I am Woman, Hear Me Laugh: Erica Jong's Fear of Flying

As a rule, feminism is not funny. At one end of the spectrum is Virginia Woolf's cool, logical yet impassioned essay "In Search of a Room of One's Own" (which is required reading, by the way) while at the other end...ever see Jennifer Lopez in the movie Enough? Where she takes self-defense classes so she can learn how to trounce her misogynist pig 0f a wife-beating ex-husband? There's the pouty, trembling lips, the enraged hiiiiiya as the aforesaid pig gets what is coming to him (I hope I didn't spoil it for anyone), but there are certainly no laughs to be had. The presumption is that the woman is a victim and therefore must be taken very, very seriously. 

All art by marginalized groups is in danger of falling into this trap, and my argument is that few attitudes are more crippling to an artist than a sense of victimhood. The world shrinks into an enclosed microcosm of suffering, the victimizers are inevitably portrayed as caricatures, and feelings of deprivation rapidly take the form of petulance. Even worse is when the artist's motives are hijacked by a "cause"--then all you're getting is the party line. These views are in no way intended to diminish the severity of social injustice; however when Virginia Woolf claimed that the literature of nineteenth century women was often flawed by deep-seated rage and feelings of inferiority, she makes a compelling case.

With this in mind, I avoided Erica Jong--who in recent decades morphed into a feminist icon--for years, thinking I'd be in for a very serious story about a seriously disenfranchised woman who rebelled against the system of Dead White Male Oppression (TM). If I'd had any idea how shockingly self-aware and how downright hilarious Fear of Flying would be, I'd have read it much sooner. Isadora White thinks and talks like a true New Yorker, with no nonsense and a painful awareness of her classically Jewish neuroses. Her voice is also distinguished by an endearing lack of self-pity most of the time. This is a girl who grew up rich and materially spoiled and is feeling lost for no discernible reason, and the author doesn't attempt to obscure those facts by creating a history of tragic abuse for the character to wallow in. The result is an honest look at the challenges facing women on a purely existential level--the ones that continue to plague women to this day. This is not just a book for the '70s.

Isadora White is as self-absorbed (and ultimately as selfish) as Carrie Bradshaw any day, but with an important difference: she is self-aware. The self-deprecating tone is surprising at times, as it seems like a strange position for someone who is known as a feminist to take. But that tone ends up working in the characters' favor; any potential criticism of Isadora is immediately carried out by the character herself, who can see the flaws in her logic and in her behavior but still feels compelled to continue that behavior. The analysis as to whether that behavior is justified in any way, or is purely selfish, is far more honest than one would expect, and elicits no easy answers for the reader or for Isadora herself.

Where the book falls short is that it has a very autobiographical feel, and as a result, events in the book occur very much as they do in real life: haphazardly and without structure. As a portrayal of a realistic scenario, Fear of Flying works well enough; but my view is that fiction that concerns itself with what actually happened in "real life" is too limited to create a story of real depth. For genuine exploration, a writer must venture into the caverns of what might have been; and a character who is supposed to replicate any existing individual, even (or especially?) the author, is limited from the start. But the book is a fun read and written in prose that sparkles with wit and honesty; it made me laugh out loud.

Comments

[shefali]

I read your review of Beloved on Amazon and was astounded by your fabulous critique.
I look forward to reading more of your eloquent reviews, I'm thinking you should write a book about reviews. Seriously, you are the master at this. How do you write so good? (Hehe, that was a pitiful attempt at a joke...I know it should be well...or I'm pretty sure...)

[Ilana]

Thank you for the kind words, Shefali! I'm sorry it took so long to post your comment. There have been some technical issues with the site.