Woman; Nora Ephron on Everything

[music] [music] [music] [music] Good evening and welcome to Woman. My guest this evening is Nora Ephron. Nora is a columnist and editor for Esquire magazine, and she is the author of the bestselling book "Crazy Salad." Nora welcome to Woman. [Nora] Thank you. [host] Nora you've been on the road a lot lately hustling the book, I hate to use that word.

but [talking over each other] [Nora] That's exactly what it is, and..and you get to...you get to a point where you think you're going to die of terminal narcissism because it is so... you know it's eight or nine shows a day and...and you're really a little dippy, uh, and tired of...of hearing yourself talk. The other thing that happens is that, I mean I was in Fort Worth last week, and they took me to this show that was called "Good Morning," so I thought it was your normal "Good Morning" show that exists in 87 cities around the country. Well, I got there and I watched it for about 10 minutes and I realized that the reason I was on this show was that they thought that "Crazy Salad" was a book about lettuce. It was a farm news show and it was me and a cattle rancher and a catfish farmer and we were all supposed to make wonderful conversation together and it was just insane. And at that point I thought, "This is it," you know. I've had it. [host] You mean it isn't about lettuce? [laughs] [Nora] It's not about lettuce. [host] Oh my goodness. Yeah.

Nora, one of the criticisms that's leveled at the women's movement, that I think is, um, in part true maybe, uh, that you seem to be the only person to be doing something about it, is that there's no humor in the women's movement. Well, I think - you know, I think it's an interesting criticism because I don't remember hearing anyone say that the Civil Rights movement and the peace movement had no sense of humor, um, and they really did not - I mean, it was not a barrel of laughs, protesting the war in Vietnam. And so, in some ways, I think it's a very easy poke to take at the movement, um, and that's how it's often used you know is as one of one of the easy ways to get out of an argument. But - but at the same time, I think it's a shame that - that people have not seen a little bit more of the humor in it because I honestly believe that if you don't, you would cry all the time, um, you know? And I'm not - I'm not so much dealing with with some of the very serious social

problems that the movement has to deal with but with - when you are trying to work the movement into your life and you find yourself having that terrible argument over someone's socks being on the floor and they are not yours. That's funny. And it's a lot easier to get through it if you see that and - and kind of see that every so often, you're you're playing a - a role in the - in something that - that happens over and over and over again. And, uh, it's a shame there isn't just a little bit more of it, I think. Do you have a lot of trouble criticizing the women's movement in your writing. 'Cause you do you have, you have done that on occasion. Yeah, well I think you have- I have as much trouble with myself as with anything because because I felt, when I was, you know, in the period when I really was writing about women all the time, it's impossible to cover the women's movement and - and tell the truth about it, which is one's obligation as a journalist, without - I

always felt in some small way, seeming to hurt it. Which makes one feel terrible as a feminist and I gradually worked it out that you know if the women's movement could not survive a little description of what was going on it and it wasn't worth anything anyway. But I'm always surprised at the amount of sort of this movement line about not criticizing things, um, and this is particularly true about women writers. We're all supposed to be sisters to one another and we're not supposed to say anything bad about anything that's written. There's a piece in the book about Pat Loud that I did and someone wrote Ms. that I was not a good sister to her because I did not like her book and I was fascinated by that because I think that that is asking us to be as condescending to women as we are always accusing men of being. It's really asking us to have different standards for books

that are politically right but miss artistically in some way. And I just - I just won't do it, you know? I don't think you can do it. And - and, you know, criticizing a book like that is not what keeps it from selling. Um. You know I I think we owe it to each other. That's interesting - especially in the light that there've been many critical reviews of women's books in Ms. Magazine. Well, I think that's more true lately than - than it used to be, and also I'm not saying this was the line of Ms. - although I think there is some of that over there - I think there's a kind of misguided notion as to what sisterhood is, and I - I don't think we do each other a favor by babying each other and pretending that we disagree. Um, you know, the - I - I'm not one of those people who believes that there's disagreement in the women's movement is bad per se because I think the - the more women realize that there is room for all kinds of women, the better off the movement's going to be. What - what I hate about the women's movement is that - that the

disagreement seems to be for the sake of disagreement, rather than for anything else and they - that's what they seem to spend most of their time doing these days. I'm very depressed about it today. We - we were having a conversation earlier in which you said if a political party, uh, had - either the Republican Party or the Democratic Party - had some of the things going on within it that - that the women's movement does that, you know, it would have been destroyed a long time ago. Oh, we would have 96-party system in America - that's - that's what would happen. I - I'm very perplexed at it, you know? I'm perplexed that - that - that there's so much splintering off, rather than taking a particular organization and working within it. And it seems to me extremely counterproductive, um, as a lot of what the movement seems to be up to, is I've come - I've changed my mind on it a lot in the last few months. Um, it seems to have gotten worse to me than it was even a few years, so... Do you think it's actually worse or that it's more public for the first time? I mean... No, I think it - you know,

I think in 1972 when I went to the Democratic convention, it was certainly public what was going on in terms of the infighting there. But it was all too - to an end end, and some things happened or some things didn't happen. Now it just seems to be a lot of fighting and - and that, I find very enervating. There seems to be a, really, a childish quality about an awful lot of it. Oh, you have this feeling that - that they're all sitting, you know, it's like a little group of girls and they say "Well, if you don't want to play jump rope, I'm just going to go have to find someone who will play with me," and you - it makes you crazy to feel that about it, you know? That - that they just don't sit there and work this out in some way. You know, on the other hand - I'm so full of on the other hands, I could kill myself - but, you know, one also likes to think that if we really believe in liberation, women ought to fight - get to fight politically among themselves as much as men do. It's just that, um, at a certain point, I'm tired of it and, uh, and I think a lot of women around the country are too, which is what is the

depressing part. I think you're right. I think there is a certain depression at this point about the whole thing. Nora, do you use a vaginal spray? What a - what a question! What a terrible question! No, I do not. I do not. and I don't think I ever would have, anyway - I think I was that intelligent, but - but, um, a few years ago when the product came out, I was so flabbergasted by it that I thought it would be interesting to do a long article about it, which is in the book, and I hope that's why you asked that question. That's exactly why. But, um, you know, I started out on that article just, you know, I just said "Well, the selling of the feminine hygiene spray - that's an interesting idea," and it took me over a year to finish it because it got more and more interesting. Um, first of all, the hexachlorophene thing happened which - which I had no idea of when I started the piece, um, I had no idea that the products were

actually physically dangerous as well as psychologically dangerous. And then, I went - started going around to see these manufacturers who really felt that they had, you know, they deserved a prize for introducing this product to the country that they had done a great public service. And one of them told me that there was a tradition for this product in the Bible and I thought he was kidding! I mean, I had not made the very obvious connection between this product and the purification rites that are common to all civilizations, you know, this - this anthropological thing that is almost everywhere that women are, in the natural state, unclean. And there still primitive groups that believe this who, you know, bury young girls when they go through puberty and in Morocco, when you have your period, you are not allowed to look at a cow for fear that it will stop giving milk. Um, the Orthodox Jews still have ritual baths for women after their menstrual periods.

So of course, it took me weeks to read all of that. I got really into that. And then of course, this thing happened that is sort of a writer's dream on a piece, which is when you find out a piece of information that you absolutely know means that your piece is going to work, even if it's the worst thing you've ever written in your life. I was talking to one of the scientists at Alberto-Culver, and we were having this sort of an interview, sort of a talk, sort of a fight - I don't know what it was. And he said to me "Well, we've tested these products and we know that they're more effective." And it - I took about a seven second delay before it occurred to me to say "How have you tested them?" And that was when he told me about this research center they have in Pennsylvania where these housewives come for four days in a row and every four hours, they take off their clothes - for the first two days, they just bathe. The second two

days, they use the feminine hygiene sprays and a professional sniffer sniffs them and rates them on a - on a scale of zero to eight. The housewives get something like $165 a week for this, which I suppose is perfectly adequate pay. Um, the sniffers, who are also trained to work in underarm odor - I mean, can you imagine this? - get something like $600 or $700 a week. It's a specialized field. Well, the minute you hear that, you think, "Well, you could not make this up." I mean no - no novelist could have made up anything quite as bizarre and crazy as this kind of set-up. And this is a feeling I often have as a journalist, you know, "Thank God I don't write fiction because I could never make anything like that up." That - I find that really unbelievable that someone would volunteer to go through this. I know! I know.Well, I mean, it's - I guess it's... First of all, I think I find it un - you know, I'm speechless. Yeah. I find it incredible that

first of all, the product is on the market, that they... Well, there is one - you know, there is some good news about this product which is that it is not selling much at all. When I did the piece it was selling, I think, $50 million worth of spray a year, which was extraordinary for a new product. Now I think it's down to about $10 million which is - which is almost something we can take hope in, you know? You do not see those peculiar ads, um, they used to have on television that you - you know barely knew what they were for. They looked like cigarette ads - people were sort of walking dreamlike by the ocean and there was this odd little voiceover that seemed to refer to feeling good about yourself that you never knew what it... [interrupted] I think it's true that people didn't know for a long time what they were exactly for, what you did with them. I think maybe you've contributed to getting rid of the last $10 million. Oh, I hope so. I hope so. Nora, what is the most difficult liberated-type thing that you had to learn to do, or adjust to do?

Well, I think, you know, I think the thing that's hardest for me to do - I don't think I had too much trouble as a professional person, partly because my mother had worked and that was a terrific leg-up for me but I think - I think working out the personal kinks were - were the worst part. And - and I see an awful lot of it still going on and it makes me - it makes me very sad because I think that the one thing the women's movement has done is that we now understand a great deal of what has happened to us as women. We have, quote, "identified the sources of our oppression," unquote. We know that this is society is set up in certain ways that don't help women and that x and y are true and so on and so on. And what seems to me to be going on is that there's a tremendous amount of being victims as a result of this. Everyone is sort of wallowing in this, um, "Look what they did to me" and

"Look what he did to me." "I couldn't possibly do that because look at the way society is structured" and I don't understand this, um. You know, we now understand some things and it's time to get on with it, it's time to stop blaming people for whatever unhappiness there is in our own lives and take some responsibility for it. And I don't see as much of that as I wish. Um, I see a lot of people walking around saying "Oh, God," you know, "look what happened to me." But there are people who say that nothing has changed essentially, in spite of the women's movement. Now, if you accept that, do you think what you're saying is still true? I don't accept that. Um, I think a lot has changed and - and, uh, you know, starting with the fact that you can get an abortion in America. this is, you know, the change this means for women is - is just enormous, I think. Um, I think Masters and Johnson have changed the sex

lives of almost every woman I know. That's - that's in only 10 years. Now, obviously, you can look around, you can see lots of things that are yet to be done. I see women in jobs that women were not in 10 years ago. I'm, you know, I'm more hopeful about women changing things than I am about the women's movement today. I think that a lot is going to happen simply as a result of this. There are more options. It's going to be much harder to grow up in this country now than it was when we were kids and think that what a woman became when she grew up was a housewife. You - you know, there are just too many role models sitting around for young girls to see. And so, you know, I have this kind of crazed optimism about all this. I see men changing, too. You know, I was just going to ask you that. I really do, um, and one of - one of the most interesting changes I see in older men -

men who - whose wives have never worked and who never wanted their wives to work [interrupts] 50s, 60s... No, I mean even 40s, right? Now I don't - that's not so much older, right? But I do think of them as older men in terms of this movement. And it's astonishing to me how you see these women going out to work and the men are so relieved. You know, it is such a burden to be responsible for another human being's income, expenditures, excitement, friends, life. You know, to have that thing where you come home to someone who - to whom really very little has happened in the course of the day and you're the one who has to bring in the world, you know, you and Walter Cronkite or something. I think this is, you know, it's incredible to see how relieved these men are as a result of this, so - they're also clearing the table, which is not

nothing. And doing the dishes and a little laundry now and then. Yeah. Nora, do you think that basically, though, that the relationship between the sexes have changed tremendously? I mean, what do you observe that seems to be happening there? Well, I see a lot of challenges. I'm thinking that... But I think - I think that - that, you know, there's - there's something in - in my book that - that always depresses me but I believe it very much that - that my ex-husband once said to me, which was that Moses kept the slaves in the desert 40 years not because it took 40 years to cross the Sinai, but because he knew this slave generation could never found a free society. And I think that there's a very, you know, horrible but true application of that to the women's movement that - that for a lot of women my age, it's very difficult to shake what you grew up with. Um, you can get to a certain point and you are still stuck with so many romantic and sexual fantasies that are so

deeply ingrained that it's very hard to get rid of them. And so, you know, I mean one of the things I wrote about in the book is something that I just hate about myself. If I'm having dinner with someone and he has trouble flagging the waiter, I just get furious. I think "Why can't he do that? Why isn't he better at that? Why isn't he better than I am at flagging the waiter?" Which is very hard because nobody's better than I am at flagging waiters. I will lie down in a restaurant and trip them if I have to to get their attention. But I find I'm stuck with this, this kind of insane, um, adolescent feeling about what men are supposed to do. So I say to myself, "Okay Nora, that it's absurd, that is sexist, that is a ridiculous expectation to make of a male human being." But I still had that feeling of rage, and I think there's an awful lot of that, that we have so many expectations about what men are supposed to be, And it's very difficult. And women are still quite willing to be subservient, aren't they?

Oh, I think so. I think, um I think, you know, the awful part about that is that, you know, if you want to be independent, um - which we do, right? One that - that is a goal - One of the difficult things is that any good, excuse the expression, relationship involves some dependence. And so, you're always pulled between those two two things, um, and that's a problem for a lot of women I know. The - the unfortunate thing about this - this seeming move toward subservience which is going on, this total woman thing, is that I don't - I don't see anything they're getting back from their husbands, um - I mean beyond the fact that they're all dressed up in these cigarette girl outfits... [interrupts] Well, they're getting credit cards. They're getting homes in the suburbs. I suppose. Clothes. You know, I read one article about that whole thing and that was the only thing that made any sense to me about it, which was in the Texas Monthly, and the man who wrote this piece made a suggestion that I found very

interesting which is that it was possible that one of the reasons they were doing this, these - these women who've been married a long time dressing up in little, you know, hot fudge on their nipples, right? Was because married women who have been, you know, long married have a tremendous amount of difficulty getting their husbands into bed. And that was the first thing I read about that that made any real sense to me, that it was about a kind of terrific sexual frustration that these are women who had probably only slept with one man, they read about the sexual revolution - they don't know what it is but they know they're not having it in their house. And that it may be some very pathetic effort to do that. I hope that's all it is, because it's - it's you know, it's pretty awful otherwise. Well, it's one level below the Stepford Wives. Yes, it is. And that's, you know, why I think lots of people find, it in a way, insidious. Speaking of sexuality. Yes. Are you ready for this?

One of the book reviewers in the New York Times, when he reviewed your book, said that he concluded that you treat your own sexuality like a Dutch treat. Um, Nora, Nora, what is that all about? I don't know. I mean first of all, I don't think he knows whereof he speaks, um, let us get that - I don't know what that means. Um, I found that review quite perplexing because it was full of things like that, that I know were - were meant to be compliments, um... But he said you were - he also said you were, uh, the perfect woman. Oh, something like that, but it was all very odd and it was - it was a very odd experience because it was - it was the kind of review that was so good that you felt terrible complaining about it and yet, it was so odd. And I remember after it, I thought of this joke that - that I knew when I was growing up about, um, the Jewish grandmother who takes her grandson to the beach and she gets wrapped up in this Mahjong game and the kid drowns, right? This is a joke. And

so, she's very upset, obviously, about her grandson drowning and she starts screaming at God and she says "God give me the kid back right this minute. I'll do anything for you if you give me this kid back but if you don't give me the kid back, I'm going to scream at you forever and drive you crazy." So after about 10 minutes, the kid reappears on the beach and she looks at the kid and she looks at the God and she says "Listen. He had a hat." That was exactly how I felt, you know? I didn't mean to complain but, you know. OK, I think - I think you've cleared that up maybe once and for all. There - there are lot of things that get blamed on the women's movement. One is the high crime rate. Another is the divorce statistics. Let's talk about that for a little bit. I mean, do you really believe that it's the women's liberation movement that is responsible for our high divorce statistics? Oh, I think - I think the women's movement has something to do with it, certainly, and I

don't think that's anything we should be ashamed of, um, I really don't. I think that - that a lot of marriages are breaking up earlier than they normally would have, and I think that's all to the good. You know, I think a lot of women are walking out after six years on things that 25 years ago, they would have stuck around for 30 years on and would have ended up miserably unhappy women with no lives at all. You know, I think there's another thing that the women's movement is affecting - I hope - which is that I hope that people are getting married with a little bit more thought than they used to. Um, I certainly know that I am not getting married partly because of the women's movement, you know, that - that there's, you know, that I'm thinking about things now that I never thought about the first time I got married. [interrupts] Why did you get married when you did? I don't know. I mean, I think - I think I was in love with my husband but I also think that I was - I was 25 years old and I thought "I am the oldest person I know who is not

married" - I mean, I was so relieved. I got married when I was 25 years and 11 months and I thought "Thank God I just made it before I was 26." Now, that is insane. Uh-huh. It's really insane but I was thinking about it. I think it was what I thought you did. Um, I think I did it as much, you know - there was some little thing in the back of my head about, uh, showing my mother that I could get married because I don't think - I think she never believed I was going to, you know? She - she really - as much as she believed in me, um... [interrupts Hope with Nora] No, really, I remember once when I was in college and I was engaged I broke the engagement off, she was desolated by it and I knew this because she thought it was the only person foolish enough to ever ask me, and I'd just let it go by. But, um - but I do think, yes, I think the women's movement has a lot to do with the divorce rate and the other thing I think it has to do with it, which

makes me worry a little bit about these women getting divorced, is that I think a lot of them are getting divorced with odd expectations. Um, I think that - I think some of - part of these expectations are good. They want to go out into the world. They want to become something. It seems a difficult thing to do, given their situation. They get divorced and it turns out that what they really wanted to be was stars. They want to be... Like, how do you mean stars? I mean, they want to be whatever it is they want to be - uh, Novelists, television personalities, Whatever it is, they aren't thinking as hard about being good, about as much hard work as it takes to be that, as they are just in this kind of idea that - that it's all going to work for them in some magic way. And so, what you see happening, what I see a lot of, is that after about a year, there's a tremendous let

down because it's hard work to be good at something and that didn't cross their minds. It requires some talent. That didn't cross their minds. I don't think that a lot of them are - are putting themselves in the places for which they are the most talented. Nora, I'm sorry, we're out of time. Oh! This has been fun! Thank you for watching and goodnight. [music] Woman was produced by WNED-TV, which is solely responsible for its content

and was funded by public television stations, The Ford Foundation, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. [music]