Xanthippe

[truepenny]

Over on Caveat Lector, Dorothea's been talking about shrewishness, an entry which I've been thinking about at odd moments over the past day or so. And I think that the perceived "problem" with Xanthippe isn't so much that she's a competent woman, managing a household and a woefully impractical spouse, as it is that she calls attention to her competency. She expects to be thanked for it. And she gets resentful when her miracles of organization are dismissed as unnecessary. I would argue that that is Xanthippe's sin. Patriarchy and its great minds are perfectly okay with women doing all the work; they just don't want it pointed out that that's what's going on. It's the Emperor's New Clothes again. Women's work is supposed to be invisible and it's supposed to be performed out of the goodness of our sweet little martyred hearts. The opposite of "bitch" is "doormat."

This is also, it's occurring to me, the idea behind the massive Victorian ideological apparatus of the Angel in the House. The Angel is supposed to rule over the private sphere; it's her toy, to keep her from trying to venture into the public sphere. And that private sphere is supposed to be perfect and beautiful and well-managed, but that descriptor of "angel" makes it completely impossible for any woman who desires to live up to this standard of womanhood ever to mention the effort that goes into this perfection. It's like the toxic version of sprezzetura, where you don't merely do something difficult as if it were easy, you and everyone around you are expressly forbidden from ever admitting that it was difficult in the first place.

Women become shrews when they refuse to be angels. Another neat double-bind brought to you by Western cultural patriarchy.

Comments

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

I must confess that I personally do not have this problem, because I am a lazy slattern. My husband probably does more of the housework than I do. I was, however, raised by a fair approximation of the Angel in the House, patient martyrdom and all. I fear I am a sad disappointment to my mother. *g*

[vass]

Oh gosh. One of the problems with being raised by an Angel in the House (or someone who gets a cleaner in instead of doing housework, or someone too polite to correct one - there are other examples, I'm sure) is that they don't, can't, teach one how to do things.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Oh, it's not that I don't know how. It's that I won't. Partly this is, as I said, laziness. Partly I think it's a kind of rebellion, defiantly refusing to conform to my mother's model of womanhood and that sort of thing. I also have an extremely high tolerance for clutter and chaos.

*looks at state of desk*

And a remarkably high proficiency at generating same. I swear this desk was tidy a week ago.

*sigh*