Eyes wide with admiration
Love is given to you
love is sought from you
You see it coming
you catch him stealing peeks, averting her gaze
you make her nervous, you see the signs of self-consciousness
(were those your eyes I felt looking at me
in the distant night?)
You don't see it coming
he's hidden his feelings
he finally declares himself
or you suddenly put two and two together
A girl who simply lives
unselfconsciously and vivaciously
becomes thereby attractive
and valuable to men
(and in their quest to consume her value
they make her self-conscious
and defensive)
No art I used men's love to draw,
I lived but by my being's law...
Michael Field (xx 1846-1914) [ELP]
Let not my beauty's fire
Enflame unstaid desire,
Nor pierce any bright eye
That wand'reth lightly.
George Peele (xx 1556?-96?) "Bethsabe Bathing" (1594)
She's picked you
And taking the acacia flower which she had in her mouth, she tossed it at me with her thumb, and it hit me right between my two eyes. Sir, that had an effect on me as if a bullet had hit me...
Prosper Merimee "Carmen"
Men who do not make advances to women are apt to become victims [of] women who make advances to them.
Walter Bagehot (England 1826-77)
You're flattered, it's nice to feel needed
(it's nice to know you still got the old touch...!)
It was the first time Emma had ever heard such things said to her, and her pride, like someone relaxing in a steam bath, stretched languidly and thoroughly in the warmth of his words.
Flaubert [MB 135]
She was overwhelmed with rapture. Her heart was full to the brim with happiness. She had never expected that this declaration of love would have made so strong an impression on her.
Tolstoy (Anna Karenin 63)
"I love men finding me beautiful and being excited by me..."
Anon. "Women and Love"
Demonstrations of love are never altogether displeasing to women, and the most disdainful, in spite of all their coyness, reserve a little complaisance in their hearts for their admirers.
Miguel de Cervantes Don Quixote (Spanish 1547-1616)
...Anna was intoxicated with the wine of admiration she had aroused.
Tolstoy (Anna Karenin 95)
...those eyes clothe me with a shining crystallization; to them I am perfection itself; and best of all, whatever I do, whatever stupidity I happen to utter, I shall not cease to be perfect in the eyes of my handsome German...
Stendhal (288)
She draws your picture
"All I could think was: is that me? Because, honestly, it didn't resemble me at all. But the more I stared at it, the more I saw that it did. It was as though I was seeing into my face for the first time."
Ralph Pape "Soap Opera"
You can't believe your luck
"When someone tells you, over and over, that he loves you, that you're the most precious thing in his whole life, you lay awake at night beside him, crying, trying to find within yourself the qualities that he seems able to see so clearly, and at last you see them, too."
Ralph Pape "Soap Opera"
Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.
Shakespeare "Twelfth Night"
You feel it's your right, your due
you feel so cool and in control
(power-trip in non-commitment)
(his ego trip at being sought turns her off
the lip curl of egotism)
You find you can express things to her more clearly and easily than ever before
(You imagine you're being courted when you're not)
a man getting praise from an attractive woman assumes too much
you hope it will make you more desirable
to another that you really want
(I'm... not your stepping stone!-- Mike Nesmith*)
you show off the loveletters she's sent you
"Johnny couldn't believe that I had ever considered myself unattractive to men, and for the first time in my life, I couldn't either. And right about then, other guys started to pay attention to me at the office."
Pape "Soap Opera"
[My mother] and my sister would label my sister's suitors: one or two had family, one had money, one-- a poor boy-- had a brilliant future, and there were a few docile, sweet ones who were simply fillers, who represented the additional number of dates that raised my sister to the rank of a very popular girl.
Brodkey "First Love and Other Sorrows"
Maybe you can make a neat profit off this?
...of all the winds that blow on love, none is so chilling and destructive as a request for money.
Flaubert [MB 269]
Or you flinch and run
(doesn't he realize how impossible it is?)
look out! there's stars in her eyes!
"I love you": three hammer strokes driving in one long nail
Ma! He's makin eyes at me!
xxx xxxx
[His thought-balloon:] She is obviously stunned by my devastating love-vibe.
[Her thought-balloon:] In thirty seconds, I will walk slowly to the phone and call the police!
Peter Hannan "The Adventures of a Big Mouth"
Chicago Reader 9-4-87
(You were good friends
but now he's asking for something more
too much, too close
wudja hafta go'n do that for?
Her come-on reeks of ego
he thinks he's more attractive than he really is
pickup lines
[Hite, She's Gotta Have It, stock character in movies]
You work too hard to take this abuse
Be on your guard, jerks on the loose!
The Roches
You dread his demands
(you, beseecher, have abandoned your heart
like a baby on my doorstep
it lies there throbbing, wailing
soft and pink
vulnerable and weak)
You were flattered
you give a little back
but as soon as she starts to get to know ya
she finds out you're not at all what she thought you was...
Weighing
Wondering if you can do better
pretty girl, hit on often, defenses, don't let it get started
he's smaller than your eye
his attentions embarrass you, you don't want your friends to see
"I shall not read this letter of which I have seen only the signature; I shall burn it."
Stendhal (305)
We might make mistakes and choose wrong. Unhappiness was real. It was even likely.
Brodkey "First Love"
The great man chooses you
you're scared, why me?
[Priscilla & Elvis]
[Flight from the Enchanter]
...no woman ever fell in love with Napoleon, the master of the world. They all felt restless, out of sorts, and ill at ease near him...
Ortega (131) (but see below)
Try to be polite, not interested
or string along, cock-tease
encourage-discourage, return warm smile
disillusioning his angel effect
shall I let on that I'm married?
(right away? or wait a bit and see what develops?)
getting carried away
...Should we beware
Of handling such intemperate shaggy creatures
As leap on us like dogs to be cosseted
And, after, claim full rights of jealousy?
Robert Graves "Those Who Came Short"
Women of pride... think themselves fortresses besieged by their lovers...
Stendhal (89) "Concerning Feminine Pride"
"And am I to blame? Have I done anything wrong? People say I'm just flirting with him, but I know that I don't love him. All the same I enjoy being with him and he's so nice..."
Kitty in Tolstoy [Anna Karenin 48]
She half consents, who silently denies.
Ovid
Actions of women, by affection led,
Must backward, like the sacred tongue, be read.
William Hammond (n.dd.) "The Dying Lover" (1655) [A2]
To say why gals act so or so,
Or don't, 'ould be persumin';
Mebby to mean yes an' say no
Comes nateral to women.
James Russell Lowell "The Courtin'"
She gives you a signal and you just don't feel like responding
later you regret your coolness
Are you ready? are you vulnerable?
(is this your fertile period?)
Too many choices
The young wolves snarl,
They snap at one another
Under the moon.
'Beasts, be reasonable,
My beauty is my own!'
Robert Graves "Lyceia"
"To you men, who are free to choose whom you like, it's always clear when you love. But a girl in a state of suspense... may and sometimes does feel that she does not know what to say. ...she can only answer yes or no."
Tolstoy (Anna Karenin 278)
He tries to steal a kiss
[jackal-nipple story]
sneaking into bond
[Siberian touch-pudenda tribe]
Love as a battle, as a game
man wants woman to surrender
woman wants man to stand and fight
[sociobiology]
There exists... a pre-established harmony between woman and man; for the former, living means surrender, for the latter, living means taking possession...
Ortega (172)
For women, frankness is like going out unclothed.
Stendhal (88)
Love doubted
Ah, ah the falce fatall tale I read,
when my hart Heedless and unwise
first studied & falce Comented,
on th'unknowne texte of thy lov'de Eyes...
17th C. lyric (8) (a woman speaking)
In such a night
Did young Lorenzo swear he lov'd her well,
Stealing her soul with many vows of faith,
And n'er a true one.
W. Shakespeare (111) "The Merchant of Venice"
Women have been given an [impressive*] sensitivity to the nuances of affection, the most imperceptible variations of the human heart, the lightest movements of self-love.
Stendhal (81)
(S. continues: ".. that we men have not...")
Love, love, love-- all the wretched cant of it, masking egotism, lust, masochism, fantasy under a mythology of sentimental postures.
Germaine Greer (xx b:1939) "The Female Eunuch" (1971)
Perhaps women... imagine that their lovers in trying to win them are seeking to satisfy a point of vanity.
Stendhal (96) ("...a mean and petty idea, this, that a
passionate man should plunge from lightheartedness into
a series of situations where he makes a fool of himself,
and yet have the time to think about points of vanity!")
Some lads there are, 'tis shame to say,
That only court to thieve,
And once they bear the bloom away
'Tis little enough they leave.
A.E. Housman (England 1859-1936)
"Oh See How Thick the Goldcup Flowers" [Cole]
There's a catch, a pricetag
he's not giving, he's trying to trade foolsgold
she wants something you've got
loves me cause I'm famous
golddigger
If I were a carpenter
And you were a lady
Would you marry me anyway
Would you have my baby?
Tim Hardin
(Too much doubt may be self-fulfilling?)
It's just tomcat lust, heavy breathing
falling in lust
[the face of lust]
you bring out the animal in him
(the two of you are alone together
and you feel his breathing slow,
his imagination reaching out and ravishing you)
he's on a power trip, bigger and stronger,
there's no one to protect you
sexual attraction-- chakras
peacefulness shattered by a sexual flash
chastity, purity, discipline, balance
O rare! I caught a sight of the inwards of his garment, and took the flame.
Plato "Charmides" (so much for Platonic love!)
In the great majority of cases [of physical attraction], sexuality is supported and complicated by germs of sentimental ardor, of admiration for physical beauty, sympathy, etc.
Ortega (39)
The red-eyed elders watching, felt
the basses of their beings throb
In witching chords, and their thin blood
Pulse pizzicati of Hosanna.
Wallace Stevens "Peter Quince"
She's trying to seduce you, hypnotise you
another notch in his belt
hit and run, seeing how far he can get
no commitment
...in general men thought very little of seducing a girl.
Tolstoy [Anna Karenin 60]
...if [Vronsky] could have put himself in her family's place and learned that Kitty would be unhappy if he did not marry her, he would have been greatly surprised and would not have believed it. He could not possibly have believed that what gave such great and genuine pleasure to him, and above all, to her, could be wrong.
Tolstoy [Anna Karenin 72]
...the charm of the seduction and the need to protect herself from it...
Flaubert [MB 204]
Standing above lust, diverting your attention
(nudist colony principle)
standing firm
saying no
many men see friendliness as invitation
sex as conquering territory
hit and run, one-night stand
tough and cool to dump a girl
3/4 of all Hite respondents had given sex on the first date
(and the next day he doesn't even call)
I feel so cheap, I gave too easily
Girls liked him, and escaped easily from his clumsy longing.
Brodkey "First Love"
...only good-looking girls could afford to be good...
Brodkey "First Love"
"I think the sexual revolution which has freed women to have casual sex has also freed them from the option of not having casual sex."
Anon "Women and Love"
Love tested-- commitment deferred
one year of mate testing in bond-for-life species
the mute swan
the beaver (fighting off his advances)
"I make him wait"
(no sex by the third date... he takes off)
A long siege humiliates a man, but glorifies a woman.
Stendhal (56)
Success too easily won soon strips love of its charm; obstacles enhance its value.
12th C. Code of Love
I can live only wholly with you or not at all-- yes, I am resolved to wander so long away from you until I can fly to your arms and say that I am really at home...
Beethoven
Undoubtedly those two years of unhappiness proved that the passion was true, and they would have engendered it if it had not existed so strongly in the first place.
Stendhal (167)
Arguing love
'Canzonet'
See, see, mine own sweet jewel,
See what I have here for my darling:
A robin-redbreast and a starling.
These I give both, in hope to move thee--
And yet thou say'st I do not love thee.
Anon. in Morley's Canzonets (1593) [Ault1]
Doubt that the stars are fire;
Doubt that the sea doth move;
Doubt truth to be a liar;
But never doubt I love.
W. Shakespeare "Hamlet"
Look in my eyes; my love is written there.
Ru:ckert (xx ) "Love Doth to Her Eyes Repair"
(tr. by James Freeman Clarke) [OOTH]
Demonstrating love
"I shall jump out of the car."
Murdoch (Black Prince 315)
Trying to talk her out of it
telling her your faults
[He:] "...you'll get my 'flu or whatever it is."
[She:] "I want your 'flu. I want you. I love you, viruses and all."
Murdoch [Word Child ]
I am a lamp, a lamp that is out,
I am a shallow stream,
In it are neither pearls nor trout,
Nor one of the things that you dream.
Frances Cornford (xx 1886-1960) "She Warns Him"
Assisting courtship
So when [Monsieur Rouault] noticed that Charles' cheeks turned red in his daughter's presence, which meant that one of these days he would ask for her hand, he pondered the whole matter in advance...
Flaubert [MB 20]