eat, pray, love, get judged: why elizabeth gilbert's biggest critics are cynical, emotionally stunted sexists
First, a confession: I’m not the biggest fan of Eat, Pray, Love. In fact, I didn’t technically “finish” it because I found Elizabeth’s Gilbert’s writing persona a little too twee and prone to pointing out the obvious in an unnecessarily elongated way.
I was never turned off by the book’s subject, “one woman’s search for everything across Italy, India, and Indonesia”.
But I am increasingly pissed off by the backlash against it in articles and blogs and on Twitter, a backlash which frames Gilbert’s memoir and its spin-off movie as “full of itself”, “self-indulgent”, “fun to hate”, and “smacking of self-obsession and therapy culture”.
If I hadn’t been kicked out of the society of cynical liberals for saying LOL, I’d certainly be kicked out for what I’m about to say next:
If more people meditated, travelled alone, and yes, underwent therapy, the world would be a much better place.
Yeah, I said it.
Therapy is a GOOD thing
Only someone who’s never had therapy could consider it an easy fix for navel-gazers. The majority of people who go to therapy would rather be anywhere else, and have practiced self-destruction for years to avoid facing their feelings. Done properly, therapy is intensely personal and frequently painful. Even though I advocate therapy and think it can be life-changing, I do understand how rife for parody “therapy-speak” can be. But I also think one of the reasons people laugh at it is because it gets to the heart of uncomfortable truths: I’m co-dependent, you act out from fear of rejection. Those terms may sound strange to the uninitiated but they become important to people because they lead them to insights that transform their lives.
I’d argue that being temporarily self-indulgent and completely obsessed with yourself is a damn sight better than lashing out from hurt and anger on a regular basis, or burying your feelings in drink or drugs or working too much. Happiness is a privilege not everyone has, through no fault of their own, and working towards it is no bad thing.
And speaking of privilege…
Sure, Elizabeth Gilbert is privileged
She’s white, able-bodied, thin, cis-gendered, middle-class, American, and had the resources to travel the world for a year. Plus, feeling disillusioned is a privilege. I think Julia Roberts drips charisma from every pore, but I still wanted to scream when I saw the Eat Pray Love trailer where she wails, “I wanna go someplace where I can MARVEL at something!” Boo freaking hoo, Julia. Some of us need to scrape together the cash to pay our bills, to buy food, to pick up prescriptions. Some of us can’t remember how it felt to not be ill or unhappy, because of life events, not our lack of marvelling. And some of us are depressed and anxious, and would find a trip into the city as challenging as trekking across the world.
The Eat, Pray, Love experience is not accessible; we can’t all do it. And even if some of us did do it, we wouldn’t necessarily feel better as a result — many people need more serious mood interventions than meditation, nature, and pasta.
But the fact that we can’t all do it is kind of the point. Elizabeth Gilbert was paid to write a book about her travel experience, just like a lot of other people. We don’t say that Bill Bryson shouldn’t write about his trip around the UK because not everyone can go to the UK and be really witty, or whine that Paul Theroux didn’t buy us a ticket for his train ride across Asia. Authors write book proposals, and if they’re lucky, they get to go to fantastic places and write about them for the rest of us. What’s the point in moaning about something being inaccessible when most of us would never have had access to it anyway? It’s hardly Elizabeth Gilbert’s fault I’ve never been to Bali.
I’ve seen her taken to task about this, most publicly on Oprah, when she was asked by audience members how she could recommend travelling to India for enlightenment when most Americans can’t afford to even leave the country.
Her response was gracious. To paraphrase: the inner journey was the stuff that really made a long-term difference and that’s open to almost anyone (meditation is free).
As much as anyone who has suffered a serious illness or tragic bereavement will probably have little time for Elizabeth Gilbert’s problems, a lot of others have good lives that they’ve lost their gratitude for. They need to marvel, and they’re the people she’s writing for.
It’s not all fun and games
I know some non-writers might scoff at this, and I know that even at its hardest, writing is a cakewalk compared to lots of other jobs, but the thing is, writing is work. Writing a book is especially hard work. And Elizabeth Gilbert got paid for doing a job. Plus, she paid her dues.
Before she proposed Eat, Pray, Love, she had form, including some impressive magazine credits (she’s the woman who worked at Coyote Ugly and wrote about it for GQ). She’d also written other books (some of them award-winning; you may not have heard of her short story collection, Pilgrims, but trust me, winning the Pushcart is a whopping deal). She wasn’t some inexperienced upstart with an entitlement complex.
And as lucky as Gilbert was to get paid to travel the world and change her life for the better, it wasn’t just for shits and giggles. I don’t know about the movie, but in real life, she was lost and confused after the end of her marriage. At the start of her book, she’s sobbing on her bathroom floor, wondering whether she should maybe kill herself. She did something bold because she was tired of pretending to be happy, tired of wasting her life.
And there’s a lesson there for all of us: sometimes doing the big thing is necessary. If you’re fortunate, maybe that means you can hop on a plane tomorrow. But the big actions we take can also seem small from the outside: booking yourself onto a training course that leads to a new job, calling a therapist so you can leave your baggage behind, or adding to that Word file you hope might one day become a novel, even though you’re not really sure whether it’s good enough.
Some scorn is sexism is disguise
It’s interesting that no-one criticises male authors for travelling the world, even when they leave their wives and kids for long periods in order to do so.
But when a single, child-free woman writes about her search for meaning outside of the expected confines of middle-aged, middle-class life, people get uncomfortable. People want to pick her to pieces: she’s a threat just for being different, for defining happiness on her own terms. And she’s a threat for rejecting the idea that the American dream is some kind of utopian ideal.
A lot of critics of EPL (the book, the movie, the concept) claim that one woman’s journey of discovery is not an interesting or worthy enough topic.
*Sigh*
This type of argument comes up a lot when it comes to books. When chairing the Orange prize panel of judges in 2008, Muriel Gray complained that women’s books often fail to tackle truly important global topics; as if the personal were not the political, as if domestic concerns have not been forced onto women for tens of thousands of years (hardly the fault of many women if they write what they know; try blaming the kyriarchy instead). And who’s to say what’s important? Why is war more important than inner peace?
This argument comes up a lot when it comes to women’s films*, too. (*By which I mean films starring and primarily aimed at women.) Sex and the City 2 got slaughtered in the press whereas similarly-excreble male-targetted films like Get Him to the Greek and Hot Tub Time Machine are just seen as fun.
At least Eat Pray Love stars a woman over forty, playing an intelligent woman who isn’t one of the usual archetypes of her age group (mom, nun, grandma).
Her success makes Elizabeth Gilbert powerful. In journalism, in publishing, and in Hollywood. She’s too zen for anyone to call her a bitch, so she gets called solipsistic, instead.
Bitch, please
Because it’s a feminist publication, Bitch took a different approach to critiquing Eat, Pray, Love than “it’s self-indulgent” or “another whiny woman: just what I needed”. In Eat Pray Spend, Joshunda Sanders and Diana Barnes-Brown suggest that Elizabeth Gilbert is portraying an unattainable lifestyle which average women can’t hope to replicate and what’s more, anyone involved in the self-help industry is just trying to rip women off; it’s all another form of oppression.
OK.
But no.
They ran a quote from an unscrupulous life coach, mentioned some overpriced EPL tie-in products, and extrapolated way too far: to the idea that anyone who encourages women to eat organic, or do yoga, or improve their goddamn life in any way is some symbol of the patriarchy.
And then they really lost me by suggesting it’s a privilege to be diagnosed with depression, because in the US it’s not possible for every woman to afford to see a doctor. Let’s not play the “I’m less privileged than you are” game: no-one who has clinical depression is privileged, whether they have the cash to see a doc or not.
The fact is, that many women turn to complementary therapies and self-help because traditional approaches have failed them (which might be a more original topic of feminist exploration) and there are lots of people in the self-help industry who are decent, and kind, and who actually help people. It’s not all about selling voodoo potions and overpriced yoga mats, and while it is worth pointing out that enlightenment has been co-opted by capitalism and is being resold (aimed at a primarily female audience) for twice its value, it’s an insult to women’s intelligence to suggest that this is preventing us from being able to make sensible choices for ourselves.
In fact, it may not be quite my cup of tea (or scoop of gelato), but I’d still say the success of Eat, Pray, Love is a good thing.
What do you think?
Comments are closed.
Excellent post! I hadn’t got a clue about any of the criticisms targeted at EPL, and only had a vague idea of what EPL was about before I read this. You make a lot of good points in a very clear way. Plenty to think about!
Thanks Jenni!
Hi Diane,
Great post! I fell in love with EPL when I read it. I totally disagree with cynics who shout that one woman’s journey of self discovery is not interesting or worthy of a feature film. How did she get millions of women to read her book, and an army of loyal followers who understood what she was saying, if her subject matter was dull?
It came at exactly the right time into my life. I had just begun a foray into the world of self-help, because I was sick and tired of living my life in a profoundly negative way and whilst I was incredibly skeptical about self-help, I was willing to suspend judgement for a while and give it a go!
8 months down the line and I am now practising yoga, I found the confidence to finally quit a soul-destroying job, and I am more comfortable in myself than I have ever been. I am a professional, intelligent, successful woman in a loving relationship and I am NOT a ‘sucker’ for self-help like most people would believe the industry is targeting. I am sensible enough to make informed decisions and I choose to frame my world positively. I choose to learn from my experiences – to eat, to pray, to love, and to be happy!
Jess x
Hi Jess, thanks for leaving such a lovely comment
I’m glad EPL was inspiring to you, and you’re right — clearly it contains truths which speak to a lot of women (and men), and what is more important than being a happy and loving member of society? I know it makes me hippie-ish to say so but it’s true: there’d be no wars to write about if everyone felt at peace.
I think people who put down self-help often fail to credit its readers with a smidgen of intelligence. Sure some people play at it, reading books instead of making any real change, but that can be said of a lot of things! I’m not sure we can ever hear *enough* inspiring stories, myself. Not all of them with resonate with all of us, but it doesn’t mean they’re not worth telling. x
It’s funny, I read the book Tales of a Female Nomad: Living Large in the World by Rita Golden Gelman before I read Eat Pray Love–it’s kind of the original eat pray love & so much better. When I read eat pray love, I was looking for a lot of what Gelman wrote about which was the people & places, and that’s what really made me feel Gilbert was so self-absorbed. I enjoyed reading Italy & Bali, but could not finish India, because I felt like I was hearing a person gloat about how spiritually elevated they were or something. I’m happy she was able to reach religious nirvana, but I wasn’t so interested in reading about it. It’s nice that she had this experience, but I admit I loved Tales of a Female Nomad so much more.
Hi Julie, thanks for your comment. See, I think what comes across as “gloating” is probably surprise and sheer relief at feeling good and finding meaning and happiness in life. I know from experience that depression or even just sadness can make it really hard to care about anyone or anything else, and sometimes you have to put yourself first in order to heal. If that makes a person self-absorbed, then that’s OK with me.
(Whether I want to read about it is of course another matter. But to each her own.)
Thanks for the book rec — I’ll have to check out Rita Golden Gelman!
A very interesting post. I found some of your points thought provoking. Especially your discussion of priviledge.
I loved the book while simultaneously finding the narrative self absorbed -but that was the *point* of the book. It is a voyage of self discovery which she was very lucky to be able to undertake. I saw the movie last weekend and it was very well done. Julia Roberts is great (as usual) as are the other actors. I do wonder how the movie is without having read the book since a lot of the scenes reminded me of other story components from the book (and some things I had COMPLETELY forgotten). One of the most troubling things about a lot of the negative opinions is that they come from people who have neither read the book nor seen the movie but are responding to their perception.
Hi Nicole, for me you hit it right on the head when you say:
“I loved the book while simultaneously finding the narrative self absorbed – but that was the *point* of the book.”
All memoirs of this type are going to be self-absorbed because that’s what they’re about, one person’s story. There seems little point criticising a memoir for doing what it says it will…
Also when you say:
“One of the most troubling things about a lot of the negative opinions is that they come from people who have neither read the book nor seen the movie but are responding to their perception.”
I couldn’t agree more. And that’s where I think some sexism creeps in; this whole “I’m gonna hate on this cos it’s about a woman who explores her feelings” scorn, when actually neither of those things is a negative.
I’m curious to see the film when it finally comes out here in a month’s time… Maybe I’ll even finish the book at some point
I loved this book. I am a not “privileged” and I understand the fact that I will never travel the world to find the things missing from my life to find my center. But, you know one would think that people could appreciate that every persons journey is different and take from the book the fact that stepping out and taking the journey is the important part. We all wish to have the beauty of the exotic worlds as scenery for our journey, but why would anyone use that particular point as the focus of an otherwise inspiring quest for authenticity in a world (that whether you are privileged or not) is filled with barriers to women in search of their true selves. These negative shots at the book and one womens experience just reinforces that fact. I am not a hardcore feminist, but you are right- men can do anything-struggle to find themselves through midlife crisis, infidelity, lavish spending, changing jobs for more self-satisfaction… I could go on, and we accept it as part of their journey. Why can’t we just allow ourselves the same opportunities to find happiness within and appreciate other women’s journey to that same end?
Great points Saundra, thanks so much for commenting.
I love it when you say “But, you know one would think that people could appreciate that every persons journey is different and take from the book the fact that stepping out and taking the journey is the important part.”
SO TRUE. I think it’s really sad that some people will always look for the cynical angle.
Oh, and nothing wrong with being a hardcore feminist! (I’m one.)
I, too, had no idea of all the criticisms of the book/movie. I LOVED the book and I drag my husband to see the movie when it’s out in Australia. I think the argument about how this lifestyle is unattainable is absolute rubbish. OMG. Sure not everyone can trollop across the world, but the point isn’t that we can’t, it’s that SHE DID. And how her experiences can empower other women. I didn’t read the Di Vinci Code and spew about how HOW I can’t go to Europe and see these beautiful sites.
People really need to get a grip and stop being so downright cynical. It’s a BOOK for god’s sake. You’d think she had written Satanic Verses or something.
Hi Steph, thanks so much for commenting.
“People really need to get a grip and stop being so downright cynical.”
I think that covers it, really
I loved the book, have not seen the movie.
My mother in law did not like most of the book. I just chalked that up to the fact that she wasn’t very ready for self discovery.
I think so much criticism is just plain jealousy.
On Oprah I remember Oprah asking her whether she meditated every day and she said there are days she misses. Oprah said she was glad to hear she wasn’t perfect.
Ha, yes, I just read something about meditation in Oprah’s O magazine and it recommended aiming for 6 days a week. Even zen masters need the odd day off