First Dialogue Questions 1 and 2

First Dialogue Questions 1 and 2

by Raina Patterson -
Number of replies: 0
  1. What is the scenario described in your dialogue (i.e. which number is it, and who is in love with whom?)

Dialogue number 1. The scenario is a middle class man is in love with a woman of the same class, though the man refers to her as possessing nobility, or being noble multiple times throughout the dialogue. The woman repeatedly rejects the man's flattery, first asserting that if her character is as noble as he claims then she should not be with him on account that there would be a difference in status between them. The man attempts to further persuade her by differentiating nobility of birth versus nobility of character. The woman in this scenario responds by pointing out a discrepancy in their ages, her being young and “shudder(ing) at the thought of receiving solaces from old men” (39). The man tries to resolve this issue by arguing that it is not his fault that he is so much older than her and his age demonstrates no correlation with his “good deeds”. The woman then alleges that the man must not understand love and she does not wish to labor and teach him its ways. After this back and forth a few times, she ultimately asserts that he will have to do a great deal of work before "getting what he wants", leaving this scenario open-ended. This dialogue largely consists of the man attempting to convince the woman to love him, and the woman laying out reasons that she shouldn’t. 

 

  1. How do gender dynamics come into play?

Reading some of the summaries of the other dialogues, this one is similar in that it places the man in a position of pursuer while the woman is the pursued. While she might ultimately have the “say” in the establishment or lack thereof of a relationship, there is a sense that she is an object to be sought after–leaving her to accept or reject rather than putting her in a position of real authority or autonomy. So there is a tension there between the woman in this dialogue having some amount of power, while ultimately being in a position of recipient rather than agent in the scenario.