A well meaning friend sent this to dd- I have to share it or murder someone! And why should I suffer alone?

[Hakluyt]

She's 19, and dealing with a collapsing relationship. An honorary uncle sent her this as a consoling message. Fortunately it fuelled her feminism, and she won't see him for a while, so his testicles will remain intact! But the thought of people thinking this sort of thing, offensive on so many levels is OK just make me despairing. So I want you all to despair as well.

How would that message cheer anyone up? If there was a sexual relationship it's saying you were dumped because you were easy.

Exactly. Probably he does not imagine it was a sexual relationship at all, he imagines she was a 'good girl' dumped because she would not cave in to provide sex the boy demanded.

Dad you have never been emotional abused by a partner I would guess. When you have been made to feel like a microbe with no right to breathe... picking yourself up from there may involve drinking lots of wine. And if friends gave you messages that you are better than that you are not going to look at them in the same way as people on here are making out. But its okay I am sure thousands of women don't need any support to get through being abused.

I recon I'm an apple that dropped of rotten and got pressed in to cider, I'm all the more interesting for it, next stage caldvados.

I imagine his motive for choosing it was to say, 'You deserve better.'

It may be awful and clumsy, but it was undoubtably sent out of love and concern for somebody he cares about.

Sausage in terms of support it's not a choice between this passage or nothing is it?

The problem is that however well-meaning this isn't a passage that says that you didn't deserve the abuse you suffered. It is saying that either you are easy pickings (and so deserved the poor treatment) or that you should be grateful that a man (any man) made the effort to reach your amazingness, because there won't be many other men who will do that. It's not actually a passage about women who have experienced abuse - it's about women who "can't catch a man"

"You think men don't like you but they do - they're just lazy and end up with slaggy women. (You're obviously not a slaggy woman). Don't be a slag, someone will notice you eventually."

Ah I feel much better now.

"Oh, bollocks is it Sappho. " I lurve FWR

Must correct my autocorrect one of these days.

I'm feeling much more favourable towards mine since it corrected manly to manky.

Ewww

The Sappho is generally read as being intended to console a woman who hadn't found a husband yet, by saying that the apples that are chosen last can be the best.

There is nothing in the Sappho to suggest that. Nor have I ever noticed scholars agreeing on a 'general reading' of any poem, let alone Sappho's.

Sappho isn't, by the way, generally read as being wildly concerned about women finding husbands.

There are images of fruit being out of reach, and apples on trees, in pretty much every Western literary tradition I know of. I bet they're in others, too. This is because it is an extremely commonplace image for an agrarian society.

It is not because women are inherently like ripe/rotten fruit.

Stuff that, I got married young (and as a colleague said - oh its the ugly girly who get married early - charming!).

The apple thing is twee, cutesy, and I admit that I did laugh at the 'easy' apple bit. I can imagine it embroidered on a quilt or a cushion by an elderly auntie.

I still feel sorry for honorary (wonder if he still is) uncle - in my minds eye he is standing in Hallmark, pondering the 'cheer up, duck' cards and spying this one and thinking 'ta-dah! girls will like this!'.

"Sappho isn't, by the way, generally read as being wildly concerned about women finding husbands."

I'm being slightly mean.

It's just ... they're fragments, they're incredibly hard to interpret, and they'd be hard to interpret even if we had the full things, preserved in a nice papyrus book with a title and introductory 'here is wot I mean when I wrote them' essay by Sappho herself.

I remember reading a passage by Louisa M Alcott about a. gentle patient man waiting for a hurt, heart sore woman to be ready for him- I wonder where it is whether it's appalling too.

As an aside, I just can't imagine reading the apple tree thing and laughing- there seems nothing funny about it at all........

It's funny because it is so trite and cheesy - who can take it seriously? Cant you imagine reading it out loud without laughing?

But it's not trite and cheesy- it's horrible!

I can't see it? No link - has the image timed out or what?

I can't see it either :s

A voter plaisir..........

Omg .. That is all

I just blogged about this. I know MNHQ don't like people randomly posting their blogs out of the blog topic, so if you find it arrogant or annoying, report and they'll zap this post. readingmedievalbooks.wordpress.com/2015/04/08/delicious-rottenness-women-sex-and-apples/

Oh, and it's in response to this one, which I can post cos it's not mine.

quiteirregular.wordpress.com/2015/04/08/eleven-ways-of-looking-at-a-sexist-apple-tree/

Oh, how interesting. The contrast between the modern and medieval versions is very thought-provoking. Great blogs (both).

OK, I popped back onto the thread and now I can see the tree in your OP as well as the re-post. Confused cos I'm not on a phone or really slow PC.

Thanks anyway, and now I can see why you felt murderous. Sometimes I'm awfully glad I didn't have daughters.