Because misogynists are the best of men.” All the poets reacted to these words with hooting. Boccaccio was forced to raise his voice: “Please understand me. Misogynists don’t despise women. Misogynists don’t like femininity. Men have always been divided into two categories. Worshipers of women, otherwise known as poets, and misogynists, or, more accurately, gynophobes. Worshipers or poets revere traditional feminine values such as feelings, the home, motherhood, fertility, sacred flashes of hysteria, and the divine voice of nature within us, while in misogynists or gynophobes these values inspire a touch of terror. Worshipers revere women’s femininity, while misogynists always prefer women to femininity. Don’t forget: a woman can be happy only with a misogynist. No woman has ever been happy with any of you!
Milan Kundera, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting
femininity, misogynist, women