Chicken Little: The Inside Story (A Jungian ... - Inner City Books

The Letter 27
the difference. She herself has a kind heart. Her animus does not.”
And he read to me from Jung:
No matter how friendly and obliging a woman’s Eros may be, no
logic on earth can shake her if she is ridden by the animus. Often the
man has the feeling—and he is not altogether wrong—that only seduction
or a beating or rape would have the necessary power of persuasion.
32
“Think of her—or him, if you like,” said my analyst, “as the
dragon that guards the treasure. A sharp tongue is like a dragon
breathing fire. It’s the hero’s task to outwit the dragon. Frau B. is in
the right place, she separates the men from the boys.”
Indeed, and in the end I even came to like her.
Arnold and I like recalling the old days. It reminds us of where
we’ve been.
Meanwhile, Rachel had been rooting around in the mess on the
floor. Now she came up with one of Brillig’s early papers and motioned
us to be quiet.
“Listen to this,” she said.
It is common knowledge that the Grail is not only the fabled “lost”
container of Christ’s blood, but also a powerful symbol for the highest
aspirations of Western man. Though I am not a Christian and
have little time for the arguably spurious revelations of the Gospels,
I accept their metaphoric weight. Unfortunately, nothing of the sort
has been historically accorded to Ms. Little. On the contrary, she and
her poignant tale have been virtually ignored. Is this evidence of a
sexist bias? Racist? Chicken phobia? Even, perhaps, a patriarchal
plot?
I urge Chickle Schtickers to pursue these inquiries with vigor. We
have nowhere to go but up. 33
Arnold laughed and helped himself to an inch of schnapps.
“Brillig must be over eighty by now,” he said.
32 “The Syzygy: Anima and Animus,” Aion, CW 9ii, par. 29. I’ve never really
cared much for that interpolation (“and he is not altogether wrong”). Still, I think
Jung accurately captured a man’s primitive reaction to an abrasive woman.
33 “Innocent Icon: C. Little and the Holy Grail,” International Journal of Chickle
Schtick, vol. 12, no. 2 (Spring 1958), p. 108.