2/26/24

For a man writing in the early 19th century, Stendhal had surprisingly enlightened views of women, but they aren’t immediately apparent. He makes very strong statements such as these that open this chapter:

A woman establishes her position by granting favours. Ninety-five per cent of her daydreams are about love, and from the moment of intimacy they revolve about one single theme: she endeavours to justify the extraordinary and decisive step she has taken in defiance of all her habits of modesty.

Stendhal’s assurance about the frame of mind of all women is off putting, as is his giving us yet another description of when the second crystallization occurs. (I think it has something to do with when a couple has sex for the first time, and then the woman starts having questions about whether she’s been used.)

But he gives a surprisingly contemporary rationale for why women feel and think differently than men:

Women prefer emotion to reason. It’s quite simple: since in our dull way we never give them any business responsibility in the family they never have occasion to use reason, and so never regard it as of any use.

This rationale puts a very interesting frame on the contemporary dating scene. Women, while still not receiving anything close to equal pay for equal work in the United States and most countries, are unquestionably in a stronger economic position today than they were in Stendhal’s time. You might think that this increase in relative power would be freeing for women, making them less likely to seek out partners based on economic factors.

Yet it seems exactly the opposite has happened — that as women’s economic power has risen, they have become more economically discriminating of their partners. Stendhal’s reasoning could provide a clue why this is happening: women are now expected to hone their analytical skills, and they are now applying that kind of thinking more readily when choosing a partner.

This result would not surprise Stendhal:

(Women) pride themselves on being more meticulous in detail than men, and half the trade across counters is carried on by women, who do better at it than their husbands. It is a commonplace that when you talk about business with them, you must always adopt a very serious tone.

There’s not much more to point out in this chapter. Stendhal, without even trying, put me on watch for the various ways relationships between men and women have evolved. It will be interesting to see what has changed and remained the same.