those years), and the spilling of the beans to Stavia as more unconvincing (because I think they didn't have to tell her the whole truth, but Tepper wants us to know it). But it's very possible that on another rereading, my sense of which was more unconvincing would change. Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 09:22:33 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/15/02 2:36:38 AM Central Standard Time, jdawley@BELLATLANTIC.NET writes: << The new Stavia is all about playing roles, though, isn't she? The first chapter is one extended meditation on how she has split herself into "actor Stavia" and "observer Stavia" because there are things she must do as a woman and a Council member that her innocent child self would find impossible. In this light I find it highly unlikely that she would ever fake an assignation. Just as her mother met up with Michael every carnival, playing the part of his devoted lover while secretly despising him, I see Stavia doing her duty and paying what she sees as an unpleasant but necessary price for the Council's long-term plan. >> I agree she may do this. But once you are playing at the whole thing, it's just as conceivable that she would 'play at' having an assignation. Her actor self was there to step in when she didn't quite know how to deal with something, but felt she must. Often because she didn't quite understand why it was being asked of her. But now she knows exactly why, and the whole point is to maintain the subterfuge, not at any cost, just at whatever necessary cost. It wouldn't be necessary for her to actually have intercourse with a warrior, because she already knows the secret. She could just fake it, and still preserve the secret. Really, I have to laugh, because it's like Tepper is creating a society where some of the common subterfuges of women vis a vis men, like faking orgasm, is writ large, so that in Women's Country they go through this elaborate subterfuge to fake reproduction . Of course, it's always been difficult to determine who the father of a child is (until recently, proof was impossible). You always know the mother (well, until recently, only technology has taken us to the point where we might not know who the genetic mother of a child is), but the father - well, lots of fathers may have wondered who the 'true' father of their children were. One of the reasons men have gone to such lengths to try to ascertain paternity by controlling women's whereabouts- chastity, virginity, etc etc. Well, this is one of the jokes of Womens Country, perhaps. [As an aside, added later: It's all this faking it that sticks in my feminist craw; although I read this as a postapocalyptic story, rather than a feminist utopia, as I've said before. Women's Country is trying to get to a feminist utopia though and lots of this discussion has been, basically, about whether we think it'll accomplish those goals, and if it's the right way or the only way or the best way or even a possible way to go about it.] These warriors are awfully trusting and/or conceited in that respect, don't you think? They accept , apparently, that all these boys are indeed their sons. First time in human history men have been so accepting of such facts. This brings to mind another point in the history of Women's Country I'd like to revisit. I need to go back and reread the section. But the history was that early on, the women were warriors, and then they left it to the men, and went inside the walls. Or some women were warriors. I should probably reread it before I talk about it, but, that whole scenario is unlikely. It's the set up for Tepper's story, of course, and close examination or exposition of that would have - well, it would have been another story. She can tell whatever story she wants, but like so much in Gate, Tepper is like a magician, getting us to focus our attention only in certain areas, so that we will accept some of the plot twists she pulls out of her hat. Egad! I think that's a good analogy - and perhaps why the play's the thing as well. Hmmm, this calls for further mulling.:>) Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 06:29:15 -0800 From: Maryelizabeth Hart Organization: Mysterious Galaxy Subject: [*FSF-L*] GTWC / THE THIRD TWIN To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Joy said in part: > But that's partly because I think you create new people by creating > different social and power structures, not by genetics. > Or, genetics seems extremely iffy to me, because of the complexity of > humans; you don't really know what you are selecting for, and so, > it is simplistic. which is part of the idea being explored in a less satisfying way in the thriller I'm currently reading, THE THIRD TWIN, about a group of post-Vietnam white supremacists who try to create a secret race of super soldiers -- but their creations are too aggressive to live in normal society -- mostly. I'm not nearly as fond of Ken Follett and his writing as I am of Tepper, but it's interesting to read this in contrast to GATE. Maryelizabeth -- ******************************************************************* Mysterious Galaxy Books Local Phone: 858.268.4747 7051 Clairemont Mesa Blvd, Suite 302 Fax: 858.268.4775 San Diego, CA 92111 Long Distance/Orders: 1.800.811.4747 http://www.mystgalaxy.com General Email: mgbooks@mystgalaxy.com ******************************************************************* ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 10:21:14 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] GTWC / THE THIRD TWIN To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/15/02 8:30:31 AM Central Standard Time, publicity@MYSTGALAXY.COM writes: << it's interesting to read this in contrast to GATE. >> yes, kind of the flip side of the same approach, from a patriarchal (not to mention racist) point of view Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 15:18:07 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU >This brings to mind another point in the history of Women's Country I'd like >to revisit. I need to go back and reread the section. But the history was >that early on, the women were warriors, and then they left it to the men, and >went inside the walls. Or some women were warriors. You are right, it's in the same section as the explanation to Michael, Patras and Stephon. So it's be about page 301 I believe. There were women who acted the role of warrior early on so that the boys would be acclimated to warrior life. That part bothered me - if there were so few men, and it seems the few men who were left actually supported the women's gaols, which it sounded like to me - (Martha Eve's daughter's goals), then why didn't they just raise the boys to accept a different way of life. If you grow up accepting women and men as equals won't you be a different kind of person. From that perspective why would you need to remind boys that there could be a patriarchal way and then force them to struggle and die through a change away from that patriarchal way. Did they really need to be sure that that was what the men wanted. From that point of view I think I like Charnas better. At the end of her Holdfast books the children, male and female, are being raised to have new values, and I don't think the women (fems) are going to recreate a mock patriarchy for the boys to eventually disown. Rose >I should probably reread >it before I talk about it, but, that whole scenario is unlikely. It's the set >up for Teppers story, of course, and close examination or exposition of that >would have - well, it would have been another story. She can tell whatever >story she wants, but like so much in Gate, Tepper is like a magician, getting >us to focus our attention only in certain areas, so that we will accept some >of the plot twists she pulls out of her hat. Egad! I think that's a good >analogy - and perhaps why the play's the thing as well. Hmmm, this calls for >further mulling.:>) > >Joy Martin > >"Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 20:37:48 -0000 From: Heather Stark Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU great passions = great anguish... so both can be true aagh, Heather p.s. really just looking for an excuse to post more than a forbidden 'wow great discussion' note...;-) -----Original Message----- From: Lee Anne Phillips To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Date: Friday, March 15, 2002 6:45 AM Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country >At 09:57 PM 3/14/02 -0500, Rose Reith wrote: >> Chances >>are without great passions they will not have great art. > >That seems unlikely, since anguish is a far more potent >source of art than love. As Richard Eder once said, >"Art grows out of what you can't recover from." ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 16:32:36 -0500 From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 2:36:38 AM 3/15/02 CST, I wrote: ><< The new Stavia is all about playing roles, though, isn't she? The first > chapter is one extended meditation on how she has split herself into "actor > Stavia" and "observer Stavia" because there are things she must do as a > woman and a Council member that her innocent child self would find > impossible. In this light I find it highly unlikely that she would ever > fake an assignation. Just as her mother met up with Michael every carnival, > playing the part of his devoted lover while secretly despising him, I see > Stavia doing her duty and paying what she sees as an unpleasant but > necessary price for the Council's long-term plan. >> And at 09:22 AM 3/15/02 -0500, Joy Martin replied: >I agree she may do this. But once you are playing at the whole thing, it's >just as conceivable that she would 'play at' having an assignation. Her actor >self was there to step in when she didn't quite know how to deal with >something, but felt she must. Often because she didn't quite understand why >it was being asked of her. But now she knows exactly why, and the whole point >is to maintain the subterfuge, not at any cost, just at whatever necessary >cost. It wouldn't be necessary for her to actually have intercourse with a >warrior, because she already knows the secret. She could just fake it, and >still preserve the secret. Fake it how, though? The man must believe that he has actually had sex with her. If they haven't done the deed she has to convince him that they really did but he was too drunk to remember, that it was too dark for him to know who she was, etc. If this happened every carnival it would really stretch believability. On the other hand, the book does say that warriors were occasionally presented with sons they didn't remember fathering, and they just took the women's word on it. So maybe you are right. But I still think it wouldn't fit the book's theme of grim duty and responsibility. Look at Morgot. She could have faked her assignations with Michael, but she didn't. Why not? >These warriors are awfully trusting and/or conceited in that respect, don't >you think? They accept, apparently, that all these boys are indeed their >sons. First time in human history men have been so accepting of such facts. Well, according to the book's premise, the men who elect to remain in the garrisons are defective in general -- impulsive, selfish, arrogant, and ironically not even very good fighters compared to the Councilwomen and the "special" servitors. How surprising is it that they are stupid, too? But seriously, why wouldn't they accept fatherhood in this case? It's not as if they are providing for their sons economically or are in any way responsible for them. Rather than being the breadwinners who must support their families, the men of the garrisons are entirely dependent on the food and other necessities that the towns provide them. More sons for the garrison just mean more expense for the women, not for the men. >This brings to mind another point in the history of Women's Country I'd like >to revisit. I need to go back and reread the section. But the history was >that early on, the women were warriors, and then they left it to the men, and >went inside the walls. Or some women were warriors. I should probably reread >it before I talk about it, but, that whole scenario is unlikely. It's the set >up for Tepper's story, of course, and close examination or exposition of that >would have - well, it would have been another story. Why is it any more unlikely than the other story elements? You've confused me. (BTW, in case you want to look it up, it's in the expository lump I complained of earlier, when Morgot is talking to Michael in chapter 34.) I thought it was a reasonable explanation of how the society was set up in its early days. The women had already planned their male testing ground (the garrison), but didn't yet have a big enough population to begin the selective culling. Once they had enough men, the interim staff of women in the garrison were phased out and the men were phased in. Makes sense to me (in a twisted way). In fact, it reminds me of the situation in Mangolia in *Illicit Passage*. That began as a legitimate mining operation, but by the end of the war was doing double duty as a concentration camp. Chilling, indeed. ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/ Listening to: Tool -- Lateralus "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 21:22:09 -0500 From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 12:36 AM 3/15/02 -0500, Joy Martin wrote: >One thing that keeps niggling at me is the line where one character says to >another, "it's SUPPOSED to be a comedy", chiding the other (I think it was >Stavia being chided) for taking it so seriously. No, the opposite. It is Stavia speaking to Corrig at the beginning of Chapter 5. He exclaims his disbelief and she replies, "Well it is, Corrig. The audience laughs." I took this as another indicator of how clueless most of the women are about the realities of Women's Country. The play is like a roman à clef for the Council members, a production that has a surface meaning (emphasized by ridiculous costuming, e.g. the giant penis Achilles wears) for the majority of the population, and a hidden meaning for those who are aware of the eugenics plan and the behind-the-scenes negotiations that result in so many warrior deaths. The tragedy of this play for the Councilwomen and the servitors is, I believe, that they see they have in many respects reversed roles. The women are now in control and the men are the chattel. But it is also a reminder that women, in the time of the Trojan war, were given no option to step through a gate into "men's country". It has struck me that in this book the psychic servitors play the role of Cassandra -- except that they are believed. I am not sure that is a good thing. In chapter 34, Corrig tells Stavia not only that they will remain together, but what the names of their two children will be. What is the point of such specificity? Does the future have to be nailed down? What if Stavia wanted to name one of them something else? Oh well, there's no use resisting prophecy... might as well take his word for it. The impression I come away with is of a beleaguered, unhappy crew working to bring about a static future they have already mapped out. I guess that future is one they find worthy, but without the uncertainties of real life it seems... scripted. And airless. Almost like Hades. Hm. ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/ Listening to: Tool -- Lateralus "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 21:22:25 EST From: Phoebe Wray Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU When I read Gate first I found in stunning. As I thought about it, and reread it, it falls apart for me. I wound up not sympathizing with anyone except the deluded girls. There is so much betrayal and so little heart in the book. The logic doesn't work. Perhaps when it was first written , the heavy-handed approach was necessary. I think it's an important book, but one that, finally, suffers from its own excesses and faulty logic. It depressed me to reread it. In re-thinking the play within the book, I wonder if it points to Tepper's own ambivalence. Iphigenia is a victim, a sacrifice, a woman betrayed, and to make her a central image is to say that all women are stuck in those roles. The women have made a web from which there is no escape. Fascinating, like watching something melt. Best, phoebe w ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 22:47:57 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU This discussion of it being a comedy also goes on between Stavia and Myra when Myra is cueing Stavia in the Iphigenia role as a youngster - maybe 11 years old or so. There's also the discussion of Iphigenia being played by a girl named Michy who is "fat," so there is the whole "fat ghost" commentary, along with the description of the baby as a doll that seemed somewhat reminiscent of Raggedy Andy, and the women, Hecuba and her daughter "all tarted up like river gypsies". Myra says the story is a commentary on certain attitudes of preconvulsion societies and that its supposed to be a comedy. Achilles with the big dong... Stavia is not amused because she says she feels the play in ways she doesn't understand it. It's in chapter 6... page 37 >At 12:36 AM 3/15/02 -0500, Joy Martin wrote: >>One thing that keeps niggling at me is the line where one character says >>to another, "it's SUPPOSED to be a comedy", chiding the other (I think it >>was Stavia being chided) for taking it so seriously. > >No, the opposite. It is Stavia speaking to Corrig at the beginning of >Chapter 5. He exclaims his disbelief and she replies, "Well it is, Corrig. >The audience laughs." -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 11:51:05 +0800 From: Sherlyn Quek Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At Fri, 15 Mar 2002 21:22:09 -0500 Janice E Dawley wrote: >No, the opposite. It is Stavia speaking to Corrig at the beginning of >Chapter 5. He exclaims his disbelief and she replies, "Well it is, Corrig. >The audience laughs." Actually, it's both. :) In a flashback during Chapter 6, Myra is shown chiding Stavia for taking the play too seriously : "You seem to keep forgetting this is a comedy." It's generally regarded as a satire by most of the population. Myra actually recalls what an instructor told her: its a "commentary on particular attitudes of preconvulsion society." I find it interesting that Stavia seems to have switched roles in the present as compared to the past - in the past she found the play un-comedic because of the part about the baby being thrown off the wall. What does that say about her character's growth? >I took this as another indicator of how clueless most >of the women are about the realities of Women's Country. The play is like a >roman à clef for the Council members, a production that has a surface >meaning (emphasized by ridiculous costuming, e.g. the giant penis Achilles >wears) for the majority of the population, and a hidden meaning for those >who are aware of the eugenics plan and the behind-the-scenes negotiations >that result in so many warrior deaths. The tragedy of this play for the >Councilwomen and the servitors is, I believe, that they see they have in >many respects reversed roles. The women are now in control and the men are >the chattel. But it is also a reminder that women, in the time of the >Trojan war, were given no option to step through a gate into "men's >country". > >It has struck me that in this book the psychic servitors play the role of >Cassandra -- except that they are believed. The impression I come away with >is of a beleaguered, unhappy crew working to bring about a static future >they have already mapped out. I >guess that future is one they find worthy, >but without the >uncertainties of real life it seems... scripted. And >airless. Almost like Hades. Hm. Frankly, I find the whole relation of the play to the book somewhat ambiguous. It's obvious from the start that the play was meant to be a parody of the original male-dominated Iliad, with themes of men's cruelty and pride resulting in destruction for the women and children. It's a reminder to the most of the women about how much they have it better here in Women's Country. For most of the book I read it as an indictment of men in general. But the twist at the end completely changes my perception of the play. The Councilwomen have literally become the men who "throw the baby off the wall" by engineering deaths among the garrisons, by ensuring that the warriors have no sons, etc. How does that fit into the idea that Women's Country is a place where the women are free from choices that make them dead or damned? I mean, the Councilwomen are still the Damned Few, still responsible for the death of other women's sons. And of course, the majority of the women are shown to have had no choice or even knowledge about the father of their children. Cassandra's role seems to be that of the psychics: both the servitors as well as the twins. Actually, their words were mostly unheeded by the people who needed them the most: Stavia disregards their warnings and naturally winds up in hot soup in the Holylands. On the other hand, they are taken seriously by the wise few, the Councilwomen aka as represented by Morgot. So how is Hades Women's Country? Babies are still "thrown off the wall" .. only this time by women instead of men ... Iphigenia says it's a place where "all burdens are taken away". It rings patently untrue: the "burden" of maintaining the secret and directing the future of the race is still on the Council women's shoulders ... Perhaps the only difference about the women in charge is that they heed the Cassandras' warnings and take it to heart. A dumb question about the line "time enough to learn the way to Hell and back again." in Chapter 33. Back again to what? Back again to Hell or back again to the living? Is the Hell mentioned referring to Women's Country? Anyone care to explain this to me? A simple question with an obvious answer, I'm sure, but I'm a little too zonked out today to understand it. :P - Iris The Crackly Chip ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 23:23:39 -0500 From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Thanks to Sherlyn and Rose for pointing out the exchange in Chapter 6 (and sorry, Joy). However, I still maintain that the play is not a comedy. A satire, maybe, but not a funny one. All the evidence Myra cites in her conversation with Stavia is superficial -- costumes and camp -- and is not there on the printed page. It sounds to me as if the Council members play it this way expressly to distract women like Myra from the play's underlying meaning while leaving the clues in there for the more discerning. But maybe I am getting carried away in my extrapolation... ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/ Listening to: Tool -- Lateralus "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 12:34:40 +0800 From: Sherlyn Quek Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU I agree that the play is probably not meant to be read as a comedy by the readers. More of a tragedy, actually, especially since Joshua and Stavia cry at the end of the play/novel. The Council Women do seem to promote its surface comedic aspects to the majority of the women (recall the bit about Myra remembering what an instructor telling her it's a "commentary on preconvulsion attitudes") and leave the hidden message for the more sensitive members to discover. It's interesting that Stavia found it uncomfortable as a child yet says it's a comedy when she's grown up. Corrig's remarks about how he finds the women's view of it as a comedy difficult to understand are fairly intriguing as well. - Iris The Crackly Chip From: "Janice E. Dawley" Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 23:23:39 -0500 >Thanks to Sherlyn and Rose for pointing out the exchange in Chapter 6 (and >sorry, Joy). However, I still maintain that the play is not a comedy. A >satire, maybe, but not a funny one. All the evidence Myra cites in her >conversation with Stavia is superficial -- costumes and camp -- and is not >there on the printed page. It sounds to me as if the Council members play >it this way expressly to distract women like Myra from the play's >underlying meaning while leaving the clues in there for the more >discerning. But maybe I am getting carried away in my extrapolation... ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 23:57:27 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Just some assorted responses to various points. In a message dated 3/15/02 8:14:12 PM Central Standard Time, jdawley@BELLATLANTIC.NET writes: << No, the opposite. It is Stavia speaking to Corrig at the beginning of Chapter 5. He exclaims his disbelief and she replies, >> Actually the line I was remembering was the beginning of Chapter 6, with Myra telling her younger sister Stavia 'you seem to keep forgetting this is a comedy'. She goes on to describe the way the characters are dressed, that it's a satire on 'the attitudes of preconvulsion society.' In a message dated 3/15/02 3:26:10 PM Central Standard Time, jdawley@BELLATLANTIC.NET writes: << But seriously, why wouldn't they accept fatherhood in this case? >> Well, why does anyone, particularly men, want their 'own' kids, rather than someone else's? Not everyone cares about that passing on of the line kind of thing, but a great deal of time and effort have been spent on making sure the kid you raise is your own kid. And esp. sons. (I don't think it's all to do with the cost or economics of raising them.) It is a bit weird in Women's Country's garrison though, because really, there is no particular property these men own. I mean, the desire to 'own' your offspring and the desire to pass on your property usually go hand in hand. In Tepper's setting, property as such and inheritance as such don't much exist, not in the form where accumulating property is a major goal. Even for the women, who apparently (it's unclear) own their houses and their farms, property as such doesn't seem to be much of an issue. In a message dated 3/15/02 3:26:10 PM Central Standard Time, jdawley@BELLATLANTIC.NET writes: << Once they had enough men, the interim staff of women in the garrison were phased out and the men were phased in >> Why retreat into the town ? Why, as Rosa said in her recent post, go to all the trouble of setting up a huge male/female dichotomy? I looked back over the passage, and Margot says at first they didn't have enough men, so women put on men's clothes (women couldn't wear their own clothes even!), 'because the men couldn't be spared' (???- from what ? reproduction?) and they took the boys into the garrison with them. When there were 'enough' men , the women went back into the town and left the garrison to the men. The reason is Martha Evesdaughter's belief that to prevent war, aggression had to be bred out of men; that genetics causes war. So they couldn't just set up a different kind of society, they had to set up a system for 'breeding' aggression out of men. It makes sense from their pacifist perspective (maybe, if you accept the analysis of what causes war), but it doesn't make sense from a feminist perspective. It makes sense if you believe what they believe. It doesn't make sense to me, believing what I believe. In a message dated 3/15/02 3:26:10 PM Central Standard Time, jdawley@BELLATLANTIC.NET writes: << Morgot. She could have faked her assignations with Michael, but she didn't. Why not? >> I'm not saying Stavia would fake her assignations, just that she could. I'm sure there were lots of ways. As for why she might, while Morgot didn't- the short version would be, she isn't Margot. The longer version would include all the ways she is different from Morgot, and that her society might be challenged in the future. In a message dated 3/15/02 8:14:12 PM Central Standard Time, jdawley@BELLATLANTIC.NET writes: << The impression I come away with is of a beleaguered, unhappy crew working to bring about a static future they have already mapped out. I guess that future is one they find worthy, but without the uncertainties of real life it seems... scripted >> I think they are working toward what they see as a war free future. It's unlikely that it will be static, esp. in their case, because they are betting on a process that isn't likely to work as expected. But the stage we are looking at does give that impression, at least in Marthatown. Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 00:10:52 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/15/02 10:16:22 PM Central Standard Time, jdawley@BELLATLANTIC.NET writes: << Thanks to Sherlyn and Rose for pointing out the exchange in Chapter 6 (and sorry, Joy). However, I still maintain that the play is not a comedy. >> By the time I sent my latest post, here are several messages making it - at least about this - unnecessary. Just can't keep up with you all!:>)) What interested me in that passage was that the play direction was so different from the play's written script. The play serves multiple purposes, and not just for the Council vs the common folk, but for the writer vis a vis the reader as well. Or so I hypothesize at the moment. It's a very interesting device, at any rate, and getting more interesting by the moment. Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 08:54:46 -0000 From: Heather Stark Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Phoebe Wray Date: Saturday, March 16, 2002 2:22 AM wrote: >When I read Gate first I found in stunning. As I thought about it, and reread >it, it falls apart for me..... >Perhaps when it was first written , the heavy-handed >approach was necessary. I think it's an important book, but one that, >finally, suffers from its own excesses and faulty logic. It depressed me to >reread it. Yes. What is portrayed is, to me, almost entirely dystopian. So for me the world reads as an example of 'an alternative way of organising things - but one that sucks big time'. However, it's one of those situations where I'm never really sure whether that reading is what the author meant or not. Suspect it may not be. The book seems very, er, Atwood. Not, to my mind, a compliment, as it implies a lack of joie de vivre. cheers, Heather ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 11:03:47 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Hi Janice, I wasn't disagreeing with you. I too think that that was just part of the plan. The play is definitely not a comedy. I think that exchange was to show that Myra was one of the oblivious women, and that it was possible for a mother like Morgot to have two very different daughters, one who got it and one who didn't. I suppose it is possible that there is also meant to be some sort of damning of Myra as unsuitable for W. C. because her father was found to be unsuitable for the plans for W. C. , while Stavia is obviously Joshua's daughter and thus is more discerning even when she is younger and unaware of all the intrigue going on, even in her own home. Myra is portrayed as seeing none of it, while Stavia senses it but doesn't get it - things like Morgot and Joshua exchanging the "my dear, not in front of the children glances, and the way she senses that her mother has certain stock answers prepared for them when they ask certain questions, etc. I definitely agree that the costumes and camp were designed as a distraction for those who weren't supposed to get it. I never managed to get through all of Illicit Passage, but it just struck me from what I read of all those conversations on the list that if some woman like Gillie had been born in Women's Country everything would have blown up around that Council. Or maybe she would have been the one to found W. C.? As I said, I just couldn't reach a point where I wanted to keep reading, so I haven't finished it yet. Rose >Thanks to Sherlyn and Rose for pointing out the exchange in Chapter 6 (and >sorry, Joy). However, I still maintain that the play is not a comedy. A >satire, maybe, but not a funny one. All the evidence Myra cites in her >conversation with Stavia is superficial -- costumes and camp -- and is not >there on the printed page. It sounds to me as if the Council members play >it this way expressly to distract women like Myra from the play's >underlying meaning while leaving the clues in there for the more >discerning. But maybe I am getting carried away in my extrapolation... > >----- >Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT >http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/ >Listening to: Tool -- Lateralus >"...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; >the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and >servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 11:10:47 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU >I agree that the play is probably not meant to be read as a comedy by the >readers. More of a tragedy, actually, especially since Joshua and Stavia cry >at the end of the play/novel. The Council Women do seem to promote its >surface comedic aspects to the majority of the women (recall the bit about >Myra remembering what an instructor telling her it's a "commentary on >preconvulsion attitudes") and leave the hidden message for the more >sensitive members to discover. It's interesting that Stavia found it >uncomfortable as a child yet says it's a comedy when she's grown up. >Corrig's remarks about how he finds the women's view of it as a comedy >difficult to understand are fairly intriguing as well. I didn't quite take her seriously when she told Corrig it was supposed to be a comedy. I think there she might have been parroting Myra's once upon a time comments to her, because all the rest of the way through every time she discussed the play with someone she mentions how she never saw all the ways it reminded her of events in her own life. I suppose that could be read to mean that her own life is a tragedy, which was actually the point that Joy or Janice made in earlier messages. I hadn't really seen it totally as a tragedy because her relationship with Corrig seems to be a positive one. >- Iris > The Crackly Chip > > >From: "Janice E. Dawley" >Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 23:23:39 -0500 > >>Thanks to Sherlyn and Rose for pointing out the exchange in Chapter 6 (and >>sorry, Joy). However, I still maintain that the play is not a comedy. A >>satire, maybe, but not a funny one. All the evidence Myra cites in her >>conversation with Stavia is superficial -- costumes and camp -- and is not >>there on the printed page. It sounds to me as if the Council members play >>it this way expressly to distract women like Myra from the play's >>underlying meaning while leaving the clues in there for the more >>discerning. But maybe I am getting carried away in my extrapolation... -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 11:31:34 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/16/02 10:17:04 AM Central Standard Time, rreith@RACORES.COM writes: << I hadn't really seen it totally as a tragedy because her relationship with Corrig seems to be a positive one. >> Well, yes, I think so too. This has been a rather circuitous discussion (and I do mean, discussion, thinking out loud, which also means conclusions morph a bit as it goes along). Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 11:38:59 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 11:57 PM -0500 3/15/02, Joy Martin wrote: >It is a bit weird in Women's Country's garrison though, because really, there >is no particular property these men own. I mean, the desire to 'own' your >offspring and the desire to pass on your property usually go hand in hand. In >Tepper's setting, property as such and inheritance as such don't much exist, >not in the form where accumulating property is a major goal. Even for the >women, who apparently (it's unclear) own their houses and their farms, >property as such doesn't seem to be much of an issue. Another way I looked at the whole send the boys off to the garrison thing was as a way of distributing child care differently from the past, (again, another effort toward figuring out a feminist alternative, since who does the work that women usually do is one of the key points toward feminist change) and a way to make the men share that burden. Also, it got the boys away from the girls during the years when boys can be difficult to handle, made the men responsible for caring for them, although it seems from one of Chernon's comments that the men didn't do much caring, and it was really the older boys taking care of the younger boys ( the "I'm on sleeper in duty with the eights", comment I think it was that he made). This leaves the women caring for the girls and the men caring for the boys. The men can't complain that the women are turning the boys into sissies. And by the time the boys who are willing to come back do come back they are old enough to take care of themselves, they are already pretty much self selected to stay out of trouble, they become and asset to W. C., and they are not likely to be dangerous toward any of the women or girls. >In a message dated 3/15/02 3:26:10 PM Central Standard Time, >jdawley@BELLATLANTIC.NET writes: > ><< Once they had enough men, the interim staff of women in > the garrison were phased out and the men were phased in >> Joy replied: >Why retreat into the town ? Why, as Rosa said in her recent post, go to all >the trouble of setting up a huge male/female dichotomy? I looked back over >the passage, and Margot says at first they didn't have enough men, so women >put on men's clothes (women couldn't wear their own clothes even!), 'because >the men couldn't be spared' (???- from what ? reproduction?) and they took >the boys into the garrison with them. When there were 'enough' men , the >women went back into the town and left the garrison to the men. The reason >is Martha Evesdaughters belief that to prevent war, aggression had to be >bred out of men; that genetics causes war. So they couldn't just set up a >different kind of society, they had to set up a system for 'breeding' >aggression out of men. It makes sense from their pacifist perspective (maybe, >if you accept the analysis of what causes war), but it doesn't make sense >from a feminist perspective. It makes sense if you believe what they believe. >It doesn't make sense to me, believing what I believe. I like how you said this. For me it does sort of work, so I can buy into her idea that they might be able to breed out the desire to make war. I am not sure I like it, since I don't imagine most of my male relatives would be ones who would choose to return, but I will admit that I did have problems with the fact that it got set up that way when they had other choices at that early point in their history. I guess that Tepper was just in the mood to try a different thought experiment than one in which those who survive the war are already changed for the better because of the devastating experiences. She obviously feels that cataclysm alone is not going to bring about that change - look at the Holylanders she creates. >n a message dated 3/15/02 8:14:12 PM Central Standard Time, >jdawley@BELLATLANTIC.NET writes: > ><< The impression I come away with is of a beleaguered, unhappy crew working > to bring about a static future they have already mapped out. I guess that > future is one they find worthy, but without the uncertainties of real life > it seems... scripted >> Joy replied: >I think they are working toward what they see as a war free future. It's >unlikely that it will be static, esp. in their case, because they are betting >on a process that isn't likely to work as expected. But the stage we are >looking at does give that impression, at least in Marthatown. Tepper certainly gives evidence that it's working as well as can be expected. That whole section after Casimur dies when the group that returns to W. C. (Habby and Corrig and others) and they talk about how many boys are missing from the ranks of warriors in each year, and how at one time they lost less than 5 boys in a hundred to W.C. , but that now they were losing 20 out of the hundred boys over the years between 15 and 25. (Chapter 14). At least for her purposes she is making it seem as if the women are eventually going to win the campaign. -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 11:45:19 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Well I am certainly enjoying this circuitous discussion. It's making me think. I just have a lot of trouble with typing as fast as I think. I have several unfinished messages because I lost the train of thought as I was typing, or I didn't quite have it worked out as well as I should have and couldn't get it down in electron words. It sure is a lot easier to discuss in a classroom setting orally rather than in writing. Rose >In a message dated 3/16/02 10:17:04 AM Central Standard Time, >rreith@RACORES.COM writes: > ><< I hadn't really seen it totally as a tragedy > because her relationship with Corrig seems to be a positive one. >> >Well, yes, I think so too. This has been a rather circuitous discussion (and >I do mean, discussion, thinking out loud , which also means conclusions morph >a bit as it goes along). > >Joy Martin > >"Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 12:42:44 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 1:03 PM -0800 3/8/02, Lee Anne Phillips wrote: >We're left with a system of selective breeding in which >the great majority of women are treated like cows in a herd, >in which a few "bulls" and "alpha cows" rule while the "steers," >the impotent (or at least infertile) male warriors are led to >slaughter. After much thought, this cozy arrangement >has pierced me to the heart with its denial of love, of >the deep tenderness possible in both men and women, >and of our common humanity. I think that Morgot and Joshua, and Stavia and Corrig, do have that deep tenderness between them as couples. Certainly the way they act with each other and the way Joshua acts so fatherly toward Stavia and even Myra, who is not really his daughter, shows that he cares about the females with whom he lives. I think what Tepper is trying to get at is more of a common humanity where men as well as women actually care about all of their offspring, something very different from Michael's comment in the book in which he says that warriors don't have daughters... they may beget girls, but their only value is in how they can be used, whereas there is that warrior saying that a woman earns her life by bearing sons for a warrior. >The real effect of this >breeding program, this inane tinkering with the very >basis of our human lives, is quite likely to be ruin for >us all. We don't understand it. We don't understand >life at all, and our arrogance and ignorance are as >>capable of destroying us with DNA as with atomic bombs. I'm not sure that breeding for a less violent human is going to change our DNA that much. The DNA of those who continue will also be human DNA. And I suppose even that sort of argument could be partially refuted by Tepper's offering of the Holylanders as the opposite extreme. One of the things I wondered about was if Joshua was possibly the sperm donor for Myra's child, her little Marky. At first I thought that was possible because of her complaints about the baby's coloring changing to look more like Stavia's - the hazel eyes etc. and by extension Joshua. Then I recalled that Marcus was one of the warriors who was with Dawid at Stavia's ritual rejection, thus implying that he did not elect to return home through the Gate. So were Myra's "warrior" genes too powerful over Joshua's "servitor" genes? Or, was that whole section on resemblances just filler? I have to admit that for the purposes of following the story, it seems to me that Tepper showed a great deal of skill in writing this book. I don't believe there is too much in the way of filler. Everything that is included seems to have a purpose, so it seems odd that there'd be something like that that makes it seem like a sort of loose end. Unless she intended to show that the war like tendencies are much stronger and thus the women's plans are truly justified? >>> And there is a crypto-racism inherent in her scheme, since it would >>> be easy to demonstrate that young African-American males are >>> responsible for a disproportionate share of violent crime and might >>> therefore have to be culled even more drastically. I don't recall any mention at all of people of color in the book, but I don't think young African Americans would be any more prone to choosing to stay in the garrison than young white males. I think the garrison would be equally challenging and equally enticing to all boys. There really wouldn't be any distinction made over them, since from the age of 5 forward they would be in the garrison with the rest of the guys. >> But this isn't addressed in the book, and it seems to me that each case >> was decided individually, by the boy himself, rather than by society at >> large or based on any demographic...unless you mean something different >> by "culled" than "decides to stay in the men's camps rather than come >> back into the city with the women"... exactly. >By culled, I mean that the men they want to kill are sent, >like Uriah, into the thick of battle and are so destroyed. >In our present society, young African-American men >are often denied the sources of pride and achievement >that make them feel good about themselves. They often >hang out with other, similarly-situated young men, and >fall into the same traps of crime and violence. In the >Gate world, these men would be sent into the thick of >battle and eliminated. Only if they had chosen to stay in the garrison. Then they would fight for glory and honor (according to patriarchal tradition) along side their white, native american, and asian brethren as far as I can extrapolate from Tepper's writing. Unlike Charnas and others who made a point of including people of color in their visions of these post-apocalyptic futures, Tepper doesn't make a point of including people based on racial lines. Or she just wanted to envision a white future. (Which sounds / looks terrible in writing, and may be another reason why I fear for the plain/drabness of this future) -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 09:42:46 -0800 From: Laura Quilter Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU I took comedy not as in the "Three's Company" or even "As You Like It" sense, but as in tragic comedy ... the comedy is in the irony. On Sat, 16 Mar 2002, Rose Reith wrote: > >I agree that the play is probably not meant to be read as a comedy by the > >readers. More of a tragedy, actually, especially since Joshua and Stavia cry > >at the end of the play/novel. The Council Women do seem to promote its > >surface comedic aspects to the majority of the women (recall the bit about > >Myra remembering what an instructor telling her it's a "commentary on > >preconvulsion attitudes") and leave the hidden message for the more > >sensitive members to discover. It's interesting that Stavia found it > >uncomfortable as a child yet says it's a comedy when she's grown up. > >Corrig's remarks about how he finds the women's view of it as a comedy > >difficult to understand are fairly intriguing as well. > > I didn't quite take her seriously when she told Corrig it was > supposed to be a comedy. I think there she might have been parroting > Myras's once upon a time comments to her, because all the rest of the > way through every time she discussed the play with someone she > mentions how she never saw all the ways it reminded her of events in > her own life. I suppose that could be read to mean that her own life > is a tragedy, which was actually the point that Joy or Janice made in > earlier messages. I hadn't really seen it totally as a tragedy > because her relationship with Corrig seems to be a positive one. > > >- Iris > > The Crackly Chip > > > > > >From: "Janice E. Dawley" > >Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2002 23:23:39 -0500 > > > >>Thanks to Sherlyn and Rose for pointing out the exchange in Chapter 6 (and > >>sorry, Joy). However, I still maintain that the play is not a comedy. A > >>satire, maybe, but not a funny one. All the evidence Myra cites in her > >>conversation with Stavia is superficial -- costumes and camp -- and is not > >>there on the printed page. It sounds to me as if the Council members play > >>it this way expressly to distract women like Myra from the play's > >>underlying meaning while leaving the clues in there for the more > >>discerning. But maybe I am getting carried away in my extrapolation... > > -- > 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' > Virginia Woolf Laura Quilter / lquilter@exo.net ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 12:53:45 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU That's a good point too. Maybe closer to the truth of what Tepper was aiming for. >I took comedy not as in the "Three's Company" or even "As You Like It" >sense, but as in tragic comedy ... the comedy is in the irony. > >Laura Quilter / lquilter@exo.net -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 13:31:22 -0500 From: "Janice E. Dawley" Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 09:42 AM 3/16/02 -0800, Laura Quilter wrote: >I took comedy not as in the "Three's Company" or even "As You Like It" >sense, but as in tragic comedy ... the comedy is in the irony. Maybe you could explain this thought a little more, Laura? I still don't see how the presence of irony indicates comedy. Stavia, Joshua and Corrig never find it funny or uplifting. The only people laughing at it are the women like Myra who are reacting to its surface. Her descriptions of its trappings do make it sound almost like an episode of "Three's Company"! ----- Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/ Listening to: Tool -- Lateralus "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 13:43:32 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/16/02 11:06:34 AM Central Standard Time, rreith@RACORES.COM writes: << She obviously feels that cataclysm alone is not going to bring about that change - look at the Holylanders she creates. >> Yes, that's one of her contrasts, and she definitely sees the eugenics as working. As you say , it's an interesting thought experiment, and makes us think, although I don't agree that the eugenics will work as proposed. But I think the book is very well done, as far as it goes, although I disagree with much of its premises. Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 13:43:33 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/16/02 11:42:21 AM Central Standard Time, lquilter@EXPLORATORIUM.EDU writes: << I took comedy not as in the "Three's Company" or even "As You Like It" sense, but as in tragic comedy ... the comedy is in the irony. >> Yes, tragicomedy, or, if you don't laugh, you cry....there's always an edge to either, or a little bit of each in the other (yinyang if you like). Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 10:54:23 -0800 From: Laura Quilter Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Well, I suppose it depends on one's definition of humor. I think it is not uncommon, however, to find a sort of humor in irony. I would go so far as to say that even the surface laughter & the surface comedy of the play is ironic, and therefore humorous. People are laughing, even though it's really tragic -- they are fooled by the comedy which masks the tragedy. There's a certain grim amusement to be had in people mistaking tragedy for comedy. It's not light comedy. On Sat, 16 Mar 2002, Janice E. Dawley wrote: > At 09:42 AM 3/16/02 -0800, Laura Quilter wrote: > >I took comedy not as in the "Three's Company" or even "As You Like It" > >sense, but as in tragic comedy ... the comedy is in the irony. > > Maybe you could explain this thought a little more, Laura? I still don't > see how the presence of irony indicates comedy. Stavia, Joshua and Corrig > never find it funny or uplifting. The only people laughing at it are the > women like Myra who are reacting to its surface. Her descriptions of its > trappings do make it sound almost like an episode of "Three's Company"! > > ----- > Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT > http://homepages.together.net/~jdawley/ > Listening to: Tool -- Lateralus > "...the public and the private worlds are inseparably connected; > the tyrannies and servilities of the one are the tyrannies and > servilities of the other." Virginia Woolf, Three Guineas Laura Quilter / lquilter@exo.net ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 11:27:38 -0800 From: Laura Quilter Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU > In a message dated 3/16/02 11:06:34 AM Central Standard Time, > rreith@RACORES.COM writes: > > << She obviously feels that cataclysm alone is not going to bring about > that change - look at the Holylanders she creates. >> > > Yes, that's one of her contrasts, and she definitely sees the eugenics as > working. As you say , it's an interesting thought experiment, and makes us > think, although I don't agree that the eugenics will work as proposed. But I > think the book is very well done, as far as it goes, although I disagree with > much of its premises. "Thought experiment" is how I've always imagined GTWC, and how I've tolerated some of its flaws. My sense is that Tepper plays with, and half-believes, some of the ideas: a certain biological determinism and that violence is genetic. So she thought, let's pretend violence is genetic, and create a novel in which people are trying to breed out the violence ... how would that work? I too disagree with the premise -- but I'm glad there are books out there that play with it. So that people who *do* believe the premise have something to work with to see the consequences of those beliefs, and so that people who *don't* believe the premise can point out the inconsistencies & problems (for instance, the wave-of-the-hand elimination of homosexuality). (Re: homosexuality, my opinion is that she didn't want to deal with it in the novel, because she felt it would distract from the plot & issues she wanted to pursue. So she eliminated it with a wave-of-the-hand. That's arrogance and an uncritical homophobia, but I don't think it's an intentional homophobia, as I've heard argued in the past. I think her work around same-sex attraction has gotten somewhat more sophisticated over the years.) I say that I think she half-believes it, based on nothing more than a general feeling I get from her various books, and from hearing her speak at Wiscon a few years back, and from reading a few interviews. Nothing concrete. I would hope that she doesn't *wholly* believe it. I think of GTWC as Tepper's first book that is really explicitly addressing feminism in a very out way. The Marianne books, the Revenants, her other books all look at women, include a sort of proto-feminism, and include some of the horror elements that show up again and again. But GTWC (published 1989) reads to me as if Tepper had recently started reading a lot of 1970s/1980s feminist theory, and was playing with it in her writing, and the output was GTWC. The works after GTWC all seem to have a more explicitly feminist feel to me, as if Tepper was more conscious of gender issues in the work. So I see GTWC as the initial wrestling, and then an evolution of feminist thought over time. BEAUTY (published 1991), for instance, takes the analysis a little further, and seems to engage not just "patriarchal male violence" (a popular 1970s theme) but also capitalism. BEAUTY also looks at religion in a way that seems to me just a little bit more theoretical than in GTWC -- not just the patriarchal religions that show up again and again in Tepper's work, but the role of religion more broadly. And, BEAUTY deals more with environmentalism. The work after GTWC and BEAUTY all seems to take feminism & environmentalism as a baseline, and doesn't deal with them as expressly as these two works did. I think that's why, after all these years, these are still my favorite of her two works. Maybe that's my take on it, since GTWC was the first Tepper I read -- when I went to the bookstore looking thru the sf section for anything that seemed to relate to women I found GTWC. Here's Tepper's publishing history in brief. I'm curious if others have read her mysteries, or followed her work, and could comment on the development of her feminism over time, and the role of GTWC in that development? True Game series (3 trilogies) 1983 (first novel published) - 1986 THE REVENANTS (1984) (seems very close to horror) Marianne trilogy: 1985 - 1989 BLOOD HERITAGE and THE BONES (1986-1987) (outright horror novels) STILL LIFE (1987/1988); horror under the name E. E. Horlak NORTH SHORE and SOUTH SHORE (1987) (fantasy but close to horror) AFTER LONG SILENCE (1987) * seems like the beginning of her stand-alone large novels GATE TO WOMEN'S COUNTRY (1988) GRASS (1989) RAISING THE STONES (1990) BEAUTY (1991) SIDESHOW (1992) (comprising a loose trilogy with GRASS & RAISING) A PLAGUE OF ANGELS (1993) SHADOW'S END 1994 GIBBON'S DECLINE AND FALL 1996 FAMILY TREE 1997 SIX MOON DANCE 1998 SINGER FROM THE SEA 1999 THE FRESCO 2000 THE VISITOR (forthcoming 2002) mysteries as A. J. Orde, starting in 1989, through 1997 at least mysteries as B. J. Olpiphant, starting 1990, thru 1997 at least On Sat, 16 Mar 2002, Joy Martin wrote: > Joy Martin > > "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil > Laura Quilter / lquilter@exo.net ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 15:31:01 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 11:27 AM -0800 3/16/02, Laura Quilter wrote: >I too disagree with the premise -- but I'm glad there are books out there >that play with it. So that people who *do* believe the premise have >something to work with to see the consequences of those beliefs, and so >that people who *don't* believe the premise can point out the >inconsistencies & problems (for instance, the wave-of-the-hand elimination >of homosexuality). (Re: homosexuality, my opinion is that she didn't want >to deal with it in the novel, because she felt it would distract from the >plot & issues she wanted to pursue. So she eliminated it with a >wave-of-the-hand. That's arrogance and an uncritical homophobia, but I >don't think it's an intentional homophobia, as I've heard argued in the >past. I think her work around same-sex attraction has gotten somewhat >more sophisticated over the years.) I agree with you, and I think that's the same thing she did by not including anyone of color. She didn't want to go into that discussion too, so she left it out completely. It certainly makes her book easier to use in doing a comparison. It's easy to see what she had to say about certain things and she's not ambiguous about others so there is no question about what she was including in that particular "thought experiment" At 11:27 AM -0800 3/16/02, Laura Quilter wrote: >I say that I think she half-believes it, based on nothing more than a >general feeling I get from her various books, and from hearing her speak >at Wiscon a few years back, and from reading a few interviews. Nothing >concrete. I would hope that she doesn't *wholly* believe it. I wonder about that. I wish I had been at that Wiscon. I wonder how much of her opinion has been formed by her work in the planned parenthood arena, which I believe I read about in a biographical entry on her somewhere. I know that the environment is a big issue for her. That's in an interview that can be read in LOCUS on line. It indicates that she is really adamant about her belief that mankind is ruining the earth and killing off other species in a really dangerous way. At 11:27 AM -0800 3/16/02, Laura Quilter wrote: >I think of GTWC as Tepper's first book that is really explicitly >addressing feminism in a very out way. The Marianne books, the Revenants, >her other books all look at women, include a sort of proto-feminism, and >include some of the horror elements that show up again and again. But >GTWC (published 1989) reads to me as if Tepper had recently started >reading a lot of 1970s/1980s feminist theory, and was playing with it in >her writing, and the output was GTWC. Seems true given the 70's/80's feminist stuff I read to be able to write my thesis. Her book really fits some of that stuff almost point by point. The medical care, the safety factors, the male predisposition to violent behavior, the rejection of patriarchy, the distribution of the child rearing, and making the technological careers all women's work... The only thing she doesn't include that most of the other authors who wrote the same kinds of stories did, are the relationships among the women. All I can figure is that deep down she is an old fashioned Catholic or Mainline Protestant who truly believes that alternative lifestyles are not acceptable. I know an awful lot of people who believe that also, despite the fact that they all seem to know people who are gay. I guess Tepper just wouldn't want to include it in her vision of the future. I did think that whole section about the HENRAMs was offensive, since she combines talk of homosexuality / lesbianism with abusive behavior of a warrior toward young boys in the garrison. If you read that section multiple times it is clear that Stavia isn't really saying the two things are the same, but on first reading it, and actually several more after that, I really thoguht she was trying to equate being gay with being a child abuser, and that really bothered me. At 11:27 AM -0800 3/16/02, Laura Quilter wrote: > The works after GTWC all seem to >have a more explicitly feminist feel to me, as if Tepper was more >conscious of gender issues in the work. So I see GTWC as the initial >wrestling, and then an evolution of feminist thought over time. BEAUTY >(published 1991), for instance, takes the analysis a little further, and >seems to engage not just "patriarchal male violence" (a popular 1970s >theme) but also capitalism. BEAUTY also looks at religion in a way that >seems to me just a little bit more theoretical than in GTWC -- not just >the patriarchal religions that show up again and again in Tepper's work, >but the role of religion more broadly. And, BEAUTY deals more with >environmentalism. Sadly I cannot recall too much about Beauty. I know I read it, and I have also read Family Tree, which I greatly enjoyed and would say that it has lots of environmental commentary. I have been trying not to read any more Tepper until I get the thesis totally finished so that I won't be influenced by any of her later works, or get mixed up about what happens in them... Rose -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 16:36:07 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Yes, I think I've read them all from Gate on, more or less as they were issued. Thanks for the listing and the comments on the development of her work. I do enjoy Tepper. It's just been a long time since I read Gate, until this reread. We've all changed, too, not just Tepper. As it should be. Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2002 12:24:38 +1100 From: Julieanne Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU When I first read GTWC, I found it wonderful - as it was one of the first I read that had the women actually "doing something" even if it was something I didn't agree with. I also read it at the same time, as Pamela Sergeants "The Shore of Women" - and I can't recall which was published first but they did come out close together, and I do remember thinking at the time that they must have influenced each other. Sergeant's work also had the post-holocaust women's walled city-state, technically advanced more or less, but with some differences - the boys were memory-wiped at age 5 and returned to their fathers who lived primitively in the wilds outside the walls. Men were somehow told to come to some rooms on the outside of the walls, where they were drugged and exposed to pornography and their semen milked mechanically for reproduction. Heterosexuality was never practised, as in the Holdfast chronicles - each to their own in terms of sexuality. Women who did not fully comply with the city-states rules were punished by exile into the wilds with the men, and the story follows one young woman who is exiled. With Tepper's later works however, I often see variations upon this theme started in GTWC of "women doing something". I have read most of her works, but many one after the other and I feel that I must have over-dosed on Tepper as after that I started to get annoyed with the constant semi-horror theme as applied to women, but that's a minor matter - except inasmuch as the women, or sometimes individual protagonist, only takes action AFTER the horror has done its deed. And many feminist writers I feel use this scenario, where women only take action after some triggering event, the holocaust or whatever. As in Joanna Russ's Female Man, where one of the alternate future women admits that they actively took the lives of men in order to build Whileaway - but it was only after great horror that the women took such drastic action. Similarly in the Wanderground, where the women separated, but only after the big-bang so to speak. Even in Mary Daly's 'Quintessence' its like saying we have to wait until men have totally messed things up before we can "do anything" to restructure society. There is also often a contrasting plot element demonstrating what happens if we don't "do something" - as in Tepper's Holylanders. The other common alternative is that it happens more or less by accident, as in Nicola Griffith's Ammonite. Its like we all assume women cannot change the world on their own initiative - they have to be pushed, goaded under extreme external pressures or accidentally dropped into it. In GTWC I also felt that the women's actions were very much like mother cleaning up the world after little Johnny has broken all the toys, and this theme of "cleaning up" after the men is a common theme of Tepper's and others. Just for a change, I'd like to read a plausible feminist story of women taking action on their own collective initiative before being forced to it, being proactive before the event instead of just reacting afterwards in circumstances of 'needs must'. In addition to the hand-waving dismissal of homosexuality, my other annoyance with Tepper, is my feeling that Tepper has some ambivalence towards the mother-daughter relationship. Or it may be some ambivalence towards just young women in general, or all women-women friendships/bonding. In GTWC there is the Morgot-Stavia mostly healthy relationship in contrast to the Morgot-Myra relationship. In later books, the Morgot-Myra type of relationship is the more common, where the daughter figure is presented as closer to the father-figure, (whether positive or negative - they are "Daddy's girls" etc) and nearly all her women protagonists have a strong focus on the mother-son relationship in contrast. But even in GTWC, Morgot is still ambivalent towards Stavia, and is on at least one occasion admonished by Joshua for her harsh judgement of Stavia. Most of the affection & bonding is father-daughter in style - even Corrig's behaviour towards Stavia is very "fatherly" and wise etc. There was a very strong focus on the grief of mothers over their sons for example, it comes up several times - and yet I got the feeling that when Myra left it was shrugged off by Morgot, and even when Stavia is nearly killed, Morgot is almost cold and clinical. Again it is the servitors, Joshua and Corrig (and Septemius) who provide nearly all the affection and support for Stavia afterwards. Although there didn't seem to be one iota of sympathy for Myra, (we readers are also meant to find her unpleasant to have around, along with Beneda), even Chernon is treated more sympathetically, to the point where his family grieve deeply over his childhood actions and keep hoping he will change and return, and Stavia accepts Chernon's rape and even unpleasant nasty companionship with far more equanimity and for far longer than anybody will tolerate Myra's whining & surliness. In addition to my annoyance over her rejection of lesbianism, I dislike Tepper's treatment of prostitution in her novels even more so - possibly because unlike the lesbianism which is largely absent, prostitution is largely present and often presented as the women's 'own choice' with no analysis. I wasn't aware of Tepper's Catholic background until someone mentioned it here on the list - and her rejection of female bonding now makes much more sense to me, (and I should have twigged with Grass & Sideshow) - not just in her rejection of lesbianism, but also in rejection of the value of Mother-Daughter (or female-female relationships of any kind) and her focus on Mother-Son/Father-Daughter, and by extension of women in general 'mothering' men and society in general. Her women protagonists are often variations upon the image of Mary - where the Mother-Son relationship is paramount, just her 'Mary' characters take different approaches to the "creation" of her Sons, or "Jesus" characters. In GTWC, 'Mary' is 'creating' Jesus through genetic manipulation over generations. Through creating the Son, she also creates the Father - the "right" kind of Father for our daughters to love. In Family Tree, the Marys are the animals and Jesus is finally created after 1,000 years or so of silent penance by humanity, and strict breeding restrictions (but as always, men have their "needs" for sexual outlet, and so women are encouraged or given to men for sexual access without reproduction) - its telling that the first human to speak is a relatively subservient and gentle male who, like Jesus, (the "new Man') will lead his people to their new lives. In Six Moon Dance, the Marys attempted to create their Jesus by removing girls at birth and whisking them away off-planet, in order to make females scarce and therefore socially valuable with high status - but again, the women were only valuable in their role as mothers. I was upset when this "secret" comes out at the end of Six Moon Dance, because the woman who arrives in "judgement" of the planet accepts this complete rejection of mother-daughter relationships as completely OK, simply because the girls aren't actually killed. Women who aren't mothers are given short shrift by Tepper - as in the gypsies in GTWC, these women don't matter much to those in Women's Country except for their ability to pass on disease - whereas great sympathy is extended to the Holylander women. The gypsies are seen as having made their 'own choice' - but I wonder how much of this 'choice' may have stemmed from feelings of rejection from their mothers totally obsessed with their sons to the exclusion of their daughters. To Tepper women are still only born to be sacrificed for the greater glory of God the Father, the Son and Holy Ghost - but her Vision of God/Father/Son is a much gentler, sweeter and a nicer version of masculinity - hence a vision much more worthy of female sacrifice I guess. There is still the Madonna/Whore split in Tepper's visions - her Madonna may have flaws, makes mistakes, and sometimes makes harsh decisions and even espouses the occasional use of violence when absolutely necessary - but her love for the Son/Father is still the ultimate objective. Julieanne ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 22:14:53 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 12:24 PM +1100 3/17/02, Julieanne wrote: >I wasn't aware of Tepper's Catholic background until someone mentioned it >here on the list - and her rejection of female bonding now makes much more >sense to me, (and I should have twigged with Grass & Sideshow) - not just >in her rejection of lesbianism, but also in rejection of the value of >Mother-Daughter (or female-female relationships of any kind) and her focus >on Mother-Son/Father-Daughter, and by extension of women in general >>'mothering' men and society in general. I hope your info as to Tepper having a Catholic background didn't come from my earlier post. It was purely speculation on my part. Simply an assumption that coming from a Catholic or Mainline Protestant background might be an explanation for her avoidance of gay and lesbian relationships. I apologize if you read it elsewhere on the list and I am just jumping in and assuming it was my post, but I did want to clarify that I have no proof that she's Catholic or whatever. I'd almost say she wouldn't be because of her work with a planned parenthood sort of organization for which she wrote pamphlets etc. for years before she became a novelist. -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 19:16:11 -0800 From: Margaret McBride Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU >In re-thinking the play within the book, I wonder if it points to Tepper's >own ambivalence. Iphigenia is a victim, a sacrifice, a woman betrayed, and to >make her a central image is to say that all women are stuck in those roles. >phoebe w At a conference one time when the topic of the play came up in a discussion, Tepper said we should pay attention to the name of the play. It isn't Trojan Women any more; it is Iphigenia at Ilium and in reality Iphigenia never makes it to Troy except as a ghost. Her death and the lies told to bring her to her death and after her death are what enable the war to happen at all to kill the Trojans, enslave the women, etc. I took that statement to mean that extreme measures, Machiavellian ones, were legitimate on the part of the women because the other choices were so awful. Look at Morgot's statement to the 11-year old Stavia: we women make horrible decisions because we think the other choices are even worse(paraphrasing). I find the decision problematic in the extreme (as has been said, why don't they do more with socialization especially in the beginning when the number of men was few); however, given the setup in the book (aggression is genetic in humans--compare with some of Octavia Butler's works), their solution after having seen the human race nearly wiped out does make sense: socialization will not work; we must change the species. I will again say that a number of things about the book bother me as have already been discussed but I have some more positive reactions too: I appreciate that Tepper problematizes the Machiavellian actions more than she does in most of her later, other books--she gives us Myra as an example of someone who could have been happy and contributed to society if the structure had not been so rigid, she has the council women admitting that they doubt they will go to heaven if such a place exists, etc. My other most positive reaction is for style. I think the use of the 2 time periods each one running chronologically interspersed with the play also in sequence is remarkably well done. Go back and reread the first chapter after knowing the whole plot--the clues, bits and pieces that will surface later are incredibly well set up. Did you notice that the doorknob of the gate (the one the servitors use and the mothers use when saying goodbye to the 15-year old sons) is a pomegranate? I take that as a reference of the way into Hades. etc. 3rd, I have taught it with freshmen in college for several years and it always gets lots of thoughtful discussion as it has this month here. For example, one student the most recent time saw the book as a kind of satire on the impossibility of "superwomen having it all" of the time period written unless extreme changes were made in the ways men and women related to each other. I'm not sure I buy that but it as well as all kinds of other interesting ideas were brought up in the class of 19-20 year olds. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 19:28:39 -0800 From: Margaret McBride Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU >A dumb question about the line "time enough to learn the way to Hell and >back again." in Chapter 33. Back again to what? Back again to Hell or back >again to the living? Is the Hell mentioned referring to Women's Country? >- Iris I too have always found the ending confusing although I assume it is meant to have that kind of poetic ambiguity. Look at the bit about "coming into harbor"--good analogy but then it's a barren harbor and the water to bring it back to life is in a sieve. I have decided that the whole ending is meant to be positive (after all a few drops can be on a sieve) but in a very dour, time-consuming way. That is, they have committed themselves to horrible actions, that by all moral standards are terrible in killing their own sons and lovers and lying to them and the other women; but they believe in the long run (maybe very long) these actions will give a better life to the human race and other women especially. One other support for my reading of the ending--Joshua weeps. Joshua in the Old Testament is the one who brings the Israelites into the Promised Land after 40 years of wandering. This Joshua is the symbol of promise (a servitor, father, etc.) but he is also weeping for them all--the pain of the women and servitors for lying, causing deaths, etc. and the betrayal of the men and other women. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2002 11:46:55 +0800 From: Sherlyn Quek Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU I still can't figure out that line. Like most of the book, the meaning is fairly ambiguous. "Time enough to learn the way to Hell and back again." Is she saying that Dawid (and by extension all the other warrior-sons) had enough time to learn about Women's Country(Hell)and decide to go back, or in this case, not go back to WC)? And as such, deserves his fate? I wonder if that makes sense. Still feeling rather slow today. :P Also, I find the idea that sinking to their (aka the men's)level of violence (although in a different, more subtly manipulative way) in order to prevent such violence from the men fairly ironic ... but I suppose I agree that they seem to justify it through the idea that they're "doing it for the good of humankind" while the men apparently fight for stupid reasons. Your previous post mentioned the pomegranate on the door/gate as a reference of the way into Hell. How? I would like to know more about that. It sounds familiar but I can't seem to recall the reference. - Iris The Crumbly Biscuit >From: Margaret McBride >I too have always found the ending confusing although I assume it is meant >to have that kind of poetic ambiguity. Look at the bit about "coming into >harbor"--good analogy but then it's a barren harbor and the water to bring >it back to life is in a sieve. I have decided that the whole ending is >meant to be positive (after all a few drops can be on a sieve) but in a >very dour, time-consuming way. That is, they have committed themselves to >horrible actions, that by all moral standards are terrible in killing their >own sons and lovers and lying to them and the other women; but they >believe in the long run (maybe very long) these actions will give a better >life to the human race and other women especially. One other support for >my reading of the ending--Joshua weeps. Joshua in the Old Testament is the >one who brings the Israelites into the Promised Land after 40 years of >wandering. This Joshua is the symbol of promise (a servitor, father, etc.) >but he is also weeping for them all--the pain of the women and servitors >for lying, causing deaths, etc. and the betrayal of the men and other >women. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 19:52:15 -0800 From: lquilter Subject: [*FSF-L*] old tepper comments To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU i scanned thru the list archives & pulled up some of the old tepper discussions. they are listed now at www.feministsf.org/femsf/listserv/bytopic/tepper.txt it's not at all a complete list of all the discussions on tepper from the list, but it does have some, probably most, of it. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 21:20:17 -0800 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 12:42 PM 3/16/02 -0500, Rose Reith wrote: >At 1:03 PM -0800 3/8/02, Lee Anne Phillips wrote: >>slaughter. After much thought, this cozy arrangement >>has pierced me to the heart with its denial of love, of >>the deep tenderness possible in both men and women, >>and of our common humanity. > >I think that Morgot and Joshua, and Stavia and Corrig, do have that >deep tenderness between them as couples. Certainly the way they act >with each other and the way Joshua acts so fatherly toward Stavia and >even Myra, who is not really his daughter, shows that he cares about >the females with whom he lives. I think what Tepper is trying to get I didn't get that, but I may have been so turned off by rest of the society by then I might not have noticed it. The other way of looking at it might be that these men are acting as perfect "servitors" as well, since the only time they can demonstrate this "affection" is when they are alone. The same might be said of any sex worker. >>The real effect of this >>breeding program, this inane tinkering with the very >>basis of our human lives, is quite likely to be ruin for >>us all. We don't understand it. We don't understand >>life at all, and our arrogance and ignorance are as >>>capable of destroying us with DNA as with atomic bombs. > >I'm not sure that breeding for a less violent human is going to >change our DNA that much. The DNA of those who continue will also be >human DNA. And I suppose even that sort of argument could be >partially refuted by Tepper's offering of the Holylanders as the >opposite extreme. Yes, it would be human DNA, but every human gene codes for multiple characteristics, as many or twenty or even more. And they are not necessarily linked in any direct way. Not that we know anything much about what traits are overlaid on the few genes for which we know only one characteristic. So, as an imaginary example, let's suppose that the same gene (or set of genes) that code for human aggressiveness also code for normal resolution of Patent Ductus Arteriosus, the opening by means of which the fetus avoids passing blood through the lungs while the lungs are non-functional. In that case, reduction of aggression might mean an increase in potentially fatal heart defects. While this defect can be repaired surgically, if the gene became widespread, any scenario in which medical knowledge or access is reduced becomes a bottleneck beyond which humanity may not survive. >>>> And there is a crypto-racism inherent in her scheme, since it would >>>> be easy to demonstrate that young African-American males are >>>> responsible for a disproportionate share of violent crime and might >>>> therefore have to be culled even more drastically. > >I don't recall any mention at all of people of color in the book, but >I don't think young African Americans would be any more prone to >choosing to stay in the garrison than young white males. I think the >garrison would be equally challenging and equally enticing to all >boys. There really wouldn't be any distinction made over them, since >from the age of 5 forward they would be in the garrison with the rest >of the guys. But in fact, at this point in "history," there are no Black, Hispanic, Asian, or any other non-white males. Surely their absence is curious, since the post-apocalypse world is presumably selected randomly. The fact that there are no persons of color left implies that some sort of non-random selection has taken place already. While it's true that she doesn't mention this, Tepper can't be let off the hook by the mere idea that she didn't want to address this issue. If you want to avoid race, one has to posit an alien culture. If one deals with humanity on this earth, the absence of "others" implies murder and genocide. >>By culled, I mean that the men they want to kill are sent, >>like Uriah, into the thick of battle and are so destroyed. > >Only if they had chosen to stay in the garrison. Then presumably, all the males of color *have* stayed in the garrison, failed to father any children, and their genetic heritage is completely expunged from the future. And the only males who survive the garrison and enter the gate to women's country are evidently white. Oh, my. Funny how that all worked out, isn't it? ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2002 09:12:21 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Ok, I'll grant you the "funny how that all worked out", but still there really is no proof that there are no people of color. There don't seem to be any in Marthatown, but we really don't get that good a picture of the rest of the population of Marthatown or the other towns. Just because the people they specifically talk about are not described as being of some other race doesn't mean they are not there. There are actually very few people described in that much detail in the novels. Morgot's family is described, Sylvia, Beneda and Chernon are described ( I'm assuming - I actually don't recall specifics.) Barten is described, right down to that "cutest little bottom". And the other people we meet specifically as fairly important characters all appear to be white - Septimus Bird and his family, etc. However the rest of the town could be all multi-racial - it really doesn't say. I am not really trying to defend Tepper, though I acknowledge that it certainly seems as if I am, but she doesn't write anything about watching a sea of only white faces march off to war when the garrison leaves to fight Susantown etc. nor does she specifically say that all the women watching them go are white either. However, not mentioning it does seem to imply that means that it probably isn't there. So, were the founders of Women's Country from one of those gated communities in California ( I have always assumed that GTWC is set in a post apocalyptic Northern California - the ocean in the west, the locations of the ruined land to the south and east - implying that at least one of the bombs hit the area that would have been around Vandenberg... the fact that it has eucalyptus growing, but seems very unlikely to be Australia) that are also rather racially pure? After all, the existence of the Holylanders implies that there are others who also survived. Women's Country shares its land with other people who did not join them - the itinerant magician's family along with others. Or worse still, if we are imagining parts of the story that go unstated - were people of color not invited to participate, (i.e. deliberately left out, both by Tepper and the founders of W. C.) and thus left to fend for themselves in the post-Apocalyptic nightmare? Who knows? She just doesn't say, nor does she say enough about the other people outside for us to figure it out. Rose >But in fact, at this point in "history," there are no Black, Hispanic, Asian, >or any other non-white males. Surely their absence is curious, since >the post-apocalypse world is presumably selected randomly. The fact >that there are no persons of color left implies that some sort of non-random >selection has taken place already. While it's true that she doesn't mention >this, Tepper can't be let off the hook by the mere idea that she didn't want >to address this issue. If you want to avoid race, one has to posit an alien >culture. If one deals with humanity on this earth, the absence of "others" >implies murder and genocide. > >>>By culled, I mean that the men they want to kill are sent, >>>like Uriah, into the thick of battle and are so destroyed. >> >>Only if they had chosen to stay in the garrison. > >Then presumably, all the males of color *have* stayed in the garrison, >failed to father any children, and their genetic heritage is completely >expunged from the future. And the only males who survive the >garrison and enter the gate to women's country are evidently white. >Oh, my. Funny how that all worked out, isn't it? -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2002 09:25:56 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU It just occurred to me that perhaps the way to hell is the time they are spending in Women's Country with its emphasis on weeding out those who are prone to violence and the back again could refer to the transition to the return to open relationships with the warriors in what will no longer be just Women's Country, but a different place where the returnees and their sons will be equal partners with the women in government etc., again presumably because they will have similar goals - of nurturing their children and creating a safe society. >I still can't figure out that line. Like most of the book, the meaning is >fairly ambiguous. "Time enough to learn the way to Hell and back again." Is >she saying that Dawid (and by extension all the other warrior-sons) had >enough time to learn about Women's Country(Hell)and decide to go back, or in >this case, not go back to WC)? And as such, deserves his fate? I wonder if >that makes sense. Still feeling rather slow today. :P > >Also, I find the idea that sinking to their (aka the men's)level of violence >(although in a different, more subtly manipulative way) in order to prevent >such violence from the men fairly ironic ... but I suppose I agree that they >seem to justify it through the idea that they're "doing it for the good of >humankind" while the men apparently fight for stupid reasons. > >Your previous post mentioned the pomegranate on the door/gate as a reference >of the way into Hell. How? I would like to know more about that. It sounds >familiar but I can't seem to recall the reference. Persephone, the daughter of the Goddess, Ceres (ahh - Demeter, I just recalled her name - I knew I was mixing Roman and Greek pantheon names) was captured by Hades and taken to the Underworld because he wanted her to be his wife. That's why we experience seasons - Winter, specifically. Demeter (who is responsible for all the things growing on the earth, plants and grain (hence the name Ceres - cereal)) is in mourning for her daughter who must return to Hades for 5 (?) months of the year because while she was in Hades the first time, when Hades himself took her there, she ate nothing all the time she was there except 5 pomegranate seeds. Thus the bargain Hades made with Demeter agreed that she could have her daughter back, but that because Persephone had eaten while she was in Hades with him, she had to return to be his wife for a time period that reflected the amount she had eaten - the 5 months for the 5 seeds. While Demeter was looking for her daughter after Hades had first captured her she let all the plants on the earth die, and there was no food for the people and the animals. Everyone and everything was dying because the woman was so upset about her daughter being lost. After writing this brief, and perhaps not quite so simple explanation I realize that there is probably a whole lot more that could be used from the myth to help with analyzing the story. Thank-you to who ever it was who pointed out the pomegranate door latch - I had seen that in the story, but since I "got" it, I didn't really take the time to "understand" it further. Rose -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2002 07:17:55 -0800 From: Maryelizabeth Hart Organization: Mysterious Galaxy Subject: [*FSF-L*] BDG GATE To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Rose Reith commented in part: > I'm not sure that breeding for a less violent human is going to > change our DNA that much. The DNA of those who continue will also > be human DNA. And I suppose even that sort of argument could be > partially refuted by Tepper's offering of the Holylanders as the > opposite extreme. Which makes me wonder how GATE fits in with Tepper's writing overall. Somewhere (darn, I know I used to know this -- SIDESHOW?) a character says "our goal as humans is to become something better than humans." (paraphrased). Is the WC program meant to be a step along that road? Or in this case, does the means negate that end? Maryelizabeth -- ******************************************************************* Mysterious Galaxy Books Local Phone: 858.268.4747 7051 Clairemont Mesa Blvd, Suite 302 Fax: 858.268.4775 San Diego, CA 92111 Long Distance/Orders: 1.800.811.4747 http://www.mystgalaxy.com General Email: mgbooks@mystgalaxy.com ******************************************************************* ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2002 07:34:31 -0800 From: Maryelizabeth Hart Organization: Mysterious Galaxy Subject: [*FSF-L*] other Tepper To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU > Here's Tepper's publishing history in brief. I'm curious if others have > read her mysteries, or followed her work, and could comment on the > development of her feminism over time, and the role of GTWC in that > development? > > True Game series (3 trilogies) 1983 (first novel published) - 1986 > THE REVENANTS (1984) (seems very close to horror) > Marianne trilogy: 1985 - 1989 > BLOOD HERITAGE and THE BONES (1986-1987) (outright > horror novels) > STILL LIFE (1987/1988); horror under the name E. E. Horlak > NORTH SHORE and SOUTH SHORE (1987) (fantasy but close to > horror) > AFTER LONG SILENCE (1987) * seems like the beginning of her > stand-alone > large novels > GATE TO WOMEN'S COUNTRY (1988) > > GRASS (1989) > RAISING THE STONES (1990) > BEAUTY (1991) > SIDESHOW (1992) (comprising a loose trilogy with GRASS & > RAISING) > > A PLAGUE OF ANGELS (1993) > SHADOW'S END 1994 > GIBBON'S DECLINE AND FALL 1996 > FAMILY TREE 1997 > SIX MOON DANCE 1998 > SINGER FROM THE SEA 1999 > THE FRESCO 2000 > THE VISITOR (forthcoming 2002) > > mysteries as A. J. Orde, starting in 1989, through 1997 at least > mysteries as B. J. Olpiphant, starting 1990, thru 1997 at least Because Sheri Tepper is no longer writing her mysteries as far as I can determine, it's been a while since I've read any of them. The Ordes have a male protagonist (with a female cop girlfriend) who is a little more traditional amateur sleuth. The Oliphants have a female protagonist who is a more contemporary amateur sleuth. I think the feminism is more understated (not as often the catalyst of incidents at least) and the environmental issues are still there, especially in the Oliphants, where IIRC (it's been a long time, did I mention?) victims and villains are often responsible for harming the environment. There is also a nice non-traditional mother/daughter relationship in the Oliphants. Maryelizabeth -- ******************************************************************* Mysterious Galaxy Books Local Phone: 858.268.4747 7051 Clairemont Mesa Blvd, Suite 302 Fax: 858.268.4775 San Diego, CA 92111 Long Distance/Orders: 1.800.811.4747 http://www.mystgalaxy.com General Email: mgbooks@mystgalaxy.com ******************************************************************* ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2002 09:23:47 -0800 From: Sandy Cronin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] other Tepper To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU > > A PLAGUE OF ANGELS (1993) > > SHADOW'S END 1994 > > GIBBON'S DECLINE AND FALL 1996 > > FAMILY TREE 1997 > > SIX MOON DANCE 1998 > > SINGER FROM THE SEA 1999 > > THE FRESCO 2000 > > THE VISITOR (forthcoming 2002) OK...now I need some help. I read a book recently that, thinking back, I would have guessed was written by Tepper, but apparently wasn't (since it's not on this list). And now I can't remember the title, either, darn it. It follows a gal who lives in a house that's been gated off, on a hill in the SF area; no apocalypse, but a gradual decline and lack of resources has caused an almost anarchic state. At the end an old boyfriend of the main character's creates a virus that spreads and removes temper and selfishness from almost everybody (there's a small percentage that it doesn't touch, but they're now handleable, since they're such a minority). Who wrote this, and what's the title, and why can't I remember, darn it? I certainly remember the STORY! -Sandy ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2002 18:51:13 GMT From: "Jeremy H. Griffith" Organization: Omni Systems, Inc. Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] other Tepper To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU On Sun, 17 Mar 2002 09:23:47 -0800, Sandy Cronin wrote: >Who wrote this, and what's the title Mona Clee, _Overshoot_, Ace, 1998, ISBN 0-441-00509-8. She also wrote _Branch Point_, Ace, 1996, ISBN 0-441-00291-9, an excellent time-travel/alternate worlds novel. I haven't seen anything from her since, but would *love* to... --Jeremy H. Griffith http://www.omsys.com/jeremy/ ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2002 14:20:42 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/17/02 8:28:51 AM Central Standard Time, rreith@RACORES.COM writes: << o hell is the time they are spending in Women's Country with its emphasis on weeding out those who are prone to violence and the back again could refer to the transition to the return to open relationships with the warriors in what will no longer be just Women's Country, but a different place >> I think that certainly could be one reading. I haven't really looked at this quote again recently (I've had a very busy last couple of days), but at any rate I think the "time enough" part of the quote means it's going to take a rather long while to reach their goal, and that's plenty of time to travel to hell and back. Or to be in hell and come back. Since someone talked about the possible Catholicism underpinnings to Tepper's worldview, I suppose it would be analogous to a kind of purgatory. Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2002 20:50:46 -0800 From: Margaret McBride Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU >Your previous post mentioned the pomegranate on the door/gate as a reference >of the way into Hell. How? I would like to know more about that. It sounds >familiar but I can't seem to recall the reference. > >- Iris Because a pomegranate seems like such an odd thing to have for a door knob, I assumed Tepper was referring to the Greek myth of Demeter's daughter Persephone who is carried off to Hades and required to come back 3 months every year because she had eaten 3 seeds of the pomegranate (an explanation of winter because Demeter--nature--is so perturbed at having her daughter gone). That part of the myth seems to fit the Gate story too with the allusion to warriors abducting/killing daughters. On a different note to respond to the question about Morgot's relationship to Stavia, I had a different reaction: I saw her as being so upset when she sees Stavia hurt that she had to get the other women to take care of Stavia for awhile (isn't she described as being red-eyed when she comes back?) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Mar 2002 01:10:23 -0800 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 12:24 PM 3/17/02 +1100, Julieanne wrote: >It's like we all assume women cannot change the world on their own >initiative - they have to be pushed, goaded under extreme external >pressures or accidentally dropped into it. But isn't this the situation we actually see? What few gains second-wave feminism made seem to be steadily eroding, with the active complicity of feminist impersonators like Katie Roiphe, Camille Paglia, and many more. We're currently in a situation where the arms control treaties hammered out with great difficulty over decades are being scrapped by one macho idiot whose ties to environmentally-disastrous money sources have also led the USA to ignore or abrogate what little progress has been made there as well. Just when are women supposed to jump in and save the day? It would seem to me that women in general, present company excepted of course, are almost as bamboozled and/or jingoist as the men. If the men on Whileaway had to be helped to assume their karmic burdens with more alacrity, surely quite a few women will have had to be as well. In fact, given the entire history of the world, with the possible exception of Lysistrata, an imaginary "comedy" written by a man, all the works you mention have incredible optimism at their heart, and perhaps a large dose of cultural feminism, in that they assume without much evidence that women in large numbers *can* be motivated to make both common cause and a real difference. Hell, we can't even get the ERA passed, much less encourage our mostly male "leadership" to pass laws that make the "open season" on women for murder and violence by male perpetrators less one-sided. The Yates case in Texas is pointedly *not* about an abusive man who bedeviled his mentally-ill wife with threats and religious bigotry and male-supremism, but the "sin" of the woman involved. The man in that case, the actual instigator and inciter-to-violence, will walk away, free to perpetuate more violence and mental anguish on yet another female victim. >In addition to my annoyance over her rejection of lesbianism, I dislike >Tepper's treatment of prostitution in her novels even more so - possibly >because unlike the lesbianism which is largely absent, prostitution is >largely present and often presented as the women's 'own choice' with no >analysis. That may not be entirely her fault. Under the influence of Margot St. James and her crowd of anti-feminist fellow-travellers, a fairytale story of the "working girl" remarkably similar to that of Hugh Hefner and Richard Gere's Pretty Woman has captured the black hearts of the corporate media with a false picture of "powerful women" who *choose* prostitution as a "career decision" much like some women choose to be chemists or astronomers. Without direct experience or investigation, it's difficult to find any different perspectives, especially feminist analysis, and I get the strong impression that Tepper is not large on feminist analysis, despite many of her themes, but rather follows popular conceptions, many of which are actually attractive to male egos and prejudice. In women's country, for example, we could make a case that her women exist in a state of existential despair because they have been forced by the foolishness of men to attempt to live without them. The poor dears. Perhaps Tepper should have read Camus' The Myth of Sysiphus along with the Troy cycles before starting the book. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 20:22:25 +1000 From: Maire Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG GATE To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Hi... I have only just finished Gate, so I have not been reading the discussion thread to avoid spoilers. I have to say, I have found the amount of discussion really remarkable- I could see it was going to be a thought provoking book. I hope that this level of discussion continues throughout the coming months- I suspect it will.. I really think we have picked some great books this round... I really like Tepper's work, and I usually don't have some of the various criticisms that I see other people mentioning. Although I really like Gate- I did think it very different from other of her books. I have mentioned this before- I usually separate out her books into 2 camps mentally= "straight (Singer from the Sea, Fresco" and "satirical (Sideshow, The Family Tree" Her writing, plot, etc just seems to be quiet different that way. One thing they all have in common- the twist at the end. There is always a brilliant twist at the end, that, for me, bumps the book up quite a few notches on my mental rating scale. I hesitate to comment too much, because I haven't read all the threads.. I saw someone recently commented on the play, and how that is the key to understanding the book. I agree, but must confess that I have found it hard to work out exactly how it is relevant and so on. I guess this is where a reread would be of benefit- rereading in a more critical way, rather than the frantic "have to find out what happens" read that characterises my first reads of a good book. I saw somewhere that someone felt very sad about the way the book had such a breach between the two sexes- before reading the book I expected to feel the same way. I think I didn't end up feeling that way- not sure why? perhaps because Tepper was not holding up the system as an ideal/ utopia etc.. for me, WC was not supposed to be a utopia- but more of a "what if?" ONe thing.... WC was supposed to be breeding for ....err... SNAGiness, yet Corrig was described as "insane, weird" etc by Chernon. What do people see as the characteristics that the Council women are selecting for? Obviously *not* docility etc, ala the reindeer... an ability not to be ruled by the desire for power? Maire ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 20:34:42 +1000 From: Maire Subject: [*FSF-L*] OT effect on woman crying, taking testosterone WAS mRe: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Just wanted to say- in regards to the tale about the woman who found her attitudes and so on changed with taking testosterone. I personally, would take this story very dubiously.. this is a woman who *wants* to be a man, with all that she perceives that entails- ie being "manly, tough, sexual predator etc etc etc" I hardly think it surprising that her attitudes changed in these ways when she began to alter herself physically. I, myself, think its impossible for a person to identify what behaviour is a result of culture, society's *and our own* conditioning on ourselves, and what is a result of biology, natural personality differences between gender and individuals. I would perhaps suggest, that this woman's change in attitude etc, was more of a "self-fulfilling prophecy" type of thing- obviously she desperately wanted to be a man? so, it seems, to me, obvious, that she would also, with the physical external changes, change herself emotionally etc to be more "man-like" (sorry for going on) My own personal theory, is that men and women are the same (or, of course, all different, but not as a result of sex) but that we get influenced in different ways at different times by our hormones. Same hardware, different software- (for all practical purposes- I realise that there are actually differences in brain structure etc etc) ie. men are more likely to react aggressively in certain situations due to the effect of testosterone and so on. Maire ----- Original Message ----- From: "Lee Anne Phillips" To: Sent: Saturday, 9 March 2002 7:47 Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country > At 12:02 PM 3/8/02 -0500, Dave Belden wrote: > >Please forgive me gabbing on, but I can't resist adding this. In my men's > >group last night we had this conversation: Do most men in our culture not > >cry easily because we are taught not to? (This is the theory I had been > >going on for 25+ years). Or is it in part because testosterone inhibits > >crying? (Viz. an article in the New York Times last year about a woman who > >had a sex change, who was amazed to find that the more testosterone she > >took, the more her tears dried up - involuntarily, as she experienced it). I > > I think so. I lived in Utah for several years and had the valuable > experience of seeing Mormon men in their natural habitat, > as it were. They highly value emotion and are openly emotional > in the "Testimonies" they often give of the centrality of their > religion in their lives, in the importance of their families, and other > deeply personal subjects that most (many?) men would avoid like > the plague, around women at least. But I read a similar story, > written by a female to male transsexual, who mentioned the > difference she felt in her feelings and sexuality after taking male > hormones for a while. Not only did her tears dry up, she became > more easily angered, and horny as all get out almost all the time. > > In particular, she (and I apologize for the word "she" but she > was talking about how she experienced this as a woman, now > living as a man, but from a woman's perspective) also said, and I > particularly remember this, that her attitude toward love changed > as well. It wasn't that she didn't believe in love, or didn't think it > was important, but that it now took a secondary place to > sex. After sex, she might think about love, but sex came first. > This admission astonished me, and made me think. > > Based on these two experiences, I'd say both things happen. > Boys are taught to "control" their tears and testosterone > makes it easier. But this also destroys much of the premise > of Women's Country. If men can be taught to be sensitive, > but not "too" sensitive, what purpose does the breeding > program really serve without simply castrating all the men? > > To be sure, the male servants *behave* a bit like castrati, > and seem to be *assumed* by the warriors to be so, since > they never express jealousy of their 24-hour access to the > women, and the warriors behave like bulls, but are castrated > by proxy, since they can have no offspring despite their > frequent ruts. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 21:06:10 +1000 From: Maire Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU I am sorry that I am replying to this so late... I guess much of what I say is now old hat, irrelevant and so on. I just wanted to say- (I am replying to Rose's post, she in turn was replying to someone whose name has been lost from the post.. sorry. So the lines with a > are from Rose, and a >> are the original poster) > >I hadn't realized Lee > >Ann's point that they were also selecting for female murderousness; nor that > >successfully breeding only from gentle men would eventually reduce the > >murderous ability of the women running the program and thus subvert it; but > >this is clearly correct. (me) I don't understand how they are selecting for murderousness in the women? Even if you say that the Council women are murderous (whcu I disagree with) they are not having more children than anyone else. Also, how can you say on the one hand, that they are selecting for murderous *women* (note- how can you select for only one gender to be murderous???) But on the other hand, that they are selecting for gentle men? Also, btw- remember, its not just the warriors that are excluded from breeding. Morgot does mention "the large number of tubal ligations and hysterectomies carried out"- we might remember Myra in this context. (rose) > And she herself admitted that among themselves the women on > the council called themselves "the damned few". (me) Yes.. really agree... I think Tepper clearly shows that the Council women are saddened, sickened, by what they must do. Nevertheless, it is hard for me to come to grips with. (rose) > There is also the > whole section in the play where Hecuba bemoans the fact that she > could have killed Talthybius, because she had hidden the knife in her > skirt, but then she felt that if she killed him she would be killing > some woman's son and that woman would end up grieving over him. > Instead she and her daughter-in-law end up watching him throw the > baby, Astyanax, off the cliff wall, so she feels that she is damned > for not having saved her grandson and would have been damned if she > had killed Talthybius. Either way she is damned, so shouldn't she > work toward what might have been a better future rather than not > acting at all? (me) Thank you for inserting this into your post... I am finding it hard to relate the play clearly to the story, this example really helped. I do need to reread it, and look for these connections. What do people think about the "Hades is Women's Country" comment? (rose) > I really think that the play is truly the key to understanding the > novel, and I have found that it takes several readings to see what > she really put in there. you have to admit that given the times she was > writing I was left wondering what about her > relationship with Joshua and Stavia's with Corrig? There is never any > mention that there was any sexual contact between them at > inappropriate times, yet they live together. (me) I also found this very confusing.... I never worked out what, exactly, a "servitor" is. Who do the servitors have sex with! Or.. are they also selecting for very low libido! (original poster) > > How much of male murderousness has in fact been bred into them by the > >choice of their mothers down the ages, to mate with warriors, in order to > >improve their (the mothers' and their children's') survival? (me) if that were the case, women would be "murderous" too. You cant breed for a characteristic too appear in only one sex!! (original poster) > >On nature/nurture, eugenics, biology, a lot has changed even since Tepper > >wrote the book. Lee Ann's point about the poor health consequences for > >women of multiple partners is very new, (me) ???? I am very confused here. What poor health consequences? The only reason that there is an increased risk of poor health, is because of disease. The connection between genital warts and/or herpes has only recently been understood. Therefore, a connection was made between multiple partners and cancer.. (genital warts virus increases chance of cervical cancer by 50%, if woman has herpes too, chance goes up even more) But, just having multiple partners, does not, in itself cause poor health! Tepper is very clear on the massive role that preventive medicine, disease checks, STD checks, quarantine for gypsies and itinerants etc is. Which brings me to a point- what do peopel think about the Gypsies?? A harsh choice for those unable to live in WC. (original poster) > >for example, (at least I only read of it > >in the last month) so Tepper can't be faulted for condemning her breeders > >to that - although of course the far more damning point that they are > >effectively being raped still stands. (rose) > This part I don't quite understand. They chose the men they had sex > with during carnival and then they unknowingly submit to artificial > insemination - that's rape? They participated in carnival, they were > admitting that they wanted to try to get pregnant. As Myra says, "I > might as well start sometime". (original poster) > >Perhaps counteracting the point about > >poor health outcomes of having multiple partners, is the finding that > >females in many species, including ours , routinely practice deception: e.g. > >bond with the gentle, committed Daddy type to get ongoing help raising the > >kids, but secretly go to the wandering, sexy adventurer (or warrior) for > >sex, to get tougher genes for the kids. (me) this is what the warriors think is happening, I guess! In actual fact0 its the opposite! (original poster) > >Bird species, previously thought to > >be monogamous, do this a lot, it turns out, and there is strong evidence > >humans did too in the ancestral pre-civilized environment (not to mention > >today, as DNA surveys of apartment blocks have shown somewhat startlingly). (rose) > Interesting - where did you read of that? (me) I read something a few years back, about women who cheat on their partners at ovulation, then go back to their SNAGs and have sex with them too. Article claimed that different types of sperm had been discovered... some that exist just to block other men's sperm and so on. Theory is that, women choose a "dominant" type to breed from, and a SNAG type to partner (nest) with, maximising chances of offspring's making it. Who knows. > Rose > > By the way I found your theory that it might be physiological that > men do not cry as much interesting. It certainly seems plausible. (me) studies have showed that pre0pubescent children, of both sexes, cry the same amount, after puberty girls cry more than boys. It is actually easier, on a purely *physical* level, for women to cry then men. Ie, our (sorry! I mean, women's) tear ducts start to overflow in response to a lower level of emotional stimuli. Doubtless there is also a large societal conditioning component also. (rose) > 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' > Virginia Woolf Maire! ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 21:14:25 +1000 From: Maire Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU The story of Troy, has been a favourite of mine since childhood, particularly feminist retellings. Has anyone read MZB's The Firebrand, or Colleen McCoullough (sp)'s Cassandra? The first one I read, was called Helen of Troy,, cant remember the author but it was very good. Maire ----- Original Message ----- From: "Julieanne" To: Sent: Tuesday, 12 March 2002 9:59 Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate > I agree that the play is critical. I have now read Gate 3 or 4 times, the > first time just after it came out. The 2nd time some years later, was just > after reading/studying a feminist analysis of Homer's Illiad and Odyssey > and it was then I recognised Tepper's play in the Gate, as being loosely > based on the Illiad & the women characters. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 21:18:25 +1000 From: Maire Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Regarding the "Do the women have sex with the servitors" controversy- I now feel I can resolve this for myself, anyway. When Corrig and Joshua rescue Stavia from the Holyland... afterwards, Corrig and Stavia have what amounts to a love scene (no, sorry, it was later on, when she was very pregnant). She asked if he would stay on after "this was all over" (or something like that) and he said yes, that he had a great hunger for her etc etc, and they caressed, embraced, and so on. So,... at least, I would say, the Council women have sex with their servitors... where the inclination exists, of course. I don't know about other women- those who don't know about the true role of the servitors and so on. Maire ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 21:25:38 +1000 From: Maire Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] servitors feelings To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU ----- Original Message ----- From: "Joy Martin" To: Sent: Monday, 11 March 2002 4:26 Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] > In a message dated 3/10/02 11:15:27 AM Central Standard Time, > rreith@RACORES.COM writes: > > << servitors would still be man enough to take over the emotional tasks > of manhood from the warriors when the time came for them to do so??? >> > > I think what Tepper is showing is that, at least at that point, the male > servitors still acknowledge they have some of the 'old' feelings and > motivations, and it has not been 'bred' completely out. (And probably > won't be for some time, if ever.) > > Joy Martin I thought it was just Tepper, acknowledging that the servitors had to put up with quite a lot of emotional crap.. somebody made the comparison with seeing a gf go off with a man to a function- their own same sex relationship not being socially acceptable etc etc- and how hard that was, and that even though theirs was the true r'ship of love and emotional intimacy, nevertheless, it meant missing out on these special moments etc. So I thought it was just Tepper adding some realism about what the servitor's go through- tat they aren't just these kind of saintly, passionless figures. Maire ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 22:16:14 +1000 From: Maire Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: The Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Iris- I think by "what are the ordinances and institutions of WC", in regards to the ordinances, it doesn't mean "what exactly are the ordinances" as in, a list of them and what they relate to... more like, um... er... you know.. what are the ordinances? as in, they are the laws of WC. They are an *exhaustive* list of regulations etc, that the women are effectively legally bound to follow (and the warriors and servitors). They relate to every area of life- from the education system, to reproduction, relations between the sexes, and so on. What are the institutions? The Council is the obvious one. The garrison.. the servitors fraternities... depends what you mean by an institution, in a way. Does it mean, like.. the institution as in a library, or parliament, or, like, when people talk about "the institution of marriage" Maire ----- Original Message ----- From: "Sherlyn Quek" To: Sent: Friday, 15 March 2002 11:15 Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: The Gate to Women's Country > Thanks for the information, but I searched the archives(in previous Tepper > novel discussion)and couldn't really seem to find anything. (Anything more > specific would be greatly appreciated.) > > Anyway, I would still like to have some response about my questions ... > maybe about the first one (on ordinances and institutions in TGTWC) if the > second has already been discussed. :) > > - Iris > The New Newbie > > > >From: Phoebe Wray > > >Seems to me there was a discussion of this a year or so ago on this list. > >It may be in the archives. > >best, > >phoebe ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 22:27:24 +1000 From: Maire Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU I don't think that Stavia could fake an assignation- it's prob impt to the warriors for them to know that one of their officers is ... (insert crude word of choice) the council women. If one of the Council women were faking, I think it would be very quickly discovered by the warriors... ie.. why is no one bragging about (insert crude word of choice) the Council women? or.. who can we get to @#$% the council woman, why did he fail, who *is* @#$% the council woman .. and so forth and so on.. Maire ----- Original Message ----- From: "Joy Martin" To: Sent: Saturday, 16 March 2002 12:22 Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country > In a message dated 3/15/02 2:36:38 AM Central Standard Time, > jdawley@BELLATLANTIC.NET writes: > > << The new Stavia is all about playing roles, though, isn't she? The first > chapter is one extended meditation on how she has split herself into "actor > Stavia" and "observer Stavia" because there are things she must do as a > woman and a Council member that her innocent child self would find > impossible. In this light I find it highly unlikely that she would ever > fake an assignation. Just as her mother met up with Michael every carnival, > playing the part of his devoted lover while secretly despising him, I see > Stavia doing her duty and paying what she sees as an unpleasant but > necessary price for the Council's long-term plan. >> > > I agree she may do this. But once you are playing at the whole thing, it's > just as conceivable that she would 'play at' having an assignation. Her actor > self was there to step in when she didn't quite know how to deal with > something, but felt she must. Often because she didn't quite understand why > it was being asked of her. But now she knows exactly why, and the whole point > is to maintain the subterfuge, not at any cost, just at whatever necessary > cost. It wouldn't be necessary for her to actually have intercourse with a > warrior, because she already knows the secret. She could just fake it, and > still preserve the secret. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 09:15:05 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG GATE To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 8:22 PM +1000 3/20/02, Maire wrote: >ONe thing.... WC was supposed to be breeding for ....err... SNAGiness, yet >Corrig was described as "insane, weird" etc by Chernon. What do people see >as the characteristics that the Council women are selecting for? Obviously >>*not* docility etc, ala the reindeer... an ability not to be ruled by the >>desire for power? I think Corrig's "weirdness" is simply someone like Chernon's reaction to Corrig's abilities in the special Servitor characteristic of being able to sense the future and the location of lost things etc. He does say that Corrig always fought like a wild man, but only when he was attacked, it seemed. Perhaps Corrig was less adept at hiding those feelings/abilities that he and the other prescient servitors seem to share, so he got more than his share of hazings in the garrison and he has learned to fight back, obviously with some skill. Rose -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 09:24:53 -0500 From: Rose Reith Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Yes, that's one of the scene's I was thinking of / referring to. But, at the same time it does seem that for the most part, Wmen's Country really seems to preach restraint, except for the carnival weeks. Perhaps Tepper was trying to turn humans more animal like (or maybe Vulcans a la Star Trek) where matings are only necessary at specific times. >Regarding the "Do the women have sex with the servitors controversy- I >now feel I can resolve this for myself, anyway. > >When Corrig and Joshua rescue Stavia from the Holyland... afterwards, Corrig >and Stavia have what amounts to a love scene (no, sorry, it was later on, >when she was very pregnant). She asked if he would stay on after "this was >all over" (or something like that) and he said yes, that he had a great >hunger for her etc etc, and they caressed, embraced, and so on. >So,... at least, I would say, the Council women have sex with their >servitors... where the inclination exists, of course. I dont know about >other women- those who don't know about the true role of the servitors and so >on. > >Maire -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 00:27:16 +1000 From: Maire Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU I think it very unlikely that a gene for a behavioural element would be linked to a gene for PDA. Maire ----- Original Message ----- From: "Lee Anne Phillips" To: Sent: Sunday, 17 March 2002 3:20 Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: Gate > Yes, it would be human DNA, but every human gene codes for > multiple characteristics, as many or twenty or even more. And they > are not necessarily linked in any direct way. Not that we know > anything much about what traits are overlaid on the few genes > for which we know only one characteristic. So, as an imaginary > example, let's suppose that the same gene (or set of genes) that > code for human aggressiveness also code for normal resolution > of Patent Ductus Arteriosus, the opening by means of which > the fetus avoids passing blood through the lungs while the lungs > are non-functional. In that case, reduction of aggression might > mean an increase in potentially fatal heart defects. While this > defect can be repaired surgically, if the gene became widespread, > any scenario in which medical knowledge or access is reduced > becomes a bottleneck beyond which humanity may not survive. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 00:38:50 +1000 From: Maire Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Stavia starts off, with the comment to .. it must have been Joshua- that "it's a comedy" but then, gradually through the book views it as otherwise- later, she gets upset at the bit where the baby gets thrown off the wall, and the director says she might be one of the few women who know what the play is all about. By the time she is a council woman, she is affected by the play on a very different level than when a young girl who had accepted it as satire. maire ----- Original Message ----- From: Rose Reith To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Sent: Saturday, 16 March 2002 1:47 Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country This discussion of it being a comedy also goes on between Stavia and Myra when Myra is cueing Stavia in the Iphigenia role as a youngster - maybe 11 years old or so. There's also the discussion of Iphigenia being played by a girl named Michy who is "fat," so there is the whole "fat ghost" commentary, along with the description of the baby as a doll that seemed somewhat reminiscent of Raggedy Andy, and the women, Hecuba and her daughter "all tarted up like river gypsies". Myra says the story is a commentary on certain attitudes of preconvulsion societies and that its supposed to be a comedy. Achilles with the big dong... Stavia is not amused because she says she feels the play in ways she doesn't understand it. It's in chapter 6... page 37 >>At 12:36 AM 3/15/02 -0500, Joy Martin wrote: >>One thing that keeps niggling at me is the line where one character says to >>another, "it's SUPPOSED to be a comedy", chiding the other (I think it was >>Stavia being chided) for taking it so seriously. > >No, the opposite. It is Stavia speaking to Corrig at the beginning of >Chapter 5. He exclaims his disbelief and she replies, "Well it is, Corrig. >The audience laughs." > >Janice E. Dawley.....Burlington, VT -- 'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world.' Virginia Woolf ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 00:41:13 +1000 From: Maire Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU I just wrote something- just realised that the "it's a comedy" comment did happen when Stavia was an adult, preparing to take over from Morgot. I cant see her as seeing this as a comedy though.... I don't understand it. Maire ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 12:05:17 -0800 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: Gate To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 12:27 AM 3/21/02 +1000, Maire wrote: >I think it very unlikely that a gene for a behavioural element would be >linked to a gene for PDA. Of course it's unlikely, but about as likely as it would be to be associated with *any* particular trait. You'll note that I said that it was an "imaginary example." But suppose it's blue eyes; does that make the linkage more palatable? The point is that we simply don't know how inheritance really works in sufficient detail to mess around with it at this stage in our development, any more than the pseudo-scientific "eugenics" movement of the last century did. We are only *just* becoming aware that cell proteins seemingly unrelated to particular traits may have far-reaching effects on the development of other body systems. And the point seems to be that In fact, the most notorious "eugenics" movement of that century, the failed but murderous effort by the National Socialist Party in Germany to "improve" the human race by "weeding out" "mental defectives," queers, Gypsies, Jews, and other undesirables is a blot on human history and scientific thought. It should be remembered that the Nazis imported much of their "science," if not their bigotry, from the USA and that many of their propaganda materials, like the execrable Protocols of the Elders of Zion, were funded and supplied by "respectable" US citizens. Right now, we are only just becoming aware that cellular proteins other than DNA may have a far-reaching effect on other body systems, and that our genetic heritage is more like a complex and interrelated ecology than an erector set. While Tepper can't be faulted for not knowing the current state of scientific knowledge, or more precisely our current realization of how much more we need to learn, she *can* be condemned for not taking the Nazi experiment to heart, and utterly rejecting the idea that such a program could possibly work. >From: "Lee Anne Phillips" > > for which we know only one characteristic. So, as an imaginary > > example, let's suppose that the same gene (or set of genes) that > > code for human aggressiveness also code for normal resolution > > of Patent Ductus Arteriosus, the opening by means of which ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 12:29:14 -0800 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU At 09:06 PM 3/20/02 +1000, Maire wrote: > >>On nature/nurture, eugenics, biology, a lot has changed even since > >>Tepper wrote the book. Lee Ann's point about the poor health > >>consequences for women of multiple partners is very new, > >(me) >???? I am very confused here. What poor health consequences? The only >reason that there is an increased risk of poor health, is because of Not so, although this is very new information. Women's immune systems work fairly efficiently to reject a developing fetus unless the body has been "desensitized" by regular exposure to foreign human proteins. The most efficient way to do this historically has been marriage, since monogamous sex, including oral sex, offers the greatest benefit for the fetus and the mother both. Developmental disorders and miscarriage, including potentially fatal (for the mother) pre-eclampsia, are all more common in women who haven't had a history of sex with the father of her child, or have been partnered with multiple males. While it's certainly true that normal pregnancies can result in less than ideal circumstances, the machinery of the body is complex and forms a part of our culture. I doubt that it's accidental that some form of marriage develops in almost every society, and that women in most societies are strongly motivated towards some variation of that state. Utilitarian explanations of marriage depending on father rights and a need for male "providers" and "protectors" fail, I think, because in *most* known hunter/gatherer cultures the vast majority of the necessities of daily life, including food, are provided by women. Real women in real societies depend on other women for most of their support and protection and grandmothers and aunts are far more important in terms of child rearing than husbands. I strongly suspect that women invented marriage, or those women who favored it were selected for by evolution, whichever sort of reason you prefer, because keeping the same man hanging around was good for the pregnancy, if not necessarily the mother after the baby was born. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 16:22:38 -0500 From: Dave Belden Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU >> At 09:06 PM 3/20/02 +1000, Maire wrote: >> >>On nature/nurture, eugenics, biology, a lot has changed even since >> >>Tepper wrote the book. Lee Ann's point about the poor health >> >>consequences for women of multiple partners is very new, >> >>(me) >>???? I am very confused here. What poor health consequences? The only >>reason that there is an increased risk of poor health, is because of > > Not so, although this is very new information. Women's immune systems > work fairly efficiently to reject a developing fetus unless the body has > been "desensitized" by regular exposure to foreign human proteins. > The most efficient way to do this historically has been marriage, since > monogamous sex, including oral sex, offers the greatest benefit for > the fetus and the mother both. Developmental disorders and miscarriage, > including potentially fatal (for the mother) pre-eclampsia, are all more > common in women who haven't had a history of sex with the father of > her child, or have been partnered with multiple males. While it's > certainly true that normal pregnancies can result in less than ideal > circumstances, the machinery of the body is complex and forms a > part of our culture. I doubt that it's accidental that some form of marriage > develops in almost every society, and that women in most societies > are strongly motivated towards some variation of that state. > > Utilitarian explanations of marriage depending on father rights and > a need for male "providers" and "protectors" fail, I think, because in > *most* known hunter/gatherer cultures the vast majority of the > necessities of daily life, including food, are provided by women. > > Real women in real societies depend on other women for most of > their support and protection and grandmothers and aunts are far > more important in terms of child rearing than husbands. I strongly > suspect that women invented marriage, or those women who favored > it were selected for by evolution, whichever sort of reason you prefer, > because keeping the same man hanging around was good for the > pregnancy, if not necessarily the mother after the baby was born. This is very interesting and persuasive, at the present level of our knowledge. I like your argument that women may have invented marriage before the neolithic (farming) revolution, and for 'medical' or biological reasons (consciously or not). But then, would you agree (?), marriage got largely out of their control, because farming led to a great increase in male status and power, putting women under male control, for what we trust will turn out to be merely a brief, early, pathological stage in human civilization. Men gained status as stock breeders, plowmen, smiths (large animals and metalworking not being easy to manage along with small children), and as warriors because increased population pressure led to increased war; agricultural surplus enabled priestly casts (the previously almost useless males found something else to do there - of mixed value) and war leaders (kings) and traders (not useless, this one), while larger populations enabled larger armies, empires etc. It has for a long time seemed to me that we men have a very deep psychological unease about our own uselessness. I can't prove this, and it's too hazy a notion anyway, untestable, intuitive, maybe just projection from my own case: but I would guess that unconscious womb envy is widespread. It needs more than testosterone, to me, to explain male violence, hubris and desire for control. I know women have their own insecurities; but I think there's a particular type of insecurity in men, that for all I know goes back to men's semi-marginality in hunter-gatherer societies, which drives us to prove our worth by great deeds, or rhetoric, or control over others, or by simply proving that one has after all brought home the bacon. (My friend who has lost a lot in the stock market is seriously depressed because of it, while his wife tries to tell him that the children are OK, the house is standing, there is food on the table). I imagine that most women may have thought it a good bargain at first to let the men specialize in the tedious tasks of government and war, all those boring meetings and all that fierce posturing, which enabled them to satisfy their fragile egos. But it got away from the women, when the men turned their anger and new-found power on them. This was the kind of thinking I was working with as a basic premise of my own science fiction novels, which I am calling the Gendering series, so please forgive the brief self-advertisement. Now, the modern economy, unlike the farming economy, seems to offer real possibilities for greater equality between the sexes, which is why we are having this conversation. Dave web page: www.davidbelden.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 09:27:25 +1000 From: Maire Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Where did you get this info? I have never heard of it... Maire ----- Original Message ----- From: "Lee Anne Phillips" To: Sent: Thursday, 21 March 2002 6:29 Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country > Not so, although this is very new information. Women's immune systems > work fairly efficiently to reject a developing fetus unless the body has > been "desensitized" by regular exposure to foreign human proteins. > The most efficient way to do this historically has been marriage, since > monogamous sex, including oral sex, offers the greatest benefit for > the fetus and the mother both. Developmental disorders and miscarriage, > including potentially fatal (for the mother) pre-eclampsia, are all more > common in women who haven't had a history of sex with the father of > her child, or have been partnered with multiple males. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 09:43:21 +1000 From: Maire Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG: Gate OT ill health from multiple partner? To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Lee Anne, I can't find it- but re your post about foetus more likely to be rejected where mother has had minimal contact with father.. its very interesting...... my interpretation is opposite though- that this is an evolutionary response to minimise pregnancies from on-off contacts etc... where mother and father have little investment in each other. (one night stands and so on) (which is the way I have always viewed brewer's droop ) Maire ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 16:49:26 -0800 From: Lee Anne Phillips Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU I believe it's mentioned in a recent issue of Scientific American, although I also subscribe to the British New Scientist, Nature, The American Scientist, and a few others of that ilk, so I may have seen it elsewhere. But I'd try SciAm first. At 09:27 AM 3/21/02 +1000, you wrote: >Where did you get this info? I have never heard of it... > >Maire ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 19:39:31 +0100 From: Petra Mayerhofer Subject: [*FSF-L*] Male usefulness, was [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Dave Belden wrote: > It has for a long time seemed to me that we men have a very deep > psychological unease about our own uselessness. I can't prove this, and > it's too hazy a notion anyway, untestable, intuitive, maybe just > projection from my own case: but I would guess that unconscious womb > envy is widespread. I don't know if that is the case. But IMO the search for 'male usefulness', for significance in any sense is _the_ major theme in _Darwin's Radio_ by Greg Bear. But it wasn't mentioned in any review I've read of that book so it's perhaps only my personal viewpoint. Petra ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 21:40:30 EST From: Joy Martin Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Gate to Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU In a message dated 3/20/02 6:05:20 AM Central Standard Time, mairen@BIGPOND.COM writes: << I dont think that Stavia could fake an assignation- its prob impt to the warriors for them to know that one of their officers is ... (insert crude word of choice) the council women. If one of the Council women were faking, I think it would be very quickly discovered by the warriors >> This is probably true, although I think where there's a will there's a way. And Stavia and others had been pretty adept at breaking the rules. (Have to admit, it's been long enough since when we were first discussing this, that I can't get my mind wrapped back around it right now. I hate to give your post short shrift, which is what it feels like I'm doing. ) Joy Martin "Absolute attention is prayer" -Simone Weil ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Mar 2002 13:20:53 -0500 From: Misha Bernard Subject: Re: [*FSF-L*] Male usefulness, was [*FSF-L*] BDG - The Gate To Women's Country To: feministsf-lit@UIC.EDU Petra, I don't think it's just you- since once you mentioned it, I was struck by how much that fit what had seemed almost extraneous before: the whole 'it has to come from the father' aspect and the way fathers also get the new skin mutation. misha On Thu, 21 Mar 2002, Petra Mayerhofer wrote: > IMO the search for 'male usefulness', > for significance in any sense is _the_ major theme in _Darwin's Radio_ by > Greg Bear. But it wasn't mentioned in any review I've read of that book so > it's perhaps only my personal viewpoint. Misha Bernard Cultural Studies PhD student mbernar1@gmu.edu George Mason University ------------------------- -mmmm! tastes like a scratch world! but it's Bishop Berkeley's Cosmo Mix!- Ursula K. Le Guin "World Making" (1981)