Victoria Mas > Quotes

“Although madness in men is not the same as that in women: men use it against others; women turn it in on themselves.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Truth to be told, whether free or incarcerated, women were not safe anywhere. Since the dawn of time, they had been the victims of decisions that were taken without their consent.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Dreams are dangerous things, Louise. Especially when they depend on someone else.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“The Salpêtriére is a dumping ground for women who disturb the peace. An asylum for those whose sensitivities do not tally what is expected of them. A prison for women guilty of possessing an opinion.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“A doctor invariably believes he knows better than a patient, and a man invariably believes he knows better than a woman; it is the prospect of this scrutiny that makes the young women nervous as they wait to be examined.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Few things are more painful than watching one's parents grow old; witnessing the strength ebb from a person one once believed immortal, seeing it replaced by an irrevocable fragility.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“The sole purpose of the corset was clearly to immobilize a woman's body in a posture considered desirable - it was certainly not intended to allow her free movement. As if intellectual contraints were not sufficent, women had to be hobbled physically. One might almost think that, in imposing such restrictions, men did not so much scorn women as fear them.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Libres ou enfermées, en fin de compte, les femmes étaient les premières concernées par des decisions qu’on prenait sans leur accord.”
― Victoria Mas, Le Bal des folles

“Somewhere between an asylum and a prison, the Salpêtrière took in those that Paris did not know how to cope with: invalids and women.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“They are no longer wives or mothers or adolescent girls, they are no longer women to be considered or contemplated, they will never be women who are desired or loved; they are patients. Lunatics. Nobodies.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“ The people who judged her, the people who have judged me. . . their judgement stems from their own beliefs. Unswerving faith in any idea inevitably leads to prejudice. Have I told you how calm I feel since I began to doubt? What is important is not to have beliefs, but to be able to doubt, to question anything, everything, even oneself.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Those who meet here are not equals: the doctor announces the fate of the patient; the patient takes him at his word. For the doctor, what is at stake is his career; for the patient, it is life itself. This rift is all the more pronounced when a woman enters the consulting room.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Often the truth is not better than a lie. In fact, our choice is never between truth and lies, but between the consequences that will follow each one.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“As long as men have pricks, all the evil in this world will go on existing.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Les rêves sont dangereux, Louise. Surtout quand ils dépendent de quelqu'un.”
― Victoria Mas, Le Bal des folles

“Relegated to the status of a common nursing auxiliary by this man who came to the Salpêtriére after the did. In the eyes of this man she has placed above all others, her years of loyalty and her devoted service have not earned her the right to have an opinion.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“(…) there was no truth capable of restoring a good name sullied by a lie.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“On ne sait jamais vraiment si l'on a bien fait de révéler sa vérité. Ce moment d'honnêteté, soulageant sur l'instant, se mue rapidement en regret. On s'en veut de s'être confié. De s'être laissé emporter par l'urgence de dire. D'avoir placé sa confiance en l'autre. Et ce regret nous fait promettre de ne plus recommencer.”
― Victoria Mas, Le Bal des folles

“What had shocked her when she first entered was the general inaction of the men present. Louise was lying on the stage, her left arm flailing, crying and pleading for help, and not a single man had intervened, as though they had all been turned into statues by a woman's despair.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Unswerving faith in any idea inevitably leads to prejudice”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Truth be told, whether free or incarcerated, women were not safe anywhere. Since the dawn of time, they had been the victims of decisions that we're taken without their consent.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Truth be told, whether free or incarcerated, women were not safe anywhere. Since the dawn of time, they had been the victims of decisions that were taken without their consent.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“La foi inébranlable en une idée mène aux préjugés. T'ai-je dit combien je me sentais sereine, depuis que je doute ? Oui, il ne faut pas avoir de convictions : il faut pouvoir douter, de tout, des choses, de soi-même. Douter.”
― Victoria Mas, Le Bal des folles

“Lekarz zawsze uważa, że wie lepiej niż pacjent, a mężczyzna zawsze uważa, że wie lepiej niż kobieta.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Far from the image of hysterical women dancing barefoot through the icy corridors, the atmosphere that prevails is the silent, day-to-day struggle of normality.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“La Salpêtrière es un vertedero de mujeres que ponen en peligro el orden social. Un asilo para aquellas cuya sensibilidad no responde a lo espera. Una cárcel para las culpables de tener una opinión.”
― Victoria Mas, Le Bal des folles

“Unswerving faith in any idea inevitably leads to prejudice.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Few things are more painful than watching one’s parents grow old; witnessing the strength ebb from a person one once believed immortal, seeing it replaced by an irrevocable fragility.”
― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball

“Es un momento extraño, cuando el mundo, tal como uno lo concebía hasta ese instante, recibe una sacudida y las certezas más íntimas se desmoronan y dan paso a ideas nuevas, que nos hacen descubrir una realidad distinta.”
― Victoria Mas, Le Bal des folles

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― Victoria Mas, The Mad Women's Ball