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Woman In Love: Tragedy or Fairytale? Mackenzie Jorgensen

Academic Integrity Pledge In keeping with Creighton Universitys ideals and with the Academic Integrity Code adopted by the College of Arts and Sciences, I pledge that this work is my own and that I have neither given nor received inappropriate assistance in preparing it. Signature: ___Mackenzie Ann Jorgensen ___December 12, 2010_

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According to Simone De Beauvoir, the woman is love is destined to a tragic fate, and not the typical fairytale of one falling in love and living happily ever after. Her discussion of the woman in love reflects the womans role, identity, and need diminished to being viewed through the perspective of an almighty man. For the woman, she has two choices to consider: either to live a life in solitude bearing her own responsibility and burdens, or to doom herself as an authentic person. De Beauvoirs solution to this is faulty, in that in order for love to be possible equality must stand indestructible. I may be so bold to say that equality is not needed, but rather a sense of self establishment apart from the successes or failures of the other person, or even in light of the other persons opinion. Ultimately it depends on what one seeks in love and how each views themselves in light of no one else but God and themselves. The question that must be asked is who essentially is the woman in love and what is the predicament being presented? In The Second Sex, De Beauvoir lays down her argument driving from womans hopeless position as the Other, leading into an inevitable relationship where she is the slave and her lover is the Master, which in due course leads to the womans demise. This is her total basis on which she develops her argument, which proves successful in further points she makes. Her own ideology stemming from existentialism pulls in the predicament of the authentic identity, conflicting with the identity of the woman as a whole resting in the masters hands. In order to fulfill authentic personhood, the desire to seek the eternal is found in providing for the master; she needs to be all that he needs, a slave, so that he would need her and further because he needs her. He therefore is her salvation, her rock (De Beauvoir 650). In seeking the eternal, the woman seeks the man and throws herself away to find power. DeBeauvoir illuminates on womans need for man, for it is difficult for a woman to find her way up in society alone. In addition to power, she seeks a man who resembles the masculinity in a father figure, not necessarily the father characteristics. In this she is given a sense of

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security, a protection from her own liberty. A dire sense of need is created for a man because of the way De Beauvoir characterizes the womans lack of responsibility and integrity in standing alone, in turn putting man upon a pedestal, that he provides all that she lacks. It makes sense that she goes to explain the tendency of women to deify man, to see him as God. She explains the notion that in giving all of ones self to idolize God, the woman would receive freedom from herself and have the universe at her hands. Thus it is logical for woman to act similarly, putting men at the center. Fundamentally, De Beauvoir says that there is supreme existence to be gained in losing self in another human being. Men being the vessel through women seek salvation, the problem then lies in the fact that men are not God, and are fallible (De Beauvoir 640, 645, 646). To solve now this further dilemma that men are fallible, De Beauvoir presents two types of women, and how they deal with the problem. The first preserves her integrity and self by holding an air of frigidity or having indifferent emotional involvement with the man, giving the example of the woman who loved her husband dearly but never outwardly showed affection. The second type of woman is one who does become emotionally involved, giving herself completely so as to become most vulnerable. In this state, the woman has no other choice but to look to the affection and praise of the man to lift her up. Therefore his love is necessary to her purpose and worth, after she empties all herself in him. Most essential to De Beauvoirs point in all of this, is that this relationship between man and woman defines who the woman must be a servant. So, it is reasonable that woman would assume the role of the second type of woman most likely, and why De Beauvoir illuminates more on the second type of woman. In serving, even though she gives her entire self, she is in return gratified by fulfilling his desires and needs. If he is satisfied and his desires are filled, then she has purpose (De Beauvoir 649, 654). However, another problem arises with the fact that man still has a choice, in that someone else may fulfill his desires better. DeBeauvoir discusses womans point of realization where a

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loved man is not necessary and a woman is not necessary to him, for he never allows himself to become possessed. This realization is key, for it motivates what action the woman must take. She realizes that man possesses sense of freedom, self-creation, and independence alone, and that he can only empower her according to his desire. Thus this premise relies solely on if the woman is desirable, for if she is coveted, she has significance. In a frenzied attempt for the woman to save herself, she enters into a game of flirtation with other men, in order to recapture his attention due to lack of certainty. De Beauvoir makes jealousy a valid point to her argument, since woman is seeking salvation in something that is uncertain the end game is a tactic by which the woman would have to live by to constantly be able to serve her master. She also concludes her argument successfully up to this point with the principle idea that drives the woman into her desperate position, that her purpose and need exist as a paradox. In order to love fully, authentically, the woman must give her whole self, but in doing this she loses the mystery that first captured the desire of the man. Thus De Beauvoir presents an enticing argument for women in love, in that essentially women either lose or win, winning signifying taking a turn from what she declares as love and establishing herself apart from men, and losing signifying the submission to the position of the slave. Woman is trapped (De Beauvoir 654, 663, 665-666). In evaluating Simone De Beauvoirs outlook on the woman in love, I believe that she does an excellent job outlining her argument, and providing valid insights into the female mind of a woman who is in a relationship that exhibits a master-slave dichotomy. However, there is weakness in that her argument is solely based off of a master-slave dichotomy, in that it lends itself towards a specific situation with a specific type of person, not fully discussing what being love really is, or could be for that matter. Although the master-slave relationship is valid in many aspects, the major predicaments of the woman in love stem from a lack of self establishment, lustful relations, and an unclear meaning of what love means. If a woman had value and her

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foundation set upon something else other than the dependence of a man, one could argue that her discussion would not apply, her discussion reflecting that women need reciprocity of some degree to be of worth. Lustful relations would most likely not result, and a deeper meaning of love might actually be possible. De Beauvoir has not considered the possibility that there are women unlike herself that may play the upper hand in a relationship, and that there are men who would offer their world for the affection of a woman. Even though De Beauvoir briefly mentions that women could potentially be the one in control, she fails to expand upon this extremely important notion. She vaguely skims the idea when she discusses that men and women both want the same thing out of each other, but fails to elaborate or even make a connection between these two. Men want women to be both his and a stranger, wanting her to conform exactly to his dream and to be different from anything he can imagine (De Beauvoir 665). Similarily, women seek to deify men, but find disappointment when they discover their faults, for the woman in love forbids him any weakness; she is disappointed and vexed if he does not live up to the image she has put in his place (De Beauvoir 655). Both men and women have set expectations to be fulfilled by each other, not always one putting expectations on the other. So how come men only have the choice here? There is potential for a flip in situation, that women may actually add to herself by taking from him, especially since she fails to account for men who may be quiet and shy in temperament. She only accounts for men who are sure of themselves and confident in what they desire, depicting them as being barely phased by love or heartbreak, possibly incapable of feeling love. She compares jealousy to love on an equal level as a passing crisis for men, explaining that the crisis may be violent and even murderous, but it is rare for him to acquire a lasting uneasiness (De Beauvoir 663). She assumes this notion for men, but never considers that this could be flipped if a woman had the upper hand in a relationship. Furthermore, she assumes that

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these confident men also are ambitious and sure of themselves, stating that heartbreak could leave a minor wound, but ultimately men have a mans life to live (De Beauvoir 666). The master-slave relationship is a valid point, but it does not necessarily lend to assigning gender to a specific role in every circumstance, for there are many instances in where a man could feel heartbreak. I think what must be highlighted about this insight is that whoever plays the master in a relationship, has their foundation set on something else other than the other person. Looking at De Beauvoirs discussion of the woman in love, she does not go into what the mans foundation really is other than the fact that he is a man and that women fall for him desperately, but just alludes to the fact that he has a foundation. If written from a males point of view, I believe it would not portray the same level of confidence that she so graciously grants to men, but might in fact look more like a master-slave dichotomy with the roles reversed. Even though she fails to elaborate on the possible flip of the coin, she is still valid that in a master-slave relationship, love is not equally shared or deepened. According to De Beauvoir, a possible solution would be if love was founded on mutual recognition of each others freedom apart from the other, with love being a revelation of the self that follows (De Beauvoir 667). Her solution breeds indifference towards a care or love of the other person, and is watered down to a sense of self fulfillment. Here love becomes impersonal and selfish, by still using love to find oneself, and does not offer much of a solution. I challenge her meaning of love with the discussion of love based in Platos Symposium. Through Agathons speech, love transcends anything people can create, for they merely participate in its goodness and focus on its bottom up approach (Plato 33-35). De Beauvoir is choosing to look at the self through love, and finds failure in this approach. Though her idea of what genuine love should look like, she does not go beyond it, and gives no instruction for how to attain it, nor does she offer any solution for the woman who plays the slave.

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The hole that needs to be filled in De Beauvoirs argument is the absolute necessity for women to have a foundation other than the man she wishes to enter into relationship with. She is insightful that women seek to glorify something with their whole self, and naturally want to love fully, and to be loved in return why not take her discussion on love for God a step further, and put that love as a foundation for everything that follows? If God is all-knowing, all-powerful, and bears an unreciprocal love for his people, dedicating ones life to God would essentially be more satisfying than what any man could provide. God is love. In viewing ones life through Gods eyes, the opinions of a man do not matter in the same way, for a womans identity is found in Gods love, not mans. Some would disagree that God is not the hole to be filled, that one could establish themselves solely in who they are but then again, we are fallible creatures, and we will all fall short of our expectations of ourselves. Thus, I propose that women look to see their self worth and purpose through Gods love for them, and treat other relationships as gifts from God. I believe that is about as authentic a person could be.

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Works Cited

Beauvoir, Simone De. The Second Sex. New York: Vintage, 1989. Print. Plato. Symposium. Trans. Alexander Nehamas and Paul Woodruff. Indianapolis; Hacket Publishing Company, 1989. Print.