ExtractShoshana Felman Silence gives the proper grace to women. Sophocles, Ajax Dalila: In argument with men a woman ever Goes by the worse, whatever be her cause. Samson: For want of words, no doubt, or lack of breath! Milton, Samson Agonistes Is it by chance that hysteria (significantly derived, as is well known, from the Greek word for ‘uterus’) was originally conceived as an exclusively female complaint, as the lot and prerogative of women? And is it by chance that even today, between women and madness, sociological statistics establish a privileged relation and a definite correlation? ‘Women,’ writes Phyllis Chesler, in her book Women and Madness, ‘Women more than men, and in greater numbers than their existence in the general population would predict, are involved in “careers” as psychiatric patients. ’ How is this sociological fact to be analysed and interpreted? What is the nature of the relationship it implies...