Montherlant’s myth of woman equates femininity with immanence and harm to men

Evidence

Woman is night, disorder, and immanence. “These convulsive shadows are nothing more than ‘the feminine in its pure state,’ ” he writes about Mme Tolstoy. The stupidity and baseness of men today, he thinks, give a positive image of feminine deficiencies: the feminine instinct, feminine intuition, and women’s clairvoyance are spoken about, while their absence of logic, stubborn ignorance, and inability to grasp the real should be denounced; they are neither good observers nor psychologists; they neither know how to see things nor understand human beings; their mystery is a trap, their unfathomable treasures have the depth of nothingness; they have nothing to give man and can only harm him. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 454

Categorization

• DEFINE: Concretely instantiates Beauvoir’s immanence/transcendence apparatus in Montherlant’s mythology of woman as night and disorder.
• XREF: Directly relevant to the reader’s existing ‘Complaints About Immodesty’ article - same pattern of male projection onto the feminine. — connects to: Montherlant’s misogyny stems from measuring the distance between male transcendence and female immanence; Mythic thinking declares women wrong when their reality contradicts the myth — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 652; Montherlant redefined woman as a lack of virility and condemned autonomous women — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 461 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Montherlant’s misogyny stems from measuring the distance between male transcendence and female immanence #corroborates (0.95)
• Montherlant redefined woman as a lack of virility and condemned autonomous women #corroborates (0.92) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 461
• Mythic thinking declares women wrong when their reality contradicts the myth #expands (0.80) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 652
• Femininity is an artificial, inculcated product rather than a natural instinct #expands (0.75) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1037