Date: Thu, 22 May 1997 23:33:21 -0400 (EDT)
From: malgosia askanas <ma-AT-panix.com>
Subject: Re:  Silence


Sig wrote:

> i don't know too many folk
> tales, but a common plot, i think, is the one of the woman who must suffer
> for a long time, and without any promise of relief, to be rewarded at the
> end for her perseverance (the prince shows up, the spell is broken, etc).
> in cases like those one might look at who is valuing that endurance and
> why. 

Actually, I would say that this plot is relatively gender-neutral; the
subject of the endurance test can be, with relatively equal frequency,
either man or woman.  In this respect, endurance test are different
from "conquest" tests, whose protagonists are usually men.  I have a feeling
that edurance tests in Occidental tales come from the idea of endurance 
as a specifically Christian virtue.  Silence is an interesting sub-topic
of this, because it is associated with so many things: the ability to keep 
a secret, and thus with hermetic knowledge; letting the voice of God speak
inside the soul; the ability to endure pain without complaining; self-mastery; 
and on. 


-m