– Simone de Beauvoir –

I never managed to finish Simone De Beauvoir’s “The Second Sex”,

however I managed to read a lot of her – on her life, on her relationship with Jean-Paul Sartre, her relationship with Nelson Algren and her idea of being a woman. She was a clever woman among the male students (or students in general) by getting the second top of the class in Sorbonne, she wrote relentlessly on various matters, she also wrote a lot over her own life. From her childhood where we could bring glimpse over how her views were constituted, to her perspectives on marriage, Sartre and Nelson Algren.

She shared a strong similarity as Virginia Woolf – a middle-class woman of intelligence and constantly feel women’s freedom lie with their economical situation strongly, which therefore they will have the total autonomy. In my view, their ideas were very much what many women would agree upon, as economic situation will bring liberty for their own things and therefore own happiness…

As for her personal life, I never could sincerely understand the reason behind her endurance toward Sartre. Sartre seemed in regards of his personal life a man who flew around like a bee to women, the agreement he made with Beauvoir despite in theory fair, but to me seemed more an excuse for himself not to be committed (maybe Beauvoir too?)…

Elizabeth Barrett Browning – Sonnet 43

Love this poem from Browning, 

there is a softness and a sense of hope in this poem,

as if indeed there is someone who will love you forever and you love them too.

I presume I have one, 

thank god he made me better in many ways.

Yet I will need a lot of work to enhance and maybe push him to become better…

 

Red Is for Sex

I quite love how the colours can be associated differently regarding different cultures etc. For example, here the colour red often associated with sex and passion etc.

Sex Science with Dr. Zhana

From red lipstick in use since 10,000 BC, to red-light districts around the world today, red is the color of sex.

Many of us know this intuitively, but now there is a lot of science to back that up.

Researchers have studied red in other mammals for a while, but as far as humans go, it all started back in 2008 at University of Rochester. In a series of 5 experiments, Andrew J. Elliot and Daniela Niesta established the following fun facts about the link between red and sex:

– a red background in a woman’s photograph led men to view her as more attractive and sexually desirable than if the background was in other chromatic (blue, green) or achromatic (e.g., white, grey) colors;
– men were completely unaware of this red effect;
– red did not alter perceptions of women’s other positive characteristics, such as likeability, kindness…

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The Love Book App

As a fan of Tom Hiddleston I downloaded this app call “The Love Book” out of support for his work.

The app filled with rich amount of poetry found available in this world, some I have known and most not at all aware of existence. However through this app, I was able to feel the richness of emotions as if I am watching peopel performing on stage, so hard to describe…so human.

As for whose poems should be read, here’s a list:
Emily Dickenson
Christopher Marlowe
W.H.Auden
John Keats
William Shakespeare
Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Juliet; Feminism & Love

Notes: http://a09201988.pixnet.net/blog/post/31097973 (Sorry it’s in Cantonese!)

#WomeninFilm #Portrayal 

Few hours ago, I stumbled upon this blog from a literacy scholar in Taiwan (http://a09201988.pixnet.net/blog, sorry it’s in my mother-tongue). I enjoyed reading her blog very much, as I love how people read the film when applying ideology into the study – especially feminism. I enjoyed her very simple and clean writing, slowly guiding me to understand how women in existence, relate themselves to many parts of the society such as religion; history and sociology. For example how women who share a strong sexual freedom have to be killed off in “Scream” ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulykPn5ZUVs) + how “room” being understood in women and film, as a symbol of women’s freedom.

I shall tell you however, the article that caught my attention.

Today the blogger wrote an article about Claire Danes and Romeo and Juliet, talking about love and feminism. For feminism, love that was portrayed in Romeo and Juliet often classed as silly and stupid, it is to them nothing more than submission to men. In her/his interpretation however, the blogger believed the love Juliet possessed was a freedom of “knowing what she wants”. This as a result, actually contradicted feminist’s interpretation on love. 

For myself, their dislike of love or marriage or having children were very much a smoke screen. Their dislike of those things all link to one, of being told what to do/what’s expected upon them. They want freedom and control over their own lives & not being criticized for having them. But then, if the woman want marriage and children, out of her so-called free will (for me, free will often is very ambiguous, there’s no such thing as totally free), then why go against it?