Three Women – Lisa Taddeo

Written by Lisa Taddeo, Three Women recounts the ‘love’ stories of three women, it is the ‘defining sexual relationships in three people’s lives’ (Witt). It is lyrical in it’s style and poses itself as non-friction, with Taddeo the omniscient narrator who spent 8 years getting to know each woman. In a sense it reads like a high-brow companion to the film How to be Single, which centres around the notion that a woman’s worth and personal story is told through her dating history. That relationships to a woman are integral though largely unsatisfying.

Love and relationships is inadvertently posited as patriarchal, something I was subconsciously feeling but hadn’t named. I have felt at the whim of men for my whole dating life, feeling as though I need to be selected, a man needs to consciously choose me or the ‘relationship’ is fleeting. I mean this in a bigger way than just deciding if you romantically like someone or not, I mean, I consistently feel disposable. Three Women has helped me see the universality of this feeling. Even when Lina begins an affair with a married man, he is the one who is calling the shots, she has no agency in the relationship. Her only agency is leaving her husband but even this garners little control for her. Furthermore, what is interesting is the two books which are cited by the women are Twilight and 50 Shades of Grey, both depicting problematic relationships. In Twilight it is a ‘forbidden’ love, Bella practically begs Edward into her life. 50 Shades on the other hand (in my opinion) depicts an abusive relationship, where Anna is controlled and (legally) silenced by Christian. In both men are cast as stoic, in control and a woman’s only power is temptation which the man consistently fights. Bright summarises this well, she writes that the two are marketed at ‘female audiences, which create an echo-chamber that enforces, romanticises and finally excuses patriarchal power’. Our literature is not only romanticising our submission but it is reinforcing male control. 

The patriarchal landscape in which this is set, casts the women in the ‘male gaze’. The women have internalised the male gaze, they are all conscious of how they are viewed by men. Sloane has sex with men her husband chooses for her because he enjoys watching her have sex. He’s voyeuristic and acts as a crew member on a porn set rather than the atypical husband.

Furthermore, victimhood is explored, Maggie is in a relationship with her schoolteacher when she is a minor. The relationship begins when Maggie confides in her teacher that she had a relationship with an older man. Their relationship unfolds much like a teenagers first love. In hindsight, Maggie begins to view this relationship as inappropriate and reports it, it goes to trial and he is found ‘not guilty’. On the one hand, it shows how a man is able to hide his crimes behind his perceived respectability and charm (in much the same way as Humbert Humbert was able to hide behind his education). On the other hand, it shows how Maggie just wasn’t the ‘right kind of victim’, her parents are heavy drinkers, following the relationship she enters a long period of depression and becomes a figure of pity but not one to be believed against Mr Knodel, Teacher of the Year. In my review of Lolita,  I made the point that we choose which children we protect. Maggie is seen as a fantasist, no one believes her, the act itself is not necessarily condemned, it is questioned, the focus becomes ‘why her?’ She is not the most popular, the most beautiful, so why would he go for her? Perhaps, it is not such a leap to suggest that this is exactly why he went for her, she was in prime condition to be groomed. Her easy silence makes her the perfect victim. Three Women perhaps also tackles how victims view themselves and perhaps in turn how we should change the way we view victims. Firstly, Maggie didn’t see herself as a victim, she sees herself as hopelessly in love with someone who reciprocates her feelings. And secondly, victims don’t have to be likeable and they don’t have to be victims for 100% of the time. I am in no way condoning this relationship, but the point I am trying to make is a situation can start off okay, sex can begin consensual, and become rape. To bring it back to Maggie, you can become a victim with hindsight, things don’t need immediately addressing as wrong to be wrong, hindsight can make them wrong. We can’t and don’t expect children to have this level of perception, knowing the inappropriateness of this relationship comes in full force with age. 

Maggie’s character is interesting as she belongs to the trajectory of female rage. The reactionary power of female rage, we see it online so frequently with the likes of #MeToo. We see women who are angry about how they’ve been treated and are speaking out. Maggie is punished for speaking out, but she belongs to a wave of female rage that needs to be heard. Perpetrators need to be accountable. I cannot stand, it is when people treat others however they want to without facing the consequences. Do what you want, but actions have consequences. People get hurt. The rage all three women in this narrative feel emerges ‘in relation or in response to that of the man or men in her life’ (Bright).

There is a solitude in Three Women, not only do the women face judgement, but they are also lacking in any kind of support group. As a woman reading this, it reinforces the importance of female companionship. When a woman is a victim, she inadvertently becomes a voice for all other women, however she must still fight to convince women that she is a victim. If we are making other women our figureheads for a better society, the very least we can do is support them, we need to stop judging fellow women so harshly.

Bright, Octavia, ‘Lisa Taddeo’s Three Women’ (in The White Review)

Witt, Emily, ‘Three Women by Lisa Taddeo review – an honest account of sexual relationships (in The Guardian)