Female Man Russ, Joanna. The Essay

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' Thus the novel is just as unsparing in the way that it shows the limits of a female-dominant perspective that simply reverses the dominant paradigm of male dominance. For example, when Jael suspects a male still believes in the inequality of women, she kills him, and hopes that all of the main characters, whom she sees as 'the same' as herself, all part of the same woman yet existing in different universes will adhere to her own society's goals to create all-female worlds. Jael does only live in a society that is absent of men, like Janet, but she is openly hostile towards males.

One of the most striking aspects of the complexity of the novel is evident at the end, when Jael tries to mobilize the women to do away with all of the males in their respective worlds. Janet refuses. Then Jael reveals that, rather than a natural plague, an effective similar campaign to the one proposed by Jael is the reason that there are no males in Whileaway. Jael is triumphant, but Janet's regret about this fact explain a comment she made earlier in the novel, that she no longer fits into the all-female Whileaway. It also explains regrets she experiences having to kill 'on assignment,' which the housewife Laura, frustrated in her role and excited by her association with Janet, gleefully celebrates (Russ 145).

The novel underlines the fact that Janet's dislike engage in violence is not because of sexual frustration because Janet enjoys sexual relationship with women, including the married Earth woman Laura, as well as having a wife of Whileaway. Instead, Janet's dissatisfaction with Jael's proposition comes from her ability to question the value of using violence and adopting 'male' norms. From personal experience, Janet knows this does not bring happiness. Because she still exists in a polarized society, Joanna can recall wanting to 'be' (and not just have a crush on) Humphrey Bogart and Douglas Fairbanks, and to be loud, ambitious, and powerful. This illustrates that ironically, living in an all-female and undivided society might be why Janet is the most disdainful of violence of all four women at the end of the novel.

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Only Janet has any inkling of what a world without gendered divisions might resemble, in contrast to the other women. Even the traditional Jeannie, who does not feel complete without a man at the beginning of the book, goes on to endorse Jael's campaign because of her own frustrations with her societal role.

Ultimately, the Female Man suggests a society that is divided between the sexes in a hostile or unequal fashion produces very 'male' violence, the kind ironically endorsed by the most radical of all the women, Jael. A society characterized by a lack of division between the genders is best. The ideal seems to be a place where physical bodies do not matter in a real fashion, where one does not have to aspire to be feminine and female or a man to succeed. But whether the author Joanna Russ openly endorses even Janet's viewpoint remains debatable, and made even more ambiguous by the fact that Joanna and Jeannie are obviously empowered by their new stance, in contrast to their previous sense of depression and incompleteness, as well as the fact that the main character from the 'present day' bears the author's name. Jael's statement that all of the women are the same woman, only modified by environmental circumstances, not biology, also calls into question who is 'right,' and who 'Joanna' is at all, given that all women are effectively incomplete without one another. Although Jael is the most unlikeable character in the book, with her superiority and cruelty towards others, without her efforts, none of the women would have connected with one another. Perhaps a 'stage-based' view of feminism is demanded, proceeding from narrow-minded to more enlightened and inclusive liberation. In short, a blended ideology of separateness and inclusion, hatred of male intolerance and acceptance of males, is implied throughout the multiple perspective of the book, and like the narrative style itself, it appears to endorse multi-faceted rather than singular perspectives......

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