[The 1990 book "Iron John: A Book About Men"] drew on myths, legends, poetry and science of a sort to make the case that American men had grown soft and feminized and needed to rediscover their primitive virtues of ferocity and audacity and thus regain the self-confidence to be nurturing fathers and mentors.... He held men-only seminars and weekend retreats, gatherings often in the woods with men around campfires thumping drums, making masks, hugging, dancing and reading poetry aloud.
He said his “mythopoetic men’s movement” was not intended to turn men against women. But many women called it a put-down, an atavistic reaction to the feminist movement. Cartoonists and talk-show hosts ridiculed it, dismissing it as tree-hugging self-indulgence by middle-class baby boomers. Mr. Bly, a shambling white-haired guru who strummed a bouzouki and wore colorful vests, was easily mocked as Iron John himself, a hairy wild man who, in the German myth, helped aimless princes in their quests....
Click my "Robert Bly" tag. I've written about him quite a few times, most recently 3 weeks ago, with "This is, perhaps, the freakiest coincidence in all my years of blogging."
And I wrote about him in my second year of blogging, 2005: "Remember the men's movement?"
There's this from a post in 2010: "And what are the burdens of manliness? Ironically — ironjohnically — men are made to feel unmanly for developing their set of grievances and whining and moaning about the unfairness of it."
Posts
12 comments:
"men are made to feel unmanly for developing their set of grievances and whining and moaning about the unfairness of it."
Well, it is unmanly. Manliness is walking through the shit thrown at us on stilts.
Said it before and I'll say it again and again: Iron John helped me break out of the man-child life I lived the first 30 years on this planet. The other men I met at those retreats and gatherings helped me find the masculine strength to be bold, take risks, and free myself from 'safety' mindset. They also showed me that real men protect women, not just use them as semen receptacles.
Mock all you want. Bly made a huge difference in my life.
Unfortunately the works of a very fine American poet are ignored so we can have a chat about a book encouraging masculinity. RIP Robert Bly.
I had "Silence in the Snowy Fields," Robert Bly's first book of poems (1962), when I was in college. I liked it but now I can't remember a single line except "silence in the snowy fields." Bly had the feeling of driving around in America or just being here, down cold. But it didn't go anywhere, just like driving around. Bob Dylan came along and had the same sort of tones at first and drew me away like a Pied Piper. Time to do something.
I was indifferent to Robert Bly and his "men's movement." Never read any of his books. But I did watch his PBS "A Gathering Of Men" special way back when and I liked it. I loved the poignant Antonio Machado poem that he recited and I loved the way he recited it. I liked the weird way he talked. I liked his weird vest. I never much thought about it but I guess I liked him.
https://youtu.be/TP3HWLIL1Aw?t=346
Getting together with men on a retreat seems like a cool idea. And i Like the idea of banging drums, singing and chanting, and maybe some poetry. But without guns for target practice, barbeque, and fine whiskey its seems like a waste of time.
The idea that the movement was anti-woman was common in the Nineties but seems ridiculous now. What was it but the guys' version of women's covens, drum circles, sewing circles, and reading groups, an adult men's version of scouting? It all seems quite harmless now, not to say useless.
It was clever of Bly to figure out a way for a poet to make headlines, though.
Masculinism is a gender ideology.
That said, most people... persons acknowledge that men and women are equal in rights and complementary in Nature/nature.
In a world without men, women would be living as gatherers in mud huts.
Toxic masculinity, indeed...
I knew him from his translation of Knut Hamsun's Hunger, which I read before learning Norwegian.
I've done some work translating legal documents from Norwegian to English. That can get fairly complicated, but nothing compared to translating quality literature.
Interesting, but predictable, that an anti-war poet would be remembered (by the NYT, anyway) mostly as a member of the men's movement.
Susan Faludi had great sport with Iron John. As it was pro-men, naturally it was anti-women; all of Backlash was like that. She did, IIRC, manage to infiltrate (or get someone else to infiltrate, I think -- men do have their uses!) one of Bly's men's retreats, and the guy crawled up behind another guy and sniffed his butt, prompting what was the funniest line I had ever heard in my life at that point: "'Woof,' he said."
I wonder what ever happened to Faludi, btw. Naomi Wolf, who came to fruition (OK, I will probably regret saying that) around the same time, is still in the public consciousness, but she isn't. I wonder what she would make of things like Biden's child credits. Back in the day, that was a Republican proposal, so naturally she opposed it. "The more children, the more credits." Now that it's a Dem thing, does the math change?
If you're worried about your masculinity, you should be.
Post a Comment