READING NOTES 01/26/98

"WOMEN AND MADNESS" BY SHOSHANA FELMAN

Notes by: Connie Silbernagel & Shama Farooq

Shoshana Felman is an author and professor of French and Comparative Studies at Yale University. In "Women and Madness," Felman attempts to distinguish dichotomous oppositions present in philosophical thought; women/men or madness/reason. She does this by first analyzing two different texts based on Western theoretical discourse; one by Phyllis Chesler and the other by Luce Irigaray. Her second analysis includes a text by Balzac entitled "Adieu," in which she tries to intricately show the dichotomous oppositions of critics who have reviewed the text.

In Felman's first analysis, she celebrates Chesler's ability of "giving a voice to the woman" (p. 10). Chesler's text shows how women can speak for themselves versus her speaking for women. At the same time, Felman establishes Chesler's lack of developing women's oppression beyond the social level. Felman describes that Irigaray is successful in bringing feminine thought past the social and to the philosophical level. However, Irigaray's statements are unclear as to if the "otherness" of woman, that is different from male thought and reason, is taken for granted.

Felman continues by including an intricate analysis of "Adieu," a text by Balzac. In this analysis, Felman describes the responses of critics analyzing the text as being "masculine" in thought. The reviews of the story are centered around the thought and reason of the masculine character, while the actual story is about a mad woman. Felman particularly points out their focus on the war scene, the silence of the mad woman, and her elimination from the text at the end of the story. Felman states that the idea of madness causes the woman's difference from man because madness lacks male reasoning. She also states that "madness is the absence of womanhood," according to the critics, because it does not resemble masculine thought (p.16). In addition, the death of the woman at the end of the text signifies the death of the madness, the illogical to masculine thought and reasoning.

Felman doubts the validity of the types of questions being asked about texts such as "Adieu." Instead of reinforcing masculine thought by raising questions as to how the man can "cure" the mad woman, Felman believes it is time to unsilence the woman and let her speak and cure herself. To avoid dichotomous oppositions, it is necessary to step back from the story and deeply evaluate the masculine thought and reasoning.

Opinions: I appreciate Felman's attempt to step back from the text of Balzac, and "rip out the guts of the story" to truly evaluate every word and its hidden message. - Connie

Felman's belief of letting the female character speak for herself raises an interesting point. While women can question and speak out against social oppressions, these oppressions are multiple and various which, in my opinion, can only truly be exposed by the particular group of women experiencing them. I agree with Felman on the importance of letting the character speak (or a particular woman) for him/herself as only the character is having the oppressive experience and thus only the character can truly speak out against it. --Shama