Is Fear of Flying Still Relevant?
Have you read Erica Jong’s Fear of Flying? If you haven’t then stop reading, this article contains spoilers. If you have, then take a moment and look back...at that time and everything that was going on in your life. This is one of those books that’s worth is very dependant on the readers circumstances, but more on that later. I was both thrilled and irritated by it. The writing is excellent, but Isadora is not the most likeable and the language is dated and ‘of a time’. So is Fear of Flying still relevant or is it better left a relic of the 70s?
Isadora. Not the most instantly likeable woman really. She is whiney, insecure, privileged, inconsiderate, judgemental, and has a terrible time making up her mind. None of these are traits we are taught to admire or look for in ‘strong female leads.’ Here is another way to look at this though, should she be likeable or is it more important to be relatable? As this is a loose autobiography of Jong, would she have been able to articulate her struggles if she had made Isadora likeable? The honesty of her writing is important. We need strong female leads in fiction, but does that necessarily mean taking on dystopian governments all the time? Isadora faces a more common set of problems. For example: a neurotic/overbearing mother, absent father, less then satisfying love life, sibling rivalries, and insecurities about her looks, career, relationships, and art. Can we not all identify with these burdens in some combination? Fear of Flying is not a read for when we want to escape our world, but rather one for when we want our eyes opened to it.
Are elements of this book dated? Yes, definitely, but personally I find that a terrible reason to discount a book. If you can only read books within your own time and field of reference I will probably give you some side eye. You don’t have to like it, but it isn’t reason enough to dust bin it. The heavy psychoanalyst angle is dated as well as some of the language and casually racism, but only in terminology. Racism still exists and other social pressures such as social media can replace the psychoanalyst angle. Other whole sections are terribly and disappointingly relevant such as when she describes street harassment, “I always wondered why I felt so sullied and spat upon and furious. It was supposed to be flattering. It was supposed to prove my womanliness,” or goes on to say, “men tried to pick me up all the time because I conveyed my “availability” ...the same old fifties lingo in disguise: There is no such thing as rape; you ladies ask for it. You ladies.” This is relevant. The words and language use change over time, but the struggles faced by Isadora are those faced by women in the fifties and are the same as those faced today.
Isadora was constantly having to choose between two images of womanhood. An independent woman, artist and feminist or a wife and mother with all the security as well as the supporters of each side arguing for why one is good and the other wrong. Leaving Isadora to declare, “being a woman meant...being split into two irreconcilable halves.” She expresses a frustration I think we all can identify with when she says, “Why did they have to keep rushing me and trying to cram me into the same molds that had made them so unhappy?” Is some of the dislike because we see ourselves in Isadora in her weakest moments? As Oscar Wilde said, “The rage of Caliban seeing his face in the mirror.” Those moments when we can’t decide between security and our dreams? Those moments when we cave to pressure from outside or hide the truth from ourselves to avoid facing and asking the questions that would take us deeper?
For myself, I read Fear of Flying in my late twenties at a moment when I faced a crossroads. I could keep doing what I was doing to not disappoint people at the expense of my happiness and other relationships, or I could walk out and start over. While I was trying to decide I read this passage, “I stopped blaming myself; it was that simple. Perhaps my finally running away was not due to malice on my part, nor to any disloyalty I need apologize for. Perhaps it was a kind of loyalty to myself. A drastic but necessary way of changing my life. You did not have to apologize for wanting to own your own soul. Your soul belonged to you – for better or worse. When all was said and done, it was all you head.” This pushed me to make a choice to set myself free. This book needs to be read in a certain moment of your life and then it can be pivotal. I suspect the social climate of the 1970’s made it particularly important to women of all ages and walks of life, but I also suspect its power remains undiminished for many women if read at the right moment. It is a book to read when change is needed! Hence, this book is still incredibly relevant!
Works Cited:
Jong, Erica. Fear of Flying. New American Library, November 1974.
Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Grey. Penguin Books, 1985.