Women and Desire: Beyond Wanting to Be Wanted [Hardcover]

Polly Young-Eisendrath Ph.D. (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 28, 1999

An internationally recognized Jungian analyst and psychologist helps women reclaim true desire for themselves. Not since Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex has female desire been explored so deeply and provocatively.

This groundbreaking book delves into the complex world of female desire where women simply "want to be wanted." Many women encourage others to identify or validate images that give them feelings of worth or vitality and then feel resentful because they have sacrificed their real needs and desires. Instead of knowing who they really are and what they would like to do with their lives, they become trapped in their images. As a result, self-direction, self-confidence, and self-determination are undermined from adolescence through old age.

Dr. Polly Young-Eisendrath examines this damaging syndrome of female development, showing women, and girls, how to untangle themselves from the web of reflected images that confuses or conceals their authentic wants and needs. Women and Desire empowers women to understand and take control of their sexual, social, and spiritual lives.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In providing some answers to Freud's famous question about what women really want, Young-Eisendrath draws on her experience as a psychotherapist and on ideas gleaned from Buddhism, Jung and feminist writings. She argues that most women don't have a clue about what they want because society has programmed them simply to want to present a desirable image. Illustrating her thesis with mythic tales and case studies of her own patients, the author shows how our culture recognizes two female stereotypes: the beautiful muse and the ugly hag-bitch who wields power to fulfill her own desires. Women should not be objects of desire, but subjects of desire, she writes, not only in personal relationships but in the workplace. While women may believe that competence leads to success at work, she contends that "what leads to power is self-promotion, making the right connections and being self-confident." According to Young-Eisendrath, women's rampant consumerism, shoplifting and binge eating are simply manifestations of unconscious desires. Although she contends that established religions have subordinated women, the author advocates learning to distinguish pathological desires from authentic ones through traditional spiritual practices or New Age feminist communities. She treads on familiar ground, but Young-Eisendrath writes with authority, offering women a valuable perspective on understanding and changing self-defeating behaviors. (Oct.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

What do women want? According to Young-Eisendrath (psychiatry, Univ. of Vermont Medical Coll.; The Gifts of Suffering), women want to be wanted. Hoping for approval and self-validation, women often conform to ideals of beauty, sexual attractiveness, and femininity before they have identified their own desires and needs. Such choices lead to resentment and a loss of self-confidence when reality does not meet expectations. Using examples from myths, fairy tales, and case studies from her own work as a Jungian analyst, Young-Eisendrath demonstrates that women can learn to know their strengths and weaknesses and become the subjects of their own desires rather than the objects of others'. Young-Eisendrath challenges widely accepted beliefs about female power and proposes an alternate view that encompasses both compassion and cooperation. Recommended for public libraries.ALucille M. Boone, San Jose P.L., CA
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Harmony (September 28, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 060960371X
• ISBN-13: 978-0609603710
• Product Dimensions: 5.6 x 1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #705,508 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

30 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An essential for those who have lived for others, December 9, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Women and Desire: Beyond Wanting to Be Wanted (Hardcover)

Young-Eisendrath brilliantly opens the reader's eyes to the female's struggle for an identity in a patriarchal society. Fables, intertwined magnificently throughout each core concept, act as examples of the concocted lives women cling to and men (and women) perpetuate. I identified strongly with the author's comparison of being the "subject of one's own desire" versus being the "object of another's desire." Reading this book, I realized how both women and men are forced to act in a stereotypical drama. Men - aggressors, emotional corpses, breadwinners, dominators. Women - weaklings, dependents, passivists, bitches. Neither role is healthy, nor genuine. Young-Eisendrath has tackled one side of the problem. Who will take on the other?

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Changed My Life, December 29, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Women and Desire: Beyond Wanting to Be Wanted (Paperback)

In the first 23 pages, this book changed my life. She hit the nail on the head, so to speak about the crux of my biggest subconscious issue, being the object of desire. This book is a must for all women and definitely for men who want to know and understand women more fully. This book opened me up to the knowledge that I am not irreparably broken, and that coming into my own power is still well within my reach. Thank you! Thank you!

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Is Feminism the F Word?, November 18, 2003

By 

M. LaJoue (New England) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Women and Desire: Beyond Wanting to Be Wanted (Paperback)

I assign this book to students in my psychology seminar. These students at a women's college tell me that they find Women and Desire to be thought provoking, interesting, even helpful. I noticed a column in Newsweek by Anna Quindlen in October. She argued that women today still need the F word feminism because society hasn't changed as much as we like to tell ourselves. It appears that the need for books such as this one by Polly Young-Eisendrath continues to be valid.