Mr. Right or Mr. Second Best?

Are you on the lookout for Mr. Right? If you are, then be warned: one woman has set out to prove you wrong! Lori Gottlieb, author of Marry Him: The Case for Settling for Mr. Good Enough is urging single thirty-something women to give Mr.Second Best a chance. Her book has caused a storm, but Lori Gottlieb argues that she wrote it from experience. A 40-year-old single mother, Lori Gottlieb wishes she had ‘settled’ for one of the men she rejected when searching for the perfect man. She says that these men were ‘perfectly acceptable but uninspiring’.

Lori Gottlieb says that her dream, like that of her mother and grandmother, was to fall in love, get married and ‘live happily ever after’. She believes that women have trouble admitting to this dream nowadays, but that it still holds true. ‘Ask any soul-baring 40-year-old single heterosexual woman what she most longs for in life, and she probably won’t tell you it’s a better career or a smaller waistline or a bigger apartment,’ she writes. ‘Most likely she’ll say that what she really wants is a husband (and, by extension, a child).’

It will come as no surprise that her views have caused a stir among feminists, especially as the American author argues in favour of the ‘traditional’ family and the role of women as wives and mothers. But in Gottlieb’s opinion, women who insist that they are self-sufficient are often kidding themselves. ‘In reality, we aren’t fish who can do without a bicycle; we’re women who want a traditional family’, she writes. ‘Every woman I know – no matter how successful and ambitious, how financially and emotionally secure – feels panic, occasionally coupled with desperation, if she hits 30 and finds herself unmarried.’ Gottlieb believes that every book, television show and film sends the message that romantic love and happy-ever-after go together. ‘We’re conditioned to crave that Big Love’, she says. ‘We grew up idealising marriage, but if we’d had a more realistic understanding [...] we might have done things differently. So we walked away from uninspiring relationships that might have made us happy’.

Gottlieb suggests that there is a big difference between what makes a good romantic relationship and what makes a good marriage. ‘Marriage isn’t a show of passion’, she says. ‘It’s a partnership.’ With this in mind, she believes that settling for Mr. Second Best could actually make women happier, especially if they are looking for a reliable life companion.

The author Elizabeth Gilbert takes a different view. In her opinion, women should stop believing that marriage will make them happy. ‘We marry most often because we are in love and we think it will make us happy, she writes in her new book, Committed: A Sceptic Makes Peace with Marriage. ‘Yet married women are more likely to suffer from depression than are single women. Married women are not as successful in their careers as single women. The fact is women generally lose in the exchange of vows.’

An article Gottlieb wrote on the subject of settling for Mr. Right caused a stir when it was published two years ago and then picked up by Oprah Winfrey’s O magazine. Some readers loved it and others hated it! Warner Independent and Tobey Maguire’s Maguire Entertainment have bought the book and film rights. But will the film be as successful as Bridget Jones?!

By Bex

Faut-il attendre un Prince Charmant incertain ou se contenter d'un prétendant de « deuxième choix » bien réel ? (A écouter en V.O. (cliquez sur le fichier MP3) à la fin de l'article. A noter également qu’en passant votre souris sur certains mots, ces derniers apparaissent traduits en surimpression.

Article publié en partenariat avec MyCow.eu