Sono molto contenta di aver pescato questo libro da un cesto di libri a poco prezzo su di una bancarella. L'ho guardato, mi ha guardata e mi gridava 'comprami' 'leggimi' ed è stato più forte di me a tal punto che sono ritornata indietro per comprarlo. Scavalcando una pila di libri da leggere, questo testo mi ha completamente rapita sin dalle prime pagine perché con mia grande meraviglia è un libro scritto da una donna negli anni settanta eppure parla di numerosi argomenti con una disinvoltura unica a volte spudorata e sfacciata, arrogante ma impossibile non volere bene alla Nostra Isadora, che vive come tutte le donne la sua vita immersa in una cosa che prima o poi tutte noi viviamo o ci cuciono addosso : i Sensi di colpa.
Credo che questo libro dovrebbe essere letto da tutte le donne e dagli uomini per rendersi conto a volte di quanto sono airidi di sentimenti, inadatti all'amore che le donne possono donare.
In questo libro però, si affronta un tema delicato, uno dei tanti e mi sento in dovere a tutte le donne di dare un consiglio: Se incappate nel tipo freddo e distaccato e voi siete persone emotive e piene di amore Non perdete il vostro tempo e tagliate i ponti così vi evitate una sofferenza inutile per chi per voi non verserà nemmeno una lacrima. Quindi perché sprecare le vostre? Voletevi bene donne!

I remember that when I called my grandmother to tell her that I was going to be in the vagina monologues, I expected her to react to the name: I expected her to be unaware of Eve Ensler and what V-Day is about. She simply said, "You should read Fear of Flying- it's like the first vagina monologue."

As it happens, she was so right. It's the kind of book you really regret not reading years earlier, when you really needed some of this information. If I'd read it as a teenager, would I have felt so conspicuous about my own, relatively mild but rather interesting sexual misadventures? And wouldn't I have felt more, you know, proud of myself? If I'd read it in my early 20's, wouldn't the bits about Isadora's first husband, the secret scizophrenic, going off the deep end have helped me deal much better when my secretly scizophrenic best friend went off the deep end?

Perhaps, though, it really is better to have read it now, when Isadora and I are practically the same age. Going through the same things, other than the whole sexual orientation thing. She talks about aging; she talks about post-college stagnation (which I can understand, though I certainly haven't managed to graduate so far). She talks about the lure and repulsiveness of pregnancy and childrearing to a childless woman nearing the end of youth. She talks about youthful ambition, spirituality, the reality of monogamy and desire. The things she found important to discover for herself are, unsurprisingly, things I, myself, have longed to hear.

Thank you, Isadora, I'll see you again in a few years.

Side note: I read a large part of this book during two rather boring stripping shifts. It felt very appropriate, but it's true that Fear of Flying was very influential in second-wave feminism. Would second-wave feminism have approved of my choice of setting? I think not, though I also think the movement would be wrong in this. In any case, posing this question to a customer right before a Peggy Lee-laden set earned me a very sizable tip.

"إنني ألقي نظرة إلى الماضي بحنو. كم كانت مهووسة. إن الهورمونات الجامحة تهيمن على حياتها. ولطالما عشقت الرجل غير المناسب ولطالما كتبت كرهًا عن ذلك. أريد أن أقول لها: على رسلك، اهدئي، تأمّلي، مارسي اليوغا، وسوف يصبح كل شيء على ما يرام."

هكذا ألقت إريكا يونغ كلمتها الأخيرة في العيد الثلاثين لصدور الرواية،
رُوّجت هذه الرواية أو هكذا وصلني أنها رواية إيروتيكية عن امرأة تتحدث عن الجنس بشكل فج. لكن في نظري البسيط هذه صراعات عشرينية تحاول أن تجد نفسها وتحقق حلم طفولي في أن تجد الرجل المناسب
تلقي نفسها بين ذراعيه.

محور الرواية بسيط جدًا، إيزادورا غير سعيدة في زواجها، زوجها غريب الطباع وبارد نحوها ولا يدعم مهنتها في الكتابة سواءً الصحفية أو الشعرية. تسافر إلى ڤيينا مع زوجها لغرض حضور مؤتمر ومن هناك تبدأ تخبطاتها في إعادة تعريف شخصيتها.

ما جذبني في الرواية كونها مكتوبة بطريقة بسيطة ومرحة وبها بعض المقاطع الجنسية في خرق إريكا لتابو كتابة المرأة عن الجنس وإيضاح أن -ياللمفاجأة- النساء أيضًا شبقات جنسيًا ولديهن رغبة! وخصوصًا كون أن الكتاب نشر في بداية السبعينات!

اقتباس أعجبني جدًا "قبل أن تبدأ النساء بتأليف الكتب لم يكن هناك إلا جانب واحد للقصة. وعلى امتداد التاريخ كله، كانت الكتب تكتب بالسائل المنوي، وليس بدم الحيض."
تكسر إريكا كل الأنماط في احتكار الرجال للحديث عن مغامراتهم الجنسية وكسر للصورة النمطية للمرأة في أنها تميل للخجل وعدم الحديث عن مغامراتها إذا كانت لديها مغامرات في الأصل، صور كتبوها الرجال وتبنتها النساء على مضض على مر العصور حتى أصبح هذا الطبيعي.
نفس الموضوع ينطبق على الشعراء الذين يتغزلون بجسد المرأة يتخذونه موضوعًا حصريًا لقصائدهم وبكلمات تعتبر بذيئة، لكن بمجرد أن تنشر امرأة كتابًا رومانسيًا أو قصة شاعرية حتى تصف بالسطحية والبذيئة وربما بالفجر والعهر؛ فكيف لامرأة أن تتكلم عن جسدها الخاص؟

بغض النظر عن الحديث الجنسي في الكتاب، إريكا على قدر محترم من الثقافة أدبيًا وتاريخيًا وحتى في الخطاب النفسي والسياسي. أرفع القبعة لها.

soul opening

This came up on my feed and recalled I read this when I was about 16, yes yes I know 40 years ago!!!!!! I thought it was crappy to be honest but at that time I was reading some Sci Fi that I thought was great and this type of thing was just up market Harold Robins or something.

I picked up this book on a whim because I a) wanted to be the kind of girl who reads books no one has heard of because she’s very cool, b) wanted to be the type of girls who reads obscure Penguin Classics from the late 20th century, because everyone usually reads classics from the 19th century and prior, and c) because I desperately wanted to pick something out that I hadn’t previously heard of or been recommended and wasn’t part of the sinkhole that constitutes reading recommendations these days (BookTok).
So how did this work out for me?
Well, on the one hand I enjoyed much of this reading experience. Isadora is witty, chaotic, slightly unhinged, and hilarious. There are actual chapter titles and quotes to go with each chapter. There is questioning womanhood, marriage, relationships, careers, and art. There is certainly vulgarity. And there were some chapter that felt like such slogs, and others that were incredibly interesting. I don’t really agree with the other Goodreaders here that the writing was bad – the colloquial, personable tone was intended because Isadora is spilling everything to us, the reader, and isn’t it more fun to listen to her various affairs, neuroses, and sarcasms like a friend?
I probably wouldn’t read this again and I hesitate to recommend this to people except for perhaps those who enjoy a woman-apart-at-the-seams type of gal and also specifically Lena Dunham, or women who relate to Hannah Horvath (and want to pretend like they don’t.)

iw69: hello. i want you now

mannyrayner: do we know each other?

iw69: not at all, that's the point. i thought we could just have a completely no-strings-attached sexual encounter for its own sake, and then say goodbye. wouldn't that be poetic and beautiful?

mannyrayner: um, well, maybe. i'm sorry, i guess i should just be doing this and not analyzing it. can i at least have a name or will that ruin everything?

iw69: i'm isadora

mannyrayner: that's a pretty name. pardon me for being so old-fashioned

iw69: it's ok. so now can we fuck?

mannyrayner: i'm not quite sure how that would work, but

iw69: i want you to put your hard cock in my cunt and make me come. i hope you aren't threatened by the way i frankly express my female desires or by my use of the word "cunt"?

mannyrayner: ah, no, not really, in fact i

iw69: it didn't used to be regarded as obscene. in the miller's tale, chaucer writes "pryvely he caught hir by the queynte." In 1380 "queynte" was pronounced "cunt"

mannyrayner: how interesting! i knew the line but wasn't aware of the pronunciation

iw69: and in swedish the root has mutated into the word "qvinna" which is the normal word for woman. so swedish women are all unashamedly cunts

mannyrayner: actually the word is normally spelled with a "k" in modern swedish, and the polite word for cunt is "sköte". you are not advised to use the vulgar "fitta"

iw69: you are remarkably knowledgeable. i already feel i understand you. you remind me of my first husband. i guess you're some kind of erratic genius type who's insecure about his sexuality and his ability to satisfy a woman, which is eventually going to destroy you?

mannyrayner: well, thanks for the first bit, but i hope you're not entirely

iw69: no wait, i think you're really more like my second husband. you're powerful and oversexed, but simultaneously cold and distant, so that while you satisfy my body you're unable to reach me emotionally?

mannyrayner: actually, i'm not sure i quite

iw69: you said "actually" again. you must be english, right? in fact, i see you're most like my lover adrian. you pretend to live in the moment, but all the time you have a plan you're hiding from me, which i'll be bitterly disappointed to discover in due course?

mannyrayner: i suppose i can't completely

iw69: hey, now i get it. you're like all of them at the same time. god you turn me on. i'm so wet from talking to you that i've had to change my panties twice already since the start of our conversation

mannyrayner: isadora, i admit i'm flattered, but

iw69: stay right where you are. i'll be with you faster than you would believe possible and then we're going to fuck like you've never fucked before in your whole life. you'll break my heart, but after i've dried my tears i'll put you and your cock in my next best-selling novel and you'll be immortal

mannyrayner: i guess i like some parts of the plan but we'll have to change a few details

iw69: why?

mannyrayner: to start with, i'm sitting in an airport lobby. i need to be at my gate within the next twenty minutes

mannyrayner: isadora?

mannyrayner: hello, are you still there?

mannyrayner: did i say something wrong?

mannyrayner: well, if it was zipless enough for you, then it was zipless enough for me

mannyrayner: bye!

It's dated and over the top, yet only about halfway what I expected it be (another Eat Pray Love?). For all the ridiculousness, it was a pretty good, err, romp. Plus, I can act all highbrow about reading it as one of the vaunted 1001 list books, so, haha.

"Fear of Flying" isn't as taboo as I've heard. While sex is big part of the story it's conveyed through the want for passion, the feeling of immediate desire, and is an element used to not feel lonely for our protagonist. In reading Henry Miller's review of "Flying" I'd say he's right on the money with his want (at the time) for more female writers to be so unhinged when it comes to our most common fears and desires and not to feel like a slut for wanting these things.

While the story has plot points based on Erica Jong's own life it does transcend into a character that I think any woman can relate to in terms of wanting to not feel alone yet always feeling that way in a relationship. Of clinging to a partner to try and make you feel better after being screwed in one relationship to being just as unhappy in the new one. To losing oneself and then finding oneself yet still having questions as to what type of person you are and if your inner most urges are wrong (as society or even you define it). There's sex, psychoanalysis, and relatability throughout. Yes, the character is a bit more well off than most people I know (raised on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, went to two ivy league schools, has a few books published) but she still has her own inner torment that's waged on her for years with these successes.

I think all women should read this once they hit eighteen or so. It may not be for all of us, but I think it should be on all our read shelves.

"Strah od letenja" neosporno je kulturološki važna knjiga. K tome, 2013. godine, roman je proslavio 40-godišnjicu od izvornog objavljivanja. E, sad - važnost određenog književnog djela često se mjeri njegovim uspjehom u artikuliranju duha vremena koje ga je iznjedrilo, a imajući to na umu, nije teško zaključiti kako nije svaka "kulturološki važna" knjiga, nužno i "dobra knjiga" (nemojmo se sada zamarati definiranjem pojma "dobra knjiga"). Primjerice, još me nitko nije uspio uvjeriti da Burroughsov "Goli ručak" ima nekakvu stvarnu književnu vrijednost, pri čemu ne osporavam njegovo pomicanje granica u poimanju opscenosti i vulgarnosti kao književnog sredstva ili pak inovativnu narativnu strukturu. Dakle, jednostavnije rečeno - "Goli ručak" je važna knjiga, barem u mojem narcističkom i subjektivnom svemiru, uglavnom zbog onoga što ona svojim tekstom reprezentira, a ne zbog onoga što sam tekst jest (jer bi u suprotnom svaki iole pristojan pripovjedač morao zabiti pero u ledinu). S druge strane, "Strah od letenja" jest dobra knjiga! I kulturološki važna, istovremeno. Dobar spoj, zar ne?!

Kako je to famozni roman Erice Jong ostario? Što sam tekst govori danas, čime zrači? Dakako da osnovni ključ u kojemu se djelo čita, treba biti spoznaja da se knjiga pojavila 1973., što međutim nikako ne isključuje mogućnost interpretacije u svijetlu današnjice, suvremenih stavova i razmišljanja. A čini se kako je "Strah od letenja" puno više štete doživio pri svojem izlasku, nego što bi je mogao doživjeti od suvremenog čitatelja. Seksualna revolucija koja je ušla u stanje zenita sa šezdesetosmaškim aktivizmom nije još uvijek posve iscrpila svoj prvotni polet i tragovi koje je ostavila bili su itekako prisutni u javnom životu i kulturnoj sferi. Doduše, 1972. su uhićenja pripadnika ekipe koja je u masovnu svijest ušla pod nazivom "Baader-Meinhof", pokazala kako su dotada, uglavnom u javnoj sferi aktivni, pripadnici lijevih tendencija, uz koje je bila vezana i seksualna revolucija, kao i njezini protagonisti (mislim na Novu ljevicu, dakako), krenuli putem lijevog ekstremizma, odnosno terorizma. Pomalo zlokobno i proročanski, sudbina navedenih mladih fanatika, tako je svojevrsno anticipirala i sudbinu šezdesetosmaške revolucije čije su tekovine vrlo brzo završile u ekstremizmima, fanatizmima i žestokim polarizacijama raznih vrsta. No, dosta lekcija iz povijesti.

Kritika je 1973. u "Strahu od letenja" uglavnom vidjela jeftini senzacionalizam i gotovo ga jednoglasno sasjekla kao umjetničko ostvarenje (među rijetke branitelje djela spadali su Henry Miller i John Updike), a ženska publika kojoj je, da se ne lažemo, ipak ponajprije roman bio namijenjen, u njemu je vidjela ili puki protest protiv dosadnih brakova u kojima se našla zaglavljena, ili glasni proglas (nanovo otkrivene) ženske seksualnosti. Zašto je to, po meni, pogrešno i zašto je time učinjena nepravda romanu Erice Jong (koji se unatoč tome, ili možda baš zbog toga, svejedno prodao u preko 20 milijuna primjeraka)?

Isadora Wing, glavna junakinja "Straha od letenja", pjesnikinja je sa dvije izdane zbirke pjesama, udana za psihoanalitičara azijskog porijekla i već zbog tih činjenica neodoljivo podsjeća na Ericu Jong, za koju su u trenutku pisanja romana bile istinite obje biografske crtice, a da je ne bismo označili kao alter-ego autorice. Napast kojoj Čitatelj često pribjegava, a opet ona koje se treba najoštrije kloniti. Fikcija je fikcija, a posljedično, sam proces pisanja jest fabrikacija koja već na određen način "krivotvori" vlastitog autora, čak i ako on ima autobiografske tendencije, namećući mu ne samo ograničenja njegove percepcije stvarnosti, već i ograničenja teksta. Toga je, međutim, Erica Jong, itekako svjesna. Međutim, s druge strane, Isadora Wing je brbljava plavuša, dobro obrazovana Židovka, sklona igrama riječima, nevjerojatno kontradiktorna i svjesna vlastitih kontradikcija - njezin je unutarnji monolog, kojim je zapravo omeđen sam roman, toliko frenetičan i brz, da neodoljivo podsjeća na najbolje filmove Woodyja Allena, pri čemu židovski identitet i verbalna eksplozivnost, zasigurno nisu najmanje važni faktori, kao i već spomenuta strast glavne junakinje prema igrama riječima, protegnuta kroz cijelu knjigu. Što se, pak, toga tiče - granica između Isadore Wing i Erice Jong ponovno postaje mutna. Isadora si neprestano uskače u vlastite misli i samu sebe korigira već sljedećom rečenicom (primjerice, razmišljajući o majci reći će: Puno sam je puta htjela pitati zašto jednostavno nije ostavila oca i otišla!, a da bi već u sljedećem retku konstatirala kako joj ne promiče ironija koja proizlazi iz činjenice da u tom slučaju nje same vjerojatno ne bi bilo).

Isadora Wing, koja nije (ali bi mogla biti!) Erica Jong, veoma je dobro obrazovana. To se očituje u rasponu šala i aluzija koje su rasute čitavim djelom - u tekst bešavno umetnuta šala na račun američkog biheviorista B.F.Skinnera (koju sam upamtio ponajprije jer sam Skinnera obrađivao u jednom nevjerojatno iscrpljujućem kolegiju na faksu), Glenn Gould, "Čarobna frula", Fieldingov "Tom Jones" i s njim povezana pitanja književne teorije, Dante i čitava šuma drugih imena i asocijacija kojima je roman načičkan.

Međutim, glavna odlika "Straha od letenja", a koja je ponajviše zapostavljana, jest njegova satiričnost. Jer, upravo je to ono što "Strah od letenja" zapravo jest. Jedna nevjerojatna i sjajna, oštra satira koja se obrušava na muško-ženske odnose, strukturu beživotnog braka, ali ponajviše na PSIHOANALIZU. Pored neobuzdane satiričnosti i neupitne inteligencije, roman pršti i humorom. Teško mi se sjetiti koja me knjiga u posljednje vrijeme natjerala da se toliko smijem, smiješim i smijuljim kao ova. Posebice se to odnosi na pojedine opaske o psihoanalizi i na genijalne dijelove teksta koji se fokusiraju na Isadorin brak sa prvim mužem, Brianom, inače shizofreničarom. Suzdržani cinizam i ironija uistinu spadaju među najzavodljivija oružja pripovjedačice Erice Jong.

Ne treba odbaciti niti inteligentne opaske o kulturi i društveno-političkoj svakodnevici koje Isadora Wing povremeno prosipa iz rukava, u kojima je uz rezignirani osmjeh zbog njihove pronicljivosti, moguće pronaći i više istine nego što bi čovjek očekivao s obzirom na vremensku distancu od prve pojave romana pa do naših dana, te činjenicu da su i te opaske u službi samog teksta. Na neki način, "Strah od letenja" me podsjetio na Verhoevenov film "Showgirls", koji je s godinama, unatoč potpunoj kritičkoj katastrofi u vrijeme svojeg kino-prikazivanja, izrastao u kultni klasik i također neumoljivu satiru američke industrije zabave à la Las Vegas. Dakle, kakav je danas "Strah od letenja"?


Ako bismo željeli biti slikoviti, a da se našalimo baš to ćemo biti - roman podsjeća na dobrostojeću gospođu u ranim pedesetima, koju susrećemo u kafiću kamo često volimo odlaziti sami i uživati u čitanju svojih omiljenih pisaca. Vani se polagano spušta večer, pale se gradska svijetla, a netko je na jukeboxu pustio album Glenna Goulda, "The Goldberg Variations". Nudimo se da ćemo platiti čašu crnog vina ili kavu matroni koja sjedi preko puta našeg stola. Kako večer odmiče, odlučujemo da ćemo je otpratiti do njezinog stana. Pred vratima smo, trenutak je sudbonosne odluke - a o tome što bismo učinili u tom trenutku (jer mogućnosti su beskonačne), ovisit će i kako će nam se i koliko danas svidjeti "Strah od letenja", te što ćemo u njemu pronaći.

Twenty-nine-year-old Isadora Wing (who’s recently published her first book, a volume of erotic poetry) is traveling with her Chinese American psychiatrist husband to a convention of psychoanalysts in Vienna. Emotionally frustrated and sexually bored in her marriage, Isadora is tormented, on the one hand, by her yearning for adventure, sexual rapture, freedom, and creativity, and on the other hand, by her need for the security and protection of a husband. She opts, at least temporarily, for adventure by taking off on a frenzied, buzzed-on-beer road trip through Western Europe in a sporty convertible with a “swinging” Jungian analyst whom she’s met at the convention. Two and a half weeks later, he dumps her in Paris in order to join his children and his current girlfriend for a long-planned vacation in Brittany. Completely unprepared for this, Isadora falls apart for a day but emerges from her panic with some of the confidence and strength she’s craved. She heads to London and the hotel where she and her husband had planned to meet before flying back to New York. He’s out, but she gets the key to his room. The book closes with her soaking in the bathtub, feeling contented, when her husband walks in. Will she stay with him or leave? She doesn’t know, but in either case, she’s convinced that she’ll be fine.

The facts of Erica Jong’s biography for her first twenty-nine years match those of Isadora Wing’s life almost exactly, but the novel was clearly intended as a satire. The author’s voice is breezy, mocking, and geared to exaggeration for comic effect. She knows who will win in the end. She’s not only survived the tale she’s telling and written it up as the novel we’re reading, she’s also cracking jokes about her journey nonstop. Jong wants the reader to laugh at Isadora, which means laughing along with Jong and enjoying the ride. It's amazing that the only thing most people seem to remember from the book is the provocative expression Ms. Jong invented to encapsulate Isadora’s fantasy, the proverbial "zipless fuck", while instead they kind of miss the fact that it’s a rare example of a bildungsroman in which a woman, not a man, struggles to define what she wants her life to look like, and to compel that image into being. The book is not a celebration of casual sex, it was completely misread as such. Isadora wants to own her body and her mind, but she cannot truly envision herself as what we would call an “independent woman” today.

“All my fantasies included marriage,” Ms. Jong wrote in one of her character’s rueful reveries. “No sooner did I imagine myself running away from one man than I envisioned myself tying up with another. I was like a boat that always had to have a port of call. I simply couldn’t imagine myself without a man.”

"I was not against marriage. I believed in it in fact. It was necessary to have one best friend in a hostile world, one person you’d be loyal to no matter what, one person who’d always be loyal to you. But what about all those other longings which after a while marriage did nothing much to appease? The restlessness, the hunger, the thump in the gut, the thump in the cunt, the longing to be filled up, to be fucked through every hole, the yearning for dry champagne and wet kisses, for the smell of peonies in a penthouse on a June night…all the romantic nonsense you yearned for with half your heart and mocked bitterly with the other half."


I don't know whether her novel belongs to the category "literary history". But I know that I could identify with Isadora who, amazingly enough, gave me the impression of a monogamous and moral person at heart, she just needed to work it out within herself. I believe that I, and many other women across the world, are grateful to Jong for the encouragement to get our own stories straight.

It's best not to get all heavy about this book. It's light, outspoken and racy, like a long rambling monologue from your best friend when she's very hyper and just needs to talk. Sometimes you have to just sit there and take it and let it wash over you and sometimes you nod with recognition, sometimes it's sort of sexy in a "I remember that feeling" sort of way and sometimes you say "Really?" in an intense sort of way and are desperate to know more. Sometimes it makes you laugh out loud (LOL). As a Chinese I was very curious to know how western women think about sex but I discovered even before I read this book that a lot of western women have much dirtier minds than this, LOL. Erica Jong. Uptight. LOL! People sometimes call me uptight. And I say, what about Erica Jong? Anyway it gets the conversation off me for a while.