Title: Never Marry a Woman with Big Feet: Women in Proverbs from Around the World Author: Minike Schipper Publisher: Yale University Press Publish Date: 2004 Pages: 350 Genres:: Gender Studies,Reviewer: SexHerald Staff

Rating:

Reading the rich source of anti-female scorn in this book prompted me to come up with my own proverb: “Frightened men have but one refuge from their fears: The ability to compose stinging insults against women.” Never Marry A Woman With Big Feet shows how women across the world are vilified, scorned, loved and lashed by the spoken and written word. These saws cut.

This book is a remarkable study of sayings around the world concerning women and how local mythology shaped them. Whether pertaining to their marital status, intelligence, comeliness or lack thereof from countries as divergent as China and Rwanda, the similarity of observations is testament to the collective ambivalence of the male of the human species when it comes to women. There are so many misogynistic sayings here you’ll feel like you have box seats at a witch trial. Literally too, i.e. “When a witch is burnt, peace returns to the country“ courtesy of Germany. “Is one veil sufficient to cover a woman’s wickedness?” whiningly laments a Tamil proverb. The Sumerians weighed in with “A woman’s sword will never rust,” referring to the sharpness of the tongue.

Next stop Hungary, the country of origin for “An unmarried woman is like an undelivered letter.” Whether of Arabic, Chinese or Latino origin, these sayings are particularly candid, often cruel and often brutal. Interestingly, there is a thread of great respect for older women whose sexual beauty has sufficiently faded so as not to be such a source of fear and discomfort for men. You’ll also find laughable contradictions and discrepancies here. Proverbs lambaste women as stupid and useless, yet if so how can they be perceived as such a threat? One of the few exceptions to this comes from Bangladesh phrased as “A good husband makes a good wife,” and “A strong man hugs his wife, a weak one hits her.”

On the positive side, much as beauty is valued in cultures around the world, it is happily acknowledged that this virtue alone does not make up for lack of others. An example of this is the Swahili proverb, “A woman’s beauty is not in her face.” The joys of a woman with a high sexual desire level even if she is not lovely of form is trumpeted in the Japanese proverb, “When an ugly woman has great passion, who should say thank you?” The sadness of weary experience and black humor darkly color another biting rebuke, but this time it’s one for the girls—“Your husband, cherish him as your best friend, but distrust him as your worst enemy.”

Mineke Schipper’s book is a stunning analysis and cross-section of how women are perceived around the world.