[Hac-announce] Coming up: "Lessons in Chemistry" by Bonnie Garmus | Saturday, July 19, 2025, 2:30PM to 4:30PM | Humanist Association of Connecticut

Mon Jul 14 19:40:01 EDT 2025

 Hi folks and greetings from Seattle:Sorry to miss the gathering, especially of this fun read. I can see why it was a best seller. I haven't been reading a lot of novels lately, so this was a welcomed change for me. The characters were all such "characters", especially Elizabeth, Mad, Six Thirty, even Calvin and Harriet. But that's the privilege of a novelist I guess. 
Garmus never specifically mentions Patriarchy, but the whole book is about the gender roles prescribed by Patriarchy and its key elements of hierarchy and dominance. Not only does Elizabeth defy prescribed femininity by not accommodating, she refuses to participate in Patriarchy's core collusion ; i.e., the "feminine" protecting the disowned fragility of the "masculine". No, instead she speaks truth to power. Nor does she show the reversal that's seen so often where the victim (feminine) has hyper-empathy for the perpetrator (masculine) and hypo-empathy for herself.
Is Elizabeth a feminist? She's portrayed as not only a scientist, but very much like Spock from Star Trek, which is typically masculine. It's not just that everything has to be logical, it's that she often has a very hard time accessing feelings - others or her own. The author doesn't make it clear whether she downplays emotion or just doesn't get it. Like most men, she seems to see her vulnerability as a weakness. On the other hand she certainly is fully capable of love, and she loves deeply and passionately. She's a fictional character and a fascinating one at that.
If the group discussion turned to feminism, I'd add a comment about the Patriarchal criticism of feminism that's gaining popularity in our hyper-masculine culture. It sees feminism as a threat, a competition - typical of the win-loose, power-over mentality of Patriarchy. It hears women say: "I am woman. hear me roar, now go fuck yourself!". It's incapable of seeing real feminism's message of "I am woman, I am strong, let's figure out how to work things out together". It can't see that the goal is to create whole people who can be strong and loving, affiliative but have boundaries, be tough and tender, vulnerable and accountable - without those attributes having to be rigidly tied to gender. It's so sad that here we are 65 years after Elizabeth's struggles, and we still have too few clear models for men or women to be free of who the culture says you must be.
All the best, Peter 
    On Saturday, July 12, 2025 at 01:43:11 PM EDT, webmaster--- via Hac-announce <hac-announce at cthumanist.org> wrote:   

   Coming up: "Lessons in Chemistry" by Bonnie Garmus | Saturday, July 19, 2025, 2:30PM to 4:30PM | Humanist Association of Connecticut   
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|  I hope you can join us for our July Book Discussion next Saturday.  |

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|  "Lessons in Chemistry" by Bonnie Garmus  |
|  Saturday, July 19, 2025
2:30PM to 4:30PM  |
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Our book for July is Lessons in Chemistry: A Novel by Bonnie Garmus.

>From Amazon: Chemist Elizabeth Zott is not your average woman. In fact, Elizabeth Zott would be the first to point out that there is no such thing as an average woman. But it’s the early 1960s and her all-male team at Hastings Research Institute takes a very unscientific view of equality. Except for one: Calvin Evans, the lonely, brilliant, Nobel–prize nominated grudge-holder who falls in love with – of all things – her mind. True chemistry results.

But like science, life is unpredictable. Which is why a few years later Elizabeth Zott finds herself not only a single mother, but the reluctant star of America’s most beloved cooking show Supper at Six. Elizabeth’s unusual approach to cooking (“combine one tablespoon acetic acid with a pinch of sodium chloride”) proves revolutionary. But as her following grows, not everyone is happy. Because as it turns out, Elizabeth Zott isn’t just teaching women to cook. She’s daring them to change the status quo.

“A kicky debut, this book tackles feminism, resilience, and rationalism in a fun and refreshing way.” – BuzzFeed
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