#113: Women Talking by Miriam Toews
Source Material, Vol. 13
Note: Today’s subject matter deals with sexual assault, a topic which is understandably uncomfortable for some readers. I tried to be sensitive but wanted to provide the warning up front.
Hello readers,
The Oscars were last Sunday and my favorite award was best adapted screenplay, which went to Sarah Polley for Women Talking. I jumped up and whooped as if my sports team had scored the game winner.
I loved this part of her speech:
Miriam Toews wrote an essential novel about a radical act of democracy in which people who don’t agree on every single issue manage to sit together in a room and carve out a way forward together free of violence. They do so not just by talking but also by listening.
Carve out a way forward, free of violence, by talking and listening. Let’s take a closer look at how the characters of Women Talking achieved this.
Background on the book and film
Women Talking is a work of fiction that takes place in a fictional Mennonite colony called Molotschna, but it was written in response to real events. Canadian author Miriam Toews (rhymes with “saves”) grew up in a town founded by Mennonites in the province of Manitoba.1 When she heard about the "ghost rapes" that took place in a small Mennonite community in Bolivia between 2005 and 2009, she knew she had to write about it.
The true story is a horrific tale of men incapacitating women at night and sexually assaulting them.2 Rather than focus her novel on describing the crimes, Toews chose to dramatize a discussion between the victims as they decide what to do. The main characters are eight women representing three generations in two close families. They have 48 hours to make a decision. They gather in a hayloft and invite schoolteacher August Epp to take minutes of the meeting.3
Producers Frances McDormand and Dede Gardner acquired the rights for the film after reading the book. Sarah Polley also read the book and wanted to write the script but had to be convinced to take on the directing job due to family commitments. I don't have space for it here, but the full story is really cool.4 I'll never stop being amazed by what can result from the acts of reading and writing.
My reading and watching experience
When I picked up the book, I became instantly invested in the dilemma. It reminded me of the proverbial Gordian Knot, which represents a problem so intricate it can only be solved with a bold stroke. But the women don’t have a bold stroke at their disposal and must tug at the strings to see what will yield — by talking.
The reading experience was like watching a large, tangled knot of my mother’s knitting yarn unravel. That may not be satisfying to some, but it was to me!
The movie brings the characters to life. It has moments of anger and laughter and a stirring rendition of one of my favorite hymns Nearer, My God, To Thee. The script maintains much of the dialogue but omits one of my favorite parts of the book. It happens near the end so I’m putting in a spoiler warning.
*Spoilers Ahead*
Untangling the Gordian Knot of oppressive religious patriarchy without the sword of violence
The women in the story are living in an oppressive religious patriarchy (the knot) and have been their entire lives.5 They were not taught to read and write but are taught, by the men, that the Bible exhorts women to obey and submit to their husbands. They are taught to forgive anytime they are wronged and that failure to do so means losing their place in the kingdom of heaven.
The extreme acts of violence committed against them present a conflict: Should they stay in the colony and forgive the assailants, thus ensuring their place in the kingdom of heaven? Or in an act of disobedience, should they fight back or leave, thus losing their eternal salvation?
In these circumstances, guilt and shame have been used to establish and maintain power. They are powerless in the colony and decide that the only way to protect their children and maintain their faith is to leave and establish a new colony, free of the oppressive structure. But what of the Biblical exhortation that women obey and submit to their husbands? If they leave the men, won’t they feel guilty for their disobedience?
They conclude that disobedient is a word the men of the colony might use to describe their leaving, but not God. God would define their leaving as “a time for love, a time for peace” to quote Ecclesiastes. The women clap, smile, and are radiant at this revelation. August realizes perhaps it is the first time the women have interpreted the word of God for themselves. It’s a glorious moment.
They make an important distinction between how they might feel and the truth:
We will feel anguish and we will feel sorrow and we will feel uncertainty and we will feel sadness, but not guilt, says Agata.
Mariche amends: We may feel guilty but we will know we are not guilty.
It will not be easy. They will feel their feelings. But feeling guilty doesn’t always mean being guilty. I needed to hear that too.
The knot untangles.
Final thoughts
I’m glad I read this book and found the film additive to my overall experience. If only more problems could be solved by women talking.
Thanks for reading,
Kyle
Here is a detailed article on Vice if you want the full background: The Ghost Rapes of Bolivia (vice.com)
The novel is presented as August’s minutes and I almost didn’t read it due to negative reviews on Goodreads. When I dug into the criticisms, they were mostly the same: “Why is this written from the man’s perspective? Isn’t he an unreliable narrator?” I strongly side with Sarah Polley on this topic, who said in the Scriptnotes interview below (time stamp 21:00): “I chafed at some of the criticism [of the book, which was] ‘why would you have a male narrator?’ I found [that criticism] so boring and beside the point. Actually, it’s also about men listening and taking notes and there is such a thing as a useful presence in the room when someone knows how to be a good ally. There was something about it that just felt so one dimensional about the criticism.”
For more background, check out this incredible Scriptnotes interview with Sarah Polley, time stamp 6:00.
While the women are Mennonite in the book, Polley made the decision to not mention what religious sect the women belonged to or even where they were in the world.
I just read the entire Scriptnotes interview with Polley. Even if readers don't have much interest in her film, the interview will be interesting if you have any interest in movies, which would presumably be the case here. The stuff about child actors is troubling: "as a society we have decided children should not work, but we’ve made this exception for this Wild West of an industry that’s probably the last place that should be given this exception".
The one surprise is that the interviewer was not familiar with Marilynne Robinson's Gilead. An earlier novel of hers, Housekeeping, was made into a terrific film by Bill Forsyth. Her name should have rung a bell at least.
Limiting the setting to focus on the talk, that can be an effective approach, and I’m reminded of everything from Godot to Spike Lee’s Get on the Bus (where the story takes place on a bus heading across the country to the Million Man March).
It’s also interesting to contrast the resistance to revenge in this story with a story where revenge for violence against women is readily embraced by just about everyone, Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven.