All About Eve - Feministing

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All About Eve

(Spoiler alert!)

Coming out of Eve Ensler’s new play The Good Body last night, I was speechless. It wasn’t until my friend Kate—who had accompanied me to the show—spoke up, that I felt a surge of relief:

“That woman is loathsome.” Thank god I wasn’t alone.

Now I know that everyone loves The Vagina Monologues—as do I. But The Good Body was nothing more than a masturbatory exercise in white upper-middle class feminism.

The entire play—touted as being a commentary on body image—is pretty much only about Ensler’s obsession with her stomach.

At first I thought maybe because I never had too many body issues, I just wasn’t connecting to what Ensler was trying to convey. But as the play went on, and her self-indulgent diatribe continued, I knew that it wasn’t just me.

Perhaps what both my friend and I found truly appalling was Ensler’s account of her international travels. Not taking any of her class privilege into account, Ensler talks about seeing maimed and starving locals and in the next sentence wistfully wishes aloud that she would catch a parasite to aid in her quest for a flat stomach.

Similarly, in her depiction of the women she meets in Africa and India, it’s as if she believes that they exist solely just to make her feel better about her “round belly.”

Her portrayal of one woman she meets reduces someone who I am sure was a very lovely person, to no more than an Indian mammy of sorts, just there to comfort the ever-nuerotic Ensler.

This attitude is fairly par for the course in terms of how mainstream American feminism views Third World women, but seeing it acted out on stage was more than disturbing.

What was also particularly scary was how my friend and I seemed to be the only ones in the audience with horrified looks on our faces. The (almost all-white) audience was just thrilled with the play, and gave Ensler a standing ovation.

I have to say that I was unsure on whether to post a negative review of the play—I would hate to add fuel to the fire of antifeminist bullshit. But at the end of the day, Ensler’s lack of any new or substantial insight into body image, coupled with her thinly-veiled racism and classism, convinced me that I needed to write something.

But I’m sure that disclaimer won’t save me from a barrage of angry emails. Let the massacre ensue...

Posted by Jessica - December 05, 2004, at 11:23AM | in Analysis , Arts , News

Email post to a friend |

19 Comments

December 5, 2004 1:46 PM

[0+] Fred Vincy said:

No problem with a negative review, but the comment I wondered about was:

"This attitude is fairly par for the course in terms of how mainstream American feminism views Third World women...."

Perhaps you could elaborate, because it does seem to me that attacking American feminists generally for not caring enough about women in other countries can be used as an unfair tactic to distract from the legitimate goals of American feminism. (At the same time, attacking Ensler for her own narrow-mindedness when writing about women abroad is perfectly appropriate.)

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December 5, 2004 3:04 PM

[0+] Katha Pollitt said:

Yes, if I could jump in to echo Fred, I think mainstream US feminism has come a long way. If you read Ms or Womensenews, there's a lot of excellent coverage of global feminism -- and what about Equality Now, the Global Fund for Women, and the Feminist Majority (which cared about Afghan women when nobody else did)? There are huge international-feminist issues that get quite a bit of attention -- sweatshop labor, sex trafficking, FGM, AIDS as a barometer of women's oppression, fundamentalism (Muslim and christian),dowry murders, the killings in Mexico. The only reason any of us even know about these things is because of mainstream feminism.
I haven't seen The Good Body, but the attitudes you describe seem way out of the mainstream of US feminism, more in line with the psychobabble-therapeutic-inner-child movement.

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December 5, 2004 4:04 PM

[0+] Kate said:

My issue with the play was more about the fact that every review I've read has hailed it as a remarkable feminist piece. I couldn't identify any feminist positions in the play, just Eve Ensler's annoying self-indulgent neuroses. Whether or not American feminism contemplates those in other nations is one question, but the idea that Ensler's views of women in other nations are equated with feminist views really irks me.
So Vagina Monologues was good. This one is not.

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December 5, 2004 4:17 PM

[0+] Amanda said:

There's nothing wrong with well-off white women expressing frustration at body image issues, but this just sounds really awful. I'm not surprised--Ensler herself gets on my nerves. The Vagina Monologues were best when characters who are not Ensler are talking.

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December 5, 2004 5:57 PM

[0+] Ari said:

See, when I saw the play I thought I was hearing my life story played out. I agree that it was problematic, but I don't think that the international women she viewed like that agreed. And also, her wistful wish for a parasite...I think it was meant to show how outrageously corrupt the American beauty standard is--I once thought that I wanted dysentary 'cause it makes you skinny. Even as I thought that I knew how fucked up it was, but still...

I dunno. Maybe I just have a different view of it, since I so closely identified with her specific brand of self-loathing.

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December 5, 2004 9:04 PM

[0+] Jessica said:

Perhaps I could have worded my argument better. I agree that US feminism has come a long way in terms of bringing attention to international women's issues.

What I do think is common however, is for certain American feminists to view Third World women as victims, without any agency. (i.e., they need US women to save them from their horrible, oppressed lives and they can't manage to help themselves...)

A great author who discusses this is Gayatri Spivak. (http://www.english.emory.edu/Bahri/Spivak.html)

And though I think American feminism has come a long way and is more cognizant of these issues, the public face of US feminism (who is heading up national women's orgs? who is getting news coverage?) is still very upper-middle class, white, and not necessarily indicative of feminists on the ground.

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December 5, 2004 11:06 PM

[0+] jessica wakeman said:

I agree that upper-middle-class women complaining about their bodies is really annoying and I've read a couple of other reviews (Google and ye shall find) saying that this new play is pretty bad.

I am in college and I have many friends and acquaintances who have various eating disorders. If I had to absolutely qualify women's experiences, I would say that American women - or at least the upper-middle class white women pursuing expensive higher education - are better off in many regards and the parasite comment is terrible.

However, I would like to think that the point Eve's play is that there is an entire mindset established within capitalism to make women feel bad about our bodies in order to sell us stuff. Which, as we all know, is a problem.

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December 6, 2004 8:13 AM

[0+] Kate said:

just to further the discussion, i just saw an ad for eve ensler's upcoming talk at barnes and noble -- the catch phrase: "from botox to burkas." is this problematic? or is is problematic to assume it is problematic?

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December 6, 2004 9:00 AM

[0+] Katha Pollitt said:

You know, when I write about female genital mutilation or the burka or other sign of extreme oppression of women in the third world, I sometimes get letters from African or Indian women (always academics) who say, well what about plastic surgery? What about high heels? what about the pressure on Western women to be thin? Sounds like Ensler AGREES with these women that the ways in which Western women are pressured to make their bodies conform to a sexist stereotype are comparable to the ways in which third world women are pressured.
I personally don't agree with this idea of equivalence, but it is actually a mainstream academic feminist idea. it just sounds different when it isn't a third world academic putting it forward to attack Western feminists, but a first-world playwright using it to dramatize her own problems.

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December 6, 2004 2:03 PM

[0+] ms. jared said:

aww drat. i'm sorry you didn't like it. i really, really enjoyed it. then again, i have a plethora of body image issues around my stomach especially and could totally relate.

i can understand your disappointment with it though. i didn't really focus on it the way you did and missed a lot of the things you bring up. i totally understand your points and they are completely valid. just goes to show how totally self-absorbed i am. now i feel like an ass!

xoxo, jared

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December 6, 2004 3:40 PM

[0+] Jessica said:

ms. jared--don't feel like an ass! i certainly can see how folks would like it--i think that kate made the point i was trying to make in a much more succinct (and less angry!) way: i'm not into the idea that many people would think that this is indicative of feminism. i think that if the PR surrounding the play was less about being all feminist and shit, i wouldn't have been so appalled.

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December 6, 2004 4:37 PM

[0+] flea said:

Embarrassingly, this is the first I've heard of her new play. Does Ensler herself refer to it as a "feminist play"? Because it seems that anything feminists do that gets media attention is referred to as feminist.

"Look at the feminist way she drank that coffee!"

"She walked that dog as only a feminist could!"

"You could tell she was a man-hater by the way she flushed that toilet!"

If she herself framed the piece as something to be viewed through a feminist lens, okay. But if not, maybe she *is* just writing a humorous look about her personal neuroses.

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December 6, 2004 5:08 PM

[0+] Amanda said:

It's such a fine line--I can see making dark jokes about the lengths women will go to for thinness--Absolutely Fabulous was great about that. But Ensler is so *earnest*, I can see how it would fall flat.

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December 7, 2004 4:46 AM

[0+] anon said:

I don't see how Eve is particularly 'racist' per se.

And she's not any more classist than some of the topics I've seen posted on feministing.

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December 8, 2004 11:50 PM

[0+] Liz said:

I find Eve Ensler quite annoying and she hardly if ever checks her privilege.

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December 13, 2004 4:24 PM

[0+] richard chilton said:

Folks who wish to have an insight into Ensler's problem with class may wish to review my paper on "The Kiraruta..." contrasting her work with that of Willa Cather (see url under "Trading Post" for info).

As the opening sentence of a developing article i'm thinking about, "The Play That Could Have Been," relates:

"No one believes more in the world-wide endeavors of Eve Ensler than we who worked with her a generation ago in our Chelsea, Manhattan neighborhood..."

Among the three of us from that era who saw an early preview of "The Good Body" we all agree that "Eve's ego got (continues to get) in the way;" both as theatric writing and performance, and as a focal point for community organizing this is a distraction from the important work and analysis that her V-Day organization - AND her art - could otherwise accomplish, in spite of the millions of dollars that HAS been given to GRASSROOTS organizations all over the world, AND the emphasis on how funds (minus 10%) raised from local (royalty-free) productions REMAINS in the community.

i applaude perspectives such as those that are being expressed both here and elsewhere regarding a critical assessment of Ensler's praxis.

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January 12, 2005 5:50 PM

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January 12, 2005 7:05 PM

[0+] hoodia said:

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January 21, 2005 7:08 PM

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