So I wrote this about 100 years ago, but what the hey, I’ll publish it now. If there’s anything offensive, please forgive. I wrote this in the throes of the first trimester and morning sickness. Or don’t forgive because I’m pretty unapologetically blunt.
So I’m in this pretty eclectic book club. It’s cool because not many of us have a lot in common with one another and we each choose a book and lead the discussion that month. You end up reading books your probably wouldn’t have read otherwise, and the differing view points turn into really valuable discussion.
This month our book was Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. The concept is nice, warm and fuzzy, and unique. Woman ends hopeless marriage, messy divorce, travels the world for a year to find herself. Ok, the concept is vile, but sometimes these books turn out to be a lot more meaningful than you imagine, especially when one is really trying to understand their life, spirituality, and their place in the world.
The book begins by immersing you in Gilbert’s marital and somewhat mid-life woes. I think this is where she lost me. Gilbert’s dilemma? Her life was too suburban, too privileged (apparently she felt trapped by her expansive New York house and Manhattan apartment), and God FORBID, her husband wanted a family. No, he wasn’t forcing her. Apparently it was something they had talked about and more or less agreed on and she freaked out. Seriously, she freaked out at a friend’s party simply looking at her newborn. I’m not saying that women should long for a suburban life. I’m saying, those who don’t and then drag their husbands through the mud (and not into any sort of couples counseling) in search of themselves do not incur my sympathy. But whatever.
After a contested divorce in which she loses everything, during which she has a sordid and juvenile fling, she gets an apparently lucrative book deal that will chronicle her travels through Italy (eat), India (pray), and Bali (love).
Gilbert starts in Italy partially to finish learning the language and I think mostly to regroup. She is weary and devastated from her drawn out divorce. Italy was probably my favorite of her travels simply because of her vivid description of the FOOD. Even if I was cynical of Gilbert, I have to admit, she is a talented and entertaining writer. She pulled me in to her pizza in Naples, pasta in Rome, and really any food that she found anywhere. Along with her food are her colorful Italian friends like, Luca Spaghetti, Sophie the Swede, and her hot language buddy. To be honest, I don’t remember much about any of these character except in how they brought out the different sides of Gilbert that would be developed along the book. The caveat of Italy is that this is among the rawest of Gilbert’s writing. I don’t mean raw in a good way either. In Italy, I felt that she could not find her voice. She was an inconsistent narrator. There were times she seemed sarcastic, sardonic, wistful, romantic, inward, outward. While I would expect a woman who has undergone trauma to experience a range of emotions, I felt like I was reading different chapters by different people. In addition, the undertone of Italy is Gilbert’s emotional healing. Yes, she seems more whole by the end (evidenced by weight gain), but I felt every painful self-analyzing statement was followed by, “But I’m ok, really, I’m ok, right?” In all, I wasn’t convinced.
India is where Gilbert rests to find spiritual healing. It’s really the antithesis of Italy. Where Italy marked her, “no carb left behind.” journey, India is a 3 month ascetic adventure. In India, Gilbert joins a remote Ashram to further understand her spirituality through strict meditation. It’s a hard curriculum starting before the sun rises and ending after. There are early meditations, late meditations, long meditations, silent, sitting, walking meditations. Gilbert as a student of the Ashram is expected to embrace them all. To her credit, she goes in with an open mind, even when struggling with particularly arduous meditations. A turning point for Gilbert seems to be when she meets the colorful Richard, a Texas devotee, who seems to be the only one in the entire book who points out how ASININE Gilbert is. He points out how she lingers in her own personal trauma and in the mess with which she has filled her mind. He encourages her to listen and embrace her studies and to let go of her divorce. He is a breath of fresh air amid the long-winded spiritual droning that Gilbert insists on using to punish the reader.
If you’re looking for a feel good book in which the author finds huge daunting spiritual (albeit, a bit shallow) revelations in a short period of time on a seemingly endless budget, you’ll probably like the “Pray” portion of Eat, Pray, Love. I felt like it dragged and was a bit heavy-handed. You lose Gilbert the person, and only get Gilbert the devotee. It feels like she drones on and on and on about something she found in Religion for Dummies. It’s a lot more Buddhist theory and a lot less Elizabeth Gilbert. She also takes allowances when she describes other religions. Her blatant oversimplifications and comparisons between Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, to name a few, are both uneducated and offensive.
There are moments of poignancy in this chapter however as Gilbert introduces you to a young Indian girl facing an unwanted and upcoming entrance into marriageable age, and humor as she vows silence and is made an official greeter at the Ashram. I wouldn’t say that they redeem this section however.
Love, was probably my favorite section of Eat, Pray, Love. I felt as though it was where Gilbert and those around her were reminded of her humanity and Americanness. In previous sections where Gilbert had droned about her ability to travel and make friends, or to be transcended to the palm of God. Gilbert starts off her stay in Bali, Indonesia with a series of blunders simply through lack of planning.
Ok, I’m going to stop there. Truth is, favorite section or no, I really skimmed. There’s only so much self loving idiocy I can handle. I’ll sum it up in one sentence. White woman with Messiah complex tries to save brown people with no thought to indigenous culture.
Please don’t read this book.
It was a fine day, just not a good first Mother’s Day. I wanted some acknowledgement that I was giving motherhood my all and for someone to tell me I had done well…and maybe something to make me feel pretty. No dice. I mean, it’s not a really big deal. It’s just a greeting card holiday anyway, but somehow, it kind of stung.
I’ll leave you with pictures.
