/lit/ - Literature

Penelope Ulysses wife remained faithful and avoided all those suiters in his absense.

>>13554813
I don't remember there being a lot to her however, she was just mentioned to avoid her suiters and wait for Ulysses, which is good of course, but it's missing the true struggle that is described on other tales about being virtuous.

What kind of challenges does a woman face as compared to men in order to remain virtuous?

>>13554779
>If Arthurian knights represent the traditional male ideals of virtue dominating over their passions by metaphorically killing them, like the dragons

theres a book, 'how to kill dragons' by Calvert Watkins, who is a linguist who used a comparative methodology in studying ancient indoeuroprean poetry. and he found that the tropes of killing dragons and beats as a trope had often been used as a figure for masturbation. the etymology of masturbate has always been fairy inconsistent, but watkins study gives it a firmer base.

>>13554779
isn't the whole point of feminism that women are utterly unrepresented in exactly this kind of thing

>>13554924
Feminism generally rejects traditional roles and ideals and considers them malicious because they propagate unequal material realities. I am looking for a more specific example of what this old traditional ideal of a woman was in the first place.

>>13554924
bravo

>>13554924
I don't even think a feminist would say this.

>>13554924
I barely have a clue what you're trying to say

>>13554954
Yet ironically these same feminists create characters that are like the male characters but with nothing to back them up. As for traditional roles of women you can just look at older periods in literature such as the romantics and I'd say there's a good chance the women in these stories fit their traditional role in society, but I don't think you'll find much where the role is idealized since it just doesn't make for good storytelling. No one wants to read about how the Lady is taking care of the domestic concerns in the castle, they want to read the knights battling it out in the field. You'll only find these women as side characters if anything, just look at Ivanhoe for example, Rebecca tends the wounds of the main character and fits nicely in this role but she certainly isn't the main focus or even the main side focus

>>13554779
>asks for an ideal icon for femininity, as Arthur is to masculinity, particularly from a Christian perspective
>but not the Virgin Mary tho
Autism. I visited a few churches and convents in Europe and they all idolize Mary.
You're not gonna find much else Biblically, and you certainly wont find anything pagan that even comes close to resembling Christian virtue

>>13554869
Staying faithful is the biggest challenge a woman will ever face and is basically her only prerogative

>>13555043
Of course I get that the Virgin Mary is the paragon of female virtue, but I seriously doubt that there is not a single story that tells how a woman struggles to follow this ideal. This is why i'm asking for the equivalent of Arthurian knights but for women.

>>13555081
>dont be a whore
>this a struggle
There's a reason why there's few archetypes on this topic

>>13555088
it's actually really hard to control lust. Just ask anyone that has tried to stop masturbating.

>>13555081
there isn't. women are supposed to just be the madonna.

>>13554813
>>13554869
Odysseus, fuck damnit.

A bit ago someone brought up the new Heroine’s Journey. Might want to check that out

>>13555092
Just keep your legs closed lmao

>>13554779
>good
>Christian
>man

>>13554916
>the gods were just telling them to have sex
Lmao at materialtards.

>>13555043
Exactly. Paganism is far superior.

>this thread alone proves that the speaker in OP's uni was correct

>>13555705
Deal with it.

>>13555743
how tho

>>13555705
Today, that’s counterculture

Clarissa, or, the History of a Young Lady, 1748.
Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded, 1740.

Ruth and Esther, obviously. And Judith.
Passion of the Holy Martyrs Perpetua and Felicity
Acts of Paul and Thecla maybe.

>>13555768
A third of the global population is christian, bucko.

>>13555743
>>13555760
yeah. how.

>>13555081
The Faerie Queen has a few female knight characters if I'm not mistaken, but it can be difficult to read if it's your first time reading a work written in Middle English.

>>13554779
>no one ever cared to try and give them a mythical ideal
It's more than modern female critiques and analysis are more focused on tearing down and co-opting male-created and centered narratives than defining, investigating and preserving the female. I'd say that saint hagiographies and romance and fairy tales are early ideals.

Women automatically have social value because they can birth children. Men have to prove themselves - as the strongest or richest or most powerful - in order to breed. It's that simple. This is why there were traditionally male heroes not female ones.

Non western but I've got two for you:
Sita from the Ramayana.
Draupadi from the Mahabharata, although this one is a subversion since shes considered chaste due to a technicality.

Regarding the Mahabharata it is interesting to see that feminists don't pick this story up since it's a very feminist story in that almost of the main action is driven due to the actions and agency of the female characters. Most of the male characters just want to chill out with their bros. Except Duryodhana.

>>13557163
Julius Evola made a similar point that women are born in a state of spiritual apotheosis, but they do not see the point of it since they do not know any other ontological state, and thus only have a trajectory downwards. This is also the reason why women were always seen in possession of the Holy Grail when it was found. Whereas men do see the point of striving towards this apotheosis since they are born without this purity.

Mary is the obvious one, and important not just because of the magnitude of her renown but because of the sheer femininity of her character. There are many exemplars of the feminine ideal in hagiography and martyriology.

Joan of Arc is in some ways a good example but unlike Mary she is also (justly) honored for her "masculine" virtues.

Penelope is probably the best non-Christian/non-Marian example. Obviously she doesn't get her own epic. Margaret Atwood wrote a "Penelopiad" which I haven't read but it isn't going to be an immortal work. You might check out Euripides' Troades.

I think feminist critiques of heroic literature do have some merit, but on the other hand the easiest way to deal with this is to *write a feminine classic* and yet it just doesn't happen.

>>13555815
Mostly niggers.

>>13555815
"Christian"

>Ctrl-F
>'Antigone'
>No results found
Maximus plebs.

>>13554924
Feminism is a cope for universal acknowledgement of women's non-being.

>>13559013
Heretical demon worshiper.

>>13560226
Not possible to be a heretic before the Birth - read the Catechism

>>13554779
>What would the traditional virtuous woman be?
The Wife of Bath's Tale. Female virtue is obtaining sovereignty over men, and thus securing a place for themselves and their children in an insecure world.

>"My liege lady, without exception," he said,
>"Women desire to have sovereignty
>As well over her husband as her love,
>And to be in mastery above him.
>This is your greatest desire,"

Male autonomy is the dragon that women seek to slay as their highest virtue.

Man is active. His virtue is in venturing out and achieving change.

Woman is passive. Her virtue is in preserving intact what is eternal.

>>13554779
Joan of Arc

>>13560247
As an aside this is why prostitutes and promiscuous women are so loathed by other women and held to be unvirtuous by women. Not only because prostitutes threaten the stranglehold of women over men by offering an escape from their sexual sovereignty, but from the sheer contempt towards prostitutes and promiscuous women for selling themselves short, that they settle for such small benefits in trading sex for trivial things instead of using sex (as a tool among other feminine armaments) to win the real prize of sovereignty over a man and men in general. True female virtue is obtaining and demonstrating mastery over men and is how women compare and rank eachother in virtue.

>>13560289
Do men fear sex workers and promiscuous women because men worry they have their power taken away?

Read old European epics like the Song of Roland/Orlando Furioso and Gerusalemme Liberata. Bradamante and Clorinda are gender-bending warriors, probably the closest thing you'll get to what you're looking for.

>>13560243
How old are you? What is your secret? Are you G-d?

>>13554961
modern feminists are managerial gynocrats and harpies, their ideal of female virtue is a hillary clinton, a postmenopausal militarised bureaucrat dedicated to serving the corporate warfare complex, worshipping power, being independent and needing no man, represented in fiction by the 'badass' 'empowered' comic book action protagonist. feminism is just propaganda to make the great atomised masses of women forget that they are dying alone and childless and cats are no replacement for all the children they aborted. Really, today's women are more dependent and hapless than they ever were under 'the patriarchy', see how they flock to therapeutic quick fixes, astrology, fad diets, ''witchcraft'', ''chronic lyme disease'', their hysteria is reallly a sign of desperation, having forsaken god, man and nature, they are left alone in the wilderness.

>>13561449
why are leftists so obsessed with sex work? a married women with children is opressed by the patriarchy but a whore is liberated and empowered. it's also the ''sex workers'' and cam girls have adopted leftism as part of their marketing. really I think leftism in its current incarnation is just madness and american individualism taken to the extreme, the logical end result to leftism and feminism can only be a world of atomised and commodified monads who have replaced family community and friendship, with allydom, ''sex work'', polyamory, yoga, psychiatric counseling and other more flexible and monetizable arrangements, these people, the journalists, the academic bluechecks, the celebs, the queers and the urbanites, they are visibly miserable, they are intolerant and have a fragile sense of identity, so why should they be upheld as models of moral behaviour for the rest of us?

>>13562542
when did the ideals of the French Revolution become leftism?

>>13562542
Sex work is just capitalism being allowed to run roughshod over society, leftists are just retarded dupes who get tricked I to carrying water for capitalism time and time again.

The reason why these traditional male ideals of chivalry and honour were necessary in the first place is because unless knights were restricted by some standard of morality they would just kill and rape as they had the strenght to do, as many did anyway. Women never had as much strenght to act upon their passions because they were restrained by the norms of society itself, so ideals weren't needed.

It could be said that now it is the time for some female ideals valuing temperance and moderation to appear, as feminism has liberated women from traditional norms without giving them any guidance on how to deal with their primal instincts and atavistic desires, but I don't think this will ever happen. We will live to see women debase themselves more and more as they become utterly unable to exhibit a modicum of inhibition and self-control, encouraged by "you go girl" mantras. It is sad and the biggest failure of feminism to women but there is nothing we can do, as simply saying "maybe you shouldn't always act on your desires" to a women is like defending slavery in their eyes.

>>13562482
damn

>>13562556
it’s where the term ‘left wing’ originates from, thick-skull.

>>13562556
Is this bait or does the left really not read at all

>>13555081
>This is why i'm asking for the equivalent of Arthurian knights but for women.
Joan of Arc might fit the bill, even though she went against some ideas of femininity from the time she was revered for her chastity, bravery and faith. At the end of the day though those are the same traits favored in (idealized) male knights.

Generally speaking you will have two types of ideal female:
1. The mother
2. The saint

The Virgin Mary is the best example that everyone keeps bringing up since she covers both but like I said, Joan of Arc would be the saint. Other women would just be idealized as good mothers (caring, nurturing, loyal). Plenty have mentioned examples of both and really you'll get more of the "mother" than of the saint since saints don't reproduce and reproduction was seen as essential to women.

>>13560289
Women don't hate prostitutes though.

>>13562482
>modern feminists
All feminists are modern. It's a byproduct of industrialisation and exhausted its intellectual potential several decades ago.
>>13562560
This.

>>13554779

>>13563063
what about xenofeminism, sadie plant's Zeroes and Ones, and Laboria Cuboniks, and amy Ireland?

>>13563395
I'm not going to read your webcomic anon.

>>13554779
>Have women always been a meme and no one ever cared to try and give them a mythical ideal?
On the contrary, in "Erec" of Hartmann von Aue, the proganist Erec can only obtain completeness as a knight, ruler and person overall because of his wife Enite. He may take the active part of their relationship by being a knight and such and this alone would disqualify it from being okay in a feminists eyes, but she is vital to him in every way. The mythical aspect is that she's virtous and beautiful, which of course is very "problematic" as well since modern women are apparently supposed to be badass bitches that kick ass and do whatever they want. In "Erec", there are many single men, but something in their life is missing and they can't develop. It's about how man and women belong together and form each other.

>>13554779
Either one:
1. mother
2. saint (bonus points for martyrdom)
3. queen

>>13562560
Yep.

>>13562702
>Plenty have mentioned examples of both and really you'll get more of the "mother" than of the saint since saints don't reproduce and reproduction was seen as essential to women.
Plain wrong; one does not need to be celibate in order to become saint. Pic very much related.

>>13555802
Thanks for the answers

>>13555894
*early Modern English

>>13564228
That picture and story is so beautiful yet tremendously sad.

bump

>>13562702
>Women don't hate prostitutes though
Very naive. You never experience greater venom and loathing than a woman towards prossies and sluts.

>>13554924
this, yea

>>13554779
Maria Magdalena.

>>13565513
They're just jealous they're not getting all that cock for themselves.

>>13554779
Household manager, other half of a man, and central pillar of one's family and race.

>>13562482
Astrology is based tho

>>13554779
Arthurian ideals present it pretty nicely- many of the Mabinogion's tales show good female characters and social archetypes, and in later works like Malory they're shown as twisted and failing as the men.

>>13557626
In which book does he say that?

>>13557626
What makes a woman be born in a state of spiritual apotheosis? What did she do to achieve that state? What does it even mean? Newborns are creatures of pure instinct.

>>13554779
I believe the feminine ideal is gentleness, innocence, loyalty, and a tendency to dotingly care for others. The feminine goal in life, in one way, the exact same as the masculine goal in life; create children and raise them to adulthood. Ideally, once adulthood has been obtained, the children can then care for the parents as they grow old and feeble, hopefully producing grandchildren for them so that they may see that their genes will live on into the future far beyond themselves (provided the grandchildren don't all die prematurely).

Once we go another step, however, their goals become very different. Men, on average, have twice the upper body strength of women and almost twice the lower body strength though not quite. Men also have larger bones that are more difficult to break, thinner hips result in being able to take falls better than women, and we have bigger lungs and a bigger heart so as to fuel us longer whether it be for work or for battle. It is the man's duty to face danger, to fight that danger if it threatens his family, and to go out and hunt for food (after all, the superior strength of a man allows for the use of bigger bows which are too powerful for a woman's arms to manage).

Women on the other hand, their duty is to provide and raise the children. For months they become more and more vulnerable, less and less capable of defending herself or even to work, ultimately resulting in childbirth which is very dangerous and will still leave her vulnerable for a time as she recovers. She must breastfeed, she must clean the baby, and tend to safe household chores while her dutiful man goes out to face the dangers of the world forthrightly. To stave off threats, to bring home food, and she should show her gratefulness for his bravery by having a nice home for him to come back to as well as prepare the food that he managed to present her. If he fails, she and the baby starves, so making sure he's looked after and fed and kept strong is, or should be, among her highest priorities.

That is the feminine ideal in my eyes. A gentle and dignified creature; loyal, grateful, someone to be cherished but also someone who should cherish the good things that her more brutish 'other half' does for her so selflessly, and indeed an element of masculinity, at least in the face of one's wife and children, is selflessness. The potential for voluntary expendability is required for men who are real men. A man who runs and leaves his family to die is a failure, but a man who dies so that his family can survive is a hero.

>>13554779
Basically chaste, either as a virgin or in marriage

See various examples in The Faerie Queene alongside your Arthurian knights

>>13555743
Fucking hate ironic catposters. Always shit tier humans

>>13567727
Studies and statistics show that couples who have ONLY sexually been with their one partner, have the highest likelihood of staying together. I say this as a man who's been with over a dozen women... frankly, I feel somewhat ashamed. I think it would be better, VASTLY better, if as a late-20s man I were married with the only woman I've ever fucked, with at least 3-4 kids by now if now more, working hard, paying the bills, with a beautiful and traditional woman to take to bed every night.

>>13555743
If anything it proves that people care a lot more about male ideals than female ones