Reviews for The Story of My Misfortunes

The average rating for The Story of My Misfortunes based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2020-08-18 00:00:00 Andrew McColgan You know, some guys interpret the warning of taking "Heaven by storm" as an incentive to their aspirations. Such a one was Peter Abelard. And so, alas, was I - to the point of imperilling my health. Abelard, though, crossed A Bridge Too Far, by crossing the family of the noble young lady whom he was in the process of 'educating.' How did he do that? I'll let you guess. Bottom line: what, do you think, did noblemen do in the Middle Ages to young swains who crossed the fine line of propriety with their daughters? Well, I gotta advise you to read this short classic to find that out. Hint: it wasn't nice. How to put a permanent crimp in your social life... yikes. So here was Abelard, one of the pre-eminent theologians (and certainly the most unsettling of 'em) of the Middle Ages... forced for THE FIRST TIME IN HIS LIFE to humbly fall back on his faith. A comeuppance for sure. But if you're a believer like me, you'll see Higher Powers at work here! Whatever you may think, Sic Transit Gloria. That glory? Being the most famous and most popular religious teacher and author in late Medieval France - and now suddenly becoming an abandoned tattered Tibetan Prayer Flag waving furiously in the unforgivingly frigid Himalayan wind. Similar things happened to me in my life... Impelled by popularity and success to seek higher and higher honours, I crashed when Reality bit hard. The Daemon Knows, says Harold Bloom, that he's impelling you to a region remote from the Rose Gardens of glory. So a word to the wise: Follow your Heart and your Soul, not your Gut Feeling! Follow the RIGHT way... To the end of your Quest.

Review # 2 was written on 2010-11-23 00:00:00 Amirhossein Aminsharifi I've never understood why the story of Abelard and Heloise is considered romantic. Abelard was a self-centered whiner who seems to have had no reservations about violating his monastic vows and the trust of his employer. He finagled a teaching position with the plan of beating his student so that she would give into his sexual demands: he had entrusted a tender lamb to the care of a ravenous wolf. When he had thus given her into my charge, not alone to be taught but even to be disciplined, what had he done save given free scope to my desires... to bend her to my will with threats and blows if I failed to do so with caresses? Is this an interesting and revelatory passage concerning how ideas of "love" change over time and cultures? Yes. Is it romantic? Not to me, at least. I'd totally be there with Heloise's brothers, castrating the teacher who knocked up my little sister. This story also peeves me because it serves as an exemplar against education for women. Of course Abelard never blames himself for any of his problems; it is all due to the jealousy of others. For a text that is supposed to be romantic, Abelard spends a lot more time bragging about how brilliant he is and whining about how everyone is mean to him than thinking about Heloise. I suspect that most of his persecutions occurred because he was an intolerable prick. And who the fuck names their baby Astrolabe?