Bly and Woodman Discuss Gender Consciousness, Promote New Book

Masculine and feminine forces collided in a philosophical battle of the sexes, as National Book Award-winning poet Robert Bly '50 and Jungian analyst and author Marion Woodman discussed their new jointly-authored book, The Maiden King: The Reunion of Masculine and Feminine, Tuesday night.

Bly's 1990 book, Iron John, a literary exploration of masculinity, garnered critical acclaim and topped The New York Times bestseller list. Bly has since been widely credited with spearheading the men's movement.

Woodman has received praise for bringing the idea of the feminine consciousness to light through her books and other work.

Woodman said she hoped to address during the discussion session the "increasingly urgent need for proper balance between the masculine and feminine."

An eclectic crowd of about 200 students, Harvard colleagues and literature aficionados gathered in the Graduate School of Education's Askwith Lecture Hall for the event.

Despite a dearth of undergraduates, the hall was filled nearly to capacity, and latecomers stood at the rear of the room or knelt on the floor.

Bly and Woodman focused on the Russian folk tale at the heart of their text, the ancient myth of "The Maiden Tsar," during their joint lecture.

The story became a point of departure for their discussion of the power struggle between masculine and feminine consciousness.

Bly began by talking about the roots and traditions of the story.

"There were great philosophers before Jung and Freud but they couldn't put it down in books because there were no books," Bly said. "So they had to invent a story so superb in its detail that it's remembered for 2,000 or 3,000 years."

In its psychological details, Bly said, the tale is "an initiation into feminine for men and women."

However, he corrected himself immediately. "No, initiation's too weak a word. It's an immersion."

Woodman tackled the various representations of the feminine consciousness in the story.

She spoke about "crone energy," the energy of a woman "literally being crowned by her own wisdom."

She also presented a conception of feminine virginity, "virginity in the old sense, like virgin woods that have not been trampled on but are full of all the possibilities of life."

The two writers also emphasized the role of the "false tutor" in the story, a teacher who betrays the young protagonist, Ivan, and consequently gets his head chopped off.

"Have you cut off the head of your false tutor, or are you still here at Harvard?" Bly cracked, provoking laughs from the crowd.

The lecture was followed by a question and answer period.

Asked to explain the pair's prior statement that "men must learn to work with matter," Woodman explained that American culture breeds materialism, addiction and the "horizontal life" demand for instant gratification.

The remedy, she said, is in "recognizing the wisdom that can come through the orifices of our bodies; senses, then, become our experiences of living."

Bly echoed the sentiment, stressing examples from everyday life of the need for direct sensory experience.

"They're talking about taking away recess for the kids," he said. "There are some already who don't want to go to recess, who stay with the computer until their teacher takes them away."

"There's a great crisis of people moving away from their bodies at tremendous speed," he said.

But Woodman's optimism for humanity resounded throughout the evening.

"Feminine is the energy that can save the planet," she said. "I have a great feeling that there's something from the other side. She's going to make herself known."

Woodman continued, "Many of us, through our addictions, are being forced to surrender, and out of that comes the new masculinity."

One audience member said she saw the potential for harm in differentiating masculine and feminine.

"Male-female is a code that does more damage than good," she said.

Bly responded half-jokingly that perhaps he and Woodman should use the terms "yin and yang" from now on. "But to deny that there are two energies is another matter," he said.

Bly and Woodman remained in the hall after the discussion session to sign copies of the book.

The event was one in an ongoing series of educational lectures sponsored by the Askwith Education Forum and Wordsworth Books.