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Sep. 23rd, 2003 06:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
I recently watched "Impromptu", and I was just thinking about how stupid it is that they portrayed Marie d'Agoult (is that how you spell it? I've no idea) as some coniving bitch who was just holding Lizst back. How stupid. Aside from the fact that she must actually have been some sort of a saint to stick with Liszt for ten years when he was off cheating on her with every woman who came along, she couldn't have any power over his creativity. I mean, I get writer's block sometimes, but that has to do with me, not anyone else, even if my mom is being a nut or my friends are jerking me around.
It just makes me sick the way historians always try to pin every misfortune in great men's lives on their women. It's the Marie Antoinette syndrome. Everyone blames the French Revolution on her, not Louis XVI, who was the king, and actually had something to do with the running of the country, unlike her, not to mention that the whole structure of the French government was flawed, and oppressive to the lower classes. The same with Empress Alexandra and Nicholas II and the Russian Revolution. They always act like she was some sort of evil person in leauge with Rasputin to control Nicholas and engineer the downfall of the Romanovs. Nevermind the oppressive government, or that Nicholas was a stupid reactionary idiot. They never take into account that societies where the rich few live of the backs of the poor are generally unstable, they always have to have some sort of scapegoat, and it's never the men. They never fault them for being ignorant, weak, or stubborn rulers. They just blame the women for that. It's all such an incredible load of crap.
Let me just say that if one woman being a 'bitch' could bring down the entire centuries old structure of a society, the world would be a VERY different place.
Whew! Righteously Indignant Feminist Speeches take a lot out of you. But I needed to get that out of my system!
I think I'll go finish reading "Prince Caspian" so I can move on the the next book. I love Narnia; one of the few fantasy series I actually like. I'm going to attempt "The Fellowship of the Ring" after that. Abby said it was good, but I have a sneaking suspicion I'll get bored and abandon it after the first chapter. I'm not generally into reading fantasies, because they're all kind of the same, and Lord of the Rings is like the blueprint for every modern fantasy book out there. But we'll see; I might just like it! Stranger things have happened! ;-D