Women Who Want To Be Alone In Western Art History

by Mallory Ortberg · September 22, 2014

art7

babe can we please go home and go to bed
after this solo
you said that before the last solo
that was the same solo
did you really think they were two different songs?
i’ll play it again
oh god please don’t

art10

at last, her dream was almost a reality: a hat so big she didn’t have to look at anybody

art6

no
don’t kiss me like that
i thought you wanted to be kissed like that
nobody wants to be kissed like this
i thought —
nobody

art20

no i’m having a wonderful time, darling
i’m having such a wonderful time with you here that i have to go be over there right now

art18

christ i hate you
i hate you so much

art22

it was only a matter of time they designed a ruff big enough that she couldn’t see his face behind it

art21

i have my needlework
and my secrets

art19

it’s so nice having you here
so nice having you here while i’m trying to finish my work
most of my friends would leave me alone when i’m trying to finish my sewing
but not you
i think it’s so lovely, how you do that
normally it’s just me and the peace and quiet

art16

how many more of these are you going to do before we can go home
i dont know
how many more trees are there that dont have my name carved in them

art15

i can almost reach my lute

art14

no
no youre not any good at this

art13

ahh i would love to stay and go out with you 
i would love that 
so much
but i have to keep running away from you 
sorry 
🙁 
how did you say 🙁 out loud like that
idk sorry cant stop running away tho!!

art11

ahh sorryyyy
sorry my arms are trees now 
what’s that, can’t hear you, arms are trees

art12

just take off all your clothes
no
im doing it
its fun
no
dont be stuck up
just be naked

art17

no i know
that’s very sweet
i’ll look at you later

art8

maybe it will look better if i just put my hands entirely over your face

art5

okay hi
let me tell you something
sure
now’s a good time for that
i was just reading but i can do that later
i’ll listen to you now
instead of reading

art4

WHAT

art2

babe
babe?
babe are you still listening
mm?
yeah
yeah im good
this is just so exciting i have to close my eyes
while i listen to you
keep going though
keep going of your story

art1

babe i thought we went over this
it doesn’t make any sense for both of us to tire ourselves out
if you just walked and i just carried the rake while i ride we’d both be exhausted
don’t you see that it makes more sense for one of us to get tired
and one of us to stay fresh
in case of
in case of danger

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150 Comments

    1. missteenwordpower +17

      I just told facebook that it was my new go-to line for the bus! For all the people who want to give me child-rearing advice on the bus! It is clearly a one-stop shop of shutting people up.

    3. Tessellation +47

      Ah, yes, Daphne and Apollo. Some people mistake this as the origin myth of the laurel tree, but actually she is becoming a whomping willow.

  3. eliana23 +118

    I want a whole post about the secrets little miss needlepoint has; I suspect they are legion and violent.

    1. hugpunch +28

      I kind of like the way he’s looking at her, like, “oh yes, she’s the killer queeeeen!” and he’s secretly handing her a new assassination job in that slip of paper.

  5. anninyn +222

    god why do men always bother you when you’re reading.

    ‘are you reading’
    ‘what are you reading’
    ‘is it good’
    ‘let me tell you all about myself and my penis’
    ‘i’m going to try and touch you now and call you a bitch when you move away’

    1. gripyfish +50

      Yes I am reading The Goldfinch. Yes I’m enjoying it. Yes it is large enough I can use it as a bludgeon on men who ask stupid questions.

      Oh, the things I would say to intrusive men on the bus, were I brave.

    2. Either_Ada +265

      “Are you *really* reading that big book?”
      “No. Like most women, I’m actually illiterate.”
      “Then why are you carrying it around?”
      “If I don’t weigh down my hands, they tend to punch the man nearest them.”

    3. shahea +107

      My beloved asked me the other day, “Does it bother you when I ask you questions when you’re reading?” I closed the book, gazed steadily at him and said, “Yes, sometimes. Now isn’t one of those times, though, so go ahead.” He is so accustomed to my Listening To Men Face that he honestly thought I was being sarcastic, when this once I meant it! He could ask me questions, I was only kind of invested in the book!

      I’m training him well.

    4. helvetica547 +86

      You know how any article offering “How to meet people?” advice will tell you to strike up a conversation with someone about the book they’re reading because then you show interest in what they like and probably also show that you can read too. How ’bout you mind your own business and leave me be because I would rather not discuss what I’m reading with you, in this moment, when I could be reading the book instead. Stop offering this as a helpful tip, article writers of the world, it doesn’t fcking work that way.

      1. quietest +23

        Ugh, yes. Reading on my phone has freed me of this forever. I miss physical books, but not the strange men that attended them.

        1. Ethylbenzene +44

          See, I find reading on my phone encourages people to bother me in the lunchroom at work because they think I must be so bored because I’m just playing around on my phone. Thankfully, I have an office now so I can shut the door and read on my phone and eat my lunch in silence and solitude like god intended.

        2. Es_Petal +13

          I find it’s worse on my kindle – with a real book I can hold it up over my face so 1) I can’t see them and 2) they can read the cover for themselves and I don’t have to even bother being rude to them.

    5. kristyq1 +33

      I was very excited to be interrupted by a man while reading “Shining Girls” by Lauren Beukes, because when he asked what it was about, saying “a time-traveling serial killer” was very satisfying.

    6. winterbymorning +29

      I have a coworker who is otherwise a pleasant, acceptable male specimen, but every single time he walks by my desk when I’m on break and reading a book, he feels the need to:

      ask me about the book
      tell me about a similar (except not similar at all) book he read in the past or maybe he didn’t even read it he maybe saw a book with a similar cover at the airport news-stand once
      ask me if I heard about the movie coming out that’s based on the book, or maybe it’s on the same topic, or maybe it’s not at all
      offer to lend me one of his own books that’s on the same topic or maybe just has a similar cover

        1. enic +7

          My fiance used to manage a large bookstore and so many of our friends are Bookstore People, and this question gives every last one of them nightmares.

    7. LeastBittern +109

      Once I was reading, and a strange man said,
      “That’s a good book.”
      “Yes,” I said, “I know.” He stopped talking, went to a different place, and let me continue reading unmolested.

      That was how I met my husband.

      1. blunderbusst +30

        Please tell us the rest of the story now! I am imagining that he continued to woo you in this incredibly quiet mannered way until you were like, “Well who is this very nice and polite gentleman who never bothers me ever but is still very cute.”

        2. LeastBittern +79

          I can’t really beat Wordsnatcher’s version, but yes, we were in a seminar together about thirty minutes later, and he was the second-best arguer there. I was the best. I demolished his argument, and he acknowledged I was correct, and then we demolished the inferior arguments* of everyone else in the class. At some point I thought “That was a good point. He is good at debate. I should fuck him.”

          He prefers I not share how indelicate my first kind thoughts about him were.

          (*Should we invade everywhere to avenge 9/11? Y/N. The fact that we were the only two people saying “what no, what? why?” in a college seminar is my personal metric for how off-kilter everything was in September 2001.)

          1. Unreadaethel +41

            So basically, you kicked his ass, he acknowledged this, then you joined forces to defeat everyone else.

          2. LeastBittern +61

            One of our friends insists he did this to preemptively win all arguments with nerdbros about Schrodinger’s rapist.

            “But what if I think she’s my one true love?”
            “Then eventually she will be in another place, receptive to conversation, and inclined to like you because you respected her boundaries.”

    8. valeriejeanpi +21

      ugh and “what’s it about?”

      oh i don’t know, let me try and consolidate several hundred pages of material into 2 sentences you’ll understand

  6. aravisthequeen +265

    That lady sewing in the garden while Tight Pants watches her? He looks like he’s about thirty seconds away from starting to mansplain to her about needlepoint.

    “Oh yeah, that’s great, but like, did you know that doing that kind of work increases your chances of fingerpricks like 500% lifetime?”
    “I did, actually, that’s why I have this boss thimble here.”
    “Yeah, well, that’s great and all but women aren’t naturally capable of sewing. That’s why all the best tailors are men. They just have a better understanding of like, the way fabric is made, and stuff. Women are really good at…..whatever that thing is you’re doing, it’s great. Is that a pincushion?”
    “No, actually it’s a dress for my niece’s doll.”
    “Oh. Well, real clothing is way harder. Tailors have like, the hardest job out there. Women are just naturally better at making like, decorative things, they have a better eye for colour. It’s like, a science thing.”

  7. msmuses +14

    Augghhh as a person who strongly prefers to initiate rather than receive touch (especially of the lingering, caress variety), I am getting short of breath seeing this.

    Doesn’t negate the hilarity, though.

  8. Ophelia +58

    FAVORITE SERIES.

    In my head, the lead-up to the woman saying “WHAT” is Stewie saying, “Ma, ma, ma, mama, mummy, ma, mommy, ma, ma, mummy…” which is also my best friend’s ring tone for when her mom calls.

      1. Ophelia +26

        Sigh, sorry. Just that one little piece has now bled into my life. It could be any toddler*, really.

        *all of them, perhaps? They stop being toddlers at some point, right? *flops back in chair with slight air of desperation*

        1. sceps yarx +15

          During the next phase, they start mixing “mom mom mommy mom” with “mom, leave me alone, I can do it mysellllf!”, and five second later it’s right back to “mommmm, why aren’t you helping meee???”

          1. Smitty +9

            This morning I tried to get a booger out of my 2 year old’s nose, and he said “No, Mommy! Don’t touch my boogies!”

  9. dorkmuffin +99

    “oh i get it. because reading quietly by yourself is an invitation for someone to talk to you.”
    “god got you preggo.”
    “can god push me down some stairs, too?”

      1. EPWordsnatcher +91

        “Annunciation paintings are hilarious.” WORD:

        edit: please note TINY FLYING JESUS BABY WITH CROSS COMING IN THROUGH THE WINDOW

        1. aravisthequeen +71

          “I know this is prolly important because you have wings and everything but, like, can it wait? I just really want to finish this chapter.”

        2. pieismyreligion +45

          “Maybe if I don’t look at him he’ll take the hint and go away, and take that damn Holy Spirit with him”

        3. queenofbithynia +50

          that is the holy ghost flying into her ear to knock her up and the angel is just there to distract her, right

          why all these annunciation paintings don’t show Mary with super big ears to display her fitness to be the lord’s vessel I really don’t know. that is what god likes in a woman, the way human men like an hourglass figure. you just picture god paging through Big Ear Magazine up in heaven trying to pick out a lady

          1. dorkmuffin +23

            My favorite is when the Holy Spirit gives someone stigmata, and you get like, laser beams. Laser beams of the lord.

            St. Francis is the best example of this:

            Domenico Veneziano:

            Giotto:

            Bonifacio Bembo:

        8. dorkmuffin +2

          I feel like you’ll enjoy the stigmata paintings of Saint Francis that are a few comments down (shameless self-promotion). Mostly because of the holy laser beams.

    2. hugpunch +25

      “did you see my new scepter? it matches this awesome new robe…”
      “oh congrats; here, i’m clapping for you, yes this is my excited clapping face”

    2. Goomaly +20

      There were a lot of ladies with “fuck you” hats at the county fair this weekend. Just big ridiculous hats.

      “Fuck you I like hats and don’t care what you think”

    1. Ethylbenzene +40

      It’s my neverending love for these posts that finally encouraged me to sign up for and IntesneDebate account, because I love them so much and need to tell Mallory that at all times, especially when she is trying to read something else.

      1. ramina +18

        Your IntenseDebate name is really tripping me out because I work in environmental consulting and just wrote a whole paragraph about ethylbenzene contamination in groundwater here and I swear, it’s following me

        1. Ethylbenzene +37

          I am a former environmental consultant! I always thought that Ethyl Benzene sounded like some kind of librarian superhero so when I needed a nom de ‘net, I went with it. Her sidekick is obviously Lad Xylene.

  12. deleted3602194 +17

    On the 5th pic, the one with the pitchfork guy: there’s a lesbian version of it in a book of collected Oprah’s magazine articles. As the cover for an article about how fluid ladies’ sexualities are. It was lovely.

  14. Hunter Felt +10

    I have been the Needlepoint Dude. Acknowledging this fact means that I’m free from not having to change my behavior, right? Sweeeeet.

  15. deleted9457019 +6

    Great. Now I’m going to spend all day wishing I was instead lolling around in the surf. (I assume they want to be there, otherwise they could just swim away?)

  17. projectbeks +16

    I would post a long comment about how great and accurate these all are, but it’s too late, I’m dead.

    3. yourbittergirl +12

      My friend’s boyfriend wrote her a haiku once where the final two syllables were “sad face” 🙁 That’s how we knew he was a keeper.

  19. Lost Era +9

    Isn’t #4 supposed to be the conversion experience of a fallen woman? (Help me out with my art history!) In which case, she really is supposed to be wanting to GTFO.

    1. queenofbithynia +34

      that’s what I was taught in art history. it used to be you could seduce a woman into vice by playing her sentimental piano ballads from an easy chair but the flip side was they would have pretty regular epiphanies about how that wasn’t any fun.

    2. BobbieWickham +35

      You can tell he’s a dissolute rake because one of his gloves is off and on the floor and he, like, doesn’t even care, man

    3. hopelessshade +15

      She’s a kept woman in her boyfriend’s garish little pied-a-terre, yes. I was fascinated by this painting as a child because her expression is so WACKO and the room is just completely claustrophobic.

    4. Bryn (Plus Others) +20

      Yes, yes it is, we wrote a whole paper about it in university, that painting and Lady Audley’s Secret (which subtly? obscurely? references said painting). It’s _The Awakening Conscience_ and Ruskin loved it because she is leaping up and realising how wrong she has been to be a Kept Woman!

        1. Bryn (Plus Others) +4

          Given the whole Rose la Touche thing, his perpetual virginity might have been a wise ethical move.

    5. aravisthequeen +21

      Did you notice the cat beneath the table going “Aacck!!” Like, WTF lady, if you’re not going to sit in my owner’s lap and let him fondle you at least don’t startle me leaping up from the piano like that.

      1. gripyfish +9

        I think I remember reading once that there’s a bird that’s escaped from the cat’s paws (just as the woman is escaping from the Vile Clutches of Adultery!), and yet I see no bird in the painting, and it’s always bothered me.

        1. Absotively +10

          Oh, I see it! It’s directly below the cat, above the table leg. It kind of blends in with the carpet.

      1. testingwithfire +6

        It’s a pretty introvert-friendly culture here – there are actually well-concealed nooks, FURNISHED WITH BOOKS, where one can sit and read on a break. Our HR department has a clue, and I am a lucky chick.

        Another key is not to eat lunch at your desk.

  22. maccrocodile +36

    I’m starting to wonder if anyone has ever enjoyed sitting for an artist.

    “I want this one to be pretty. Smile a little bit for me.”
    “I am smiling. :|”
    “Yeah… okay. Let’s do that, then.”

    1. Ethylbenzene +25

      I’ve done it once or twice for friends and it’s incredibly strenuous and difficult, especially when you’re in some weird position that initially feels like it could be comfortable and then in like ten minutes your ankles fall asleep and your ears start to hurt. The people who pose for figure drawing classes get mighty respect from me.

      1. maccrocodile +10

        Your ears start to hurt? What in god’s name…

        “Okay, that’s good right there. I want to try something else here, is that okay?”
        “What are you thinking?”
        “I want to hang five pounds of meat from your ears with these dull, rusty meat hooks.”
        “Five pounds from each ear, or total on both ears?”
        “That’s a good question. Can we do one configuration, then the other? This should just take a few extra days.”
        “Yeah, okay. That should be fine.”

        1. Ethylbenzene +9

          Hahaha not quite that bad 😀 I was sitting with my head resting on my hand and you know how sometimes you wake up and your ear is all owie from laying on it (maybe this is just me though?)? It was kind of like that.

  23. ramina +34

    this is just so exciting i have to close my eyes

    Every work meeting ever, I relate to you sleepy bored blue dress lady

  24. katjaellen +65

    I would really love a “best of” list of “Women Being Pestered by Cherubs in Western Art History”

    2. readalongcassidy +19

      Nicole should totally write that one because ALL MOMS TOTALLY UNDERSTAND THAT FEELING. “mom, hey mom. mom? mama? HEY, MOM.” (etcetera, forever)

    1. queenofbithynia +14

      HA I just realized since you mentioned that that the poor woman whose neck he’s trying to break is at least a foot taller than that guy. he’s on his feet and she’s down on her knees just to aim for his level.

      and his NECK

      and the way she’s trying to pry his one hand off her face with her other hand

      I don’t hate Klimt especially but I hate this painting a lot

      1. winterbymorning +23

        I saw it IRL and there was such a crowd around it of people murmuring about how romantic it was.

        No, it’s actually just SUPER CREEPY AND WEIRD

        1. queenofbithynia +55

          that moment when you realize a guy is going to kiss you and you don’t quite have the balls to stop him entirely because you fear social awkwardness more than unwanted contact but no way are you going to kiss him on the mouth so you just turn your head and he sort of flounders around on the side of your face and then you say good night and go inside to stew in your own timidity and then dip that side of your face in a pot of boiling water

          IMMORTALIZED IN ART FOREVER

          I mean at least it’s evocative

  27. Laura +27

    “WHAT” is definitely my mother. My brother’s and my mom-pestering was so persistent that we still send her emails with subject lines that say “Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom. MOM. MOM!!!”

    And the hat in #2 is relevant to my interests. I would like to subscribe to its newsletter.

  28. typewriterandgramophone +14

    Mallory, you’re lovely and you never disappoint.

    I actually have bought hats with large, low brims so I didn’t have to look at people. Also, I would love a shawl like Awakening Conscience’s, but there must be a better way of getting one than by letting Mr. Muttonchops play your piano.

    1. Bryn (Plus Others) +16

      Watch out! That shawl is part of the tawdry modern culture which surrounds her, in which nothing is Sanctified By Long Usage and thus it is not a true home and so you know she is fallen! Oh the fatal newness of that shawl!

      I like to think of Holman Hunt being so determined to get the details right that he went and rented one of the sets of rooms in St. John’s Wood where men really did keep their mistresses, and sitting there carefully painting the wood grain on the piano and everything. But then this is the same man who tortured a poor goat by the Dead Sea in his quest for perfect accuracy…

      1. typewriterandgramophone +2

        Holman Hunt had…shawl issues. In this posthumous portrait of his first wife he put all his anguish into the paintwork on the shawl: http://www.wikiart.org/en/william-holman-hunt/por… (“Desperate Romantics” was trashy tv, but I was sorry they didn’t do another season that included all the William/Annie/Fanny/Thomas Woolner/Alice/Edith Love Dodecahedron. All those Waugh sisters would be great subjects for drama.)

  29. Mephyle +3

    Now I wonder, did the artists KNOW what the women were thinking. Their expressions are so perfectly matched with the dialogue. Were any of the artists women, and in the cases where they were not, HOW did the artists KNOW?

  30. singstrix +6

    I’m super-distracted by the Marcus Stone one (big hat / no heart + Napoleon-hatted beau) — painted in 1907, but THAT UNCORSETED BOSOM?

    1. winterbymorning +7

      What on earth is going on with that woman in the upper right, that does NOT look like a shape that the human torso could possibly take on, corset or not

    2. Cricket +12

      Fashion history is one of my favorite things in the world, so I think I can help here! Marcus Stone seems to paint a ton of his women in clothing that belongs to an earlier time period. The dude’s clothing is actually a big indicator this wasn’t meant to portray a couple from 1907, because he’s just as period inappropriate as her: the cravat, bicorn hat, high cut tailcoat, and the Beau Brummell hair all align with the time period of her dress, which is definitely early Directoire/Regency period rather than Edwardian.

      Neither of them are in period appropriate clothing for 1907, which would be way more structured for her, as you said–the “pigeon breast”/Gibson Girl silhouette being super popular right around then–and men were wearing things that more closely resembled the long, lean lines of the 1920s by 1907: more modern three piece suits/ties/bowties/blazers/boater hats/etc.

      The only sorta 1907 thing going on in her outfit is the hat/hair, which is kind of odd and still not super period-appropriate. But hey, I still dig it. Also–can we talk about how horrifying “health corsets” were?! What kind of organ-shifting nightmare

      1. singstrix +3

        Fashion aside, it’s pretty great that in at least TWO paintings Stone titled “In Love,” it’s a case of a Man gazing while the lady in question totally ignores him. (Even as she ,confoundingly, appears to be in gossamer-y, breast-hugging muslin.)

  31. winterbymorning +119

    idk, i guess i just thought
    all that “solitary contemplation of the Divine” you were talking about
    would involve some actual solitude
    0/10 convent would not join again

  32. Marste +26

    “but i have to keep running away from you”

    This reminds me of the movie “Roxanne,” with Steve Martin and Daryl Hannah. (If you haven’t seen it, YOU NEED TO.) There’s a scene in a bar where someone is pestering Daryl Hannah, and she finally smiles sweetly and says, “I’m sorry, I have to stop talking now,” and just turns her back. It’s FANTASTIC.

    I may or may not have used that line on particularly irritating men after that.

  33. leslieellenjones +37

    Actual quote from the First Branch of the Mabinogi (probably 10th century Welsh; earliest ms. 14th century):

    [Terynon enters the bedroom in the middle of the night.]
    “My lady,” he said, “are you asleep?”
    “No, my lord,” she said. “I was asleep, but when you came in I woke up.”

    There has to be a painting of this.

    1. HotDoom +6

      10,000 Mabingion reference points awarded to thee, fellow medieval Welsh knower. Between your comment and the OE Cat in the Hat, my nerd cup runneth over today and IT’S GREAT.

        1. HotDoom +4

          Yes! That is awesome. I was accepted to a programme to do my doctorate in medieval Celtic literature, with a specialisation in Welsh, but…then I didn’t, and took a total career turn instead. But part of me wishes I HAD done that, because it is so rich and interesting.

    2. JGH

      I love the Mabinogi, its dialogue is eerily realistic sometimes, despite the plot being absurd. When I came across that part in the book my wife jumped a little in surprise as I laughed out loud.

  37. Unreadaethel +11

    Oh god #1. He’s played so many solos that all his bros are bummed out, and he still thinks everybody wants to hear his dopey fluting.

  39. Lei +10

    Dearest Mallory,

    As a heavily engrossed and invested “this is the first time I’ve been on the-toast.net” reader, I would like to propose that we marry. I chose this particular article to propose to you so you could cleverly turn down my advance, in the same fashion these art historical women have. It was a toss up between this one and your thesis on Criticism: http://the-toast.net/2014/09/19/no-criticism-than…. Once you decide I’m not marriage material, but am witty enough to want to befriend and banter for hours, please contact me via all of the social networking venues. @grrrir would be appropriate, as I am hidden on facebook.

    I eagerly await your response,
    Leina`ala Robinson

  40. kwillmoreeldred +16

    it’s so nice having you here
    so nice having you here while i’m trying to finish my work
    most of my friends would leave me alone when i’m trying to finish my sewing
    but not you
    i think it’s so lovely, how you do that
    normally it’s just me and the peace and quiet

    My last relationship, in a nutshell.

  46. Miss_Dahila +3

    “I have my needlework and my secrets” could be an entirely accurate motto for the 18th century.