I want to work.
”Don Draper, Shut the Door. Have a Seat
Freud defined sanity as the ability to work and to love. (I actually did some research on this saying for a book; some people think it’s apocryphal. Whatever.)
Archie Whitman could neither work nor love. He was a cold, mean-spirited man who cruelly told his wife, when she had a stillbirth, that she’d killed the baby. Meanwhile, he visited a local prostitute. He was a drunk who beat his son and cheated a hobo out of a quarter. Loveless, he focused on work, but ultimately that failed him as well and he died in the midst of his failure. How perfectly symbolic that he was killed while resigning himself to selling his crop at a loss; he was dead anyway.
Like father like son? Basketcase Vandi wisely observed that Don has an attachment disorder. He has failed to love in any mature way. He did love Betty, but he was incapable of being faithful, truthful, or reliable.
As his marriage came crashing down, he looked to the other side of the sanity formula: Work. (Mind you, Betty didn’t announce she was seeing a divorce lawyer until after the SCDP conspiracy began, but she’d already said she didn’t love him; Gods know what the interim three weeks were like at Casa Draper.)
“I want to work.”
Don has been disaffected at work for a long time. We’ve all pointed to his powerlessness in Season 3; his decreasing ability to be truly creative, but this has been going on for a while. It’s been downhill since “It’s toasted.”
Don Draper: If I leave this place one day, it will not be for more advertising.
Roger Sterling: What else is there?
Don: I don’t know, life being lived? I’d like to stop talking about it and get back to it.Shoot
Don was angry at Roger for selling the company and taking away Don’s control. I think Roger (who has been acting like he started a company) has been angry about this. How dare Don say there’s better and more than advertising!
Turns out Don wants to be in advertising after all. He looks at Archie, looks at a life without work or love, and says no.
Don capable of truly embracing work is Don halfway to sanity. I don’t think it’s a coincidence, then, that Don is able to repair his work relationships (with Roger and Peggy) as a result of this choice. The sanity of work has allowed him to make progress towards the sanity of love, if only, for now, loving his co-workers. This truly was an optimistic season finale!
So you do want to be in advertising after all.
”Roger Sterling, Shut the Door. Have a Seat
40 Responses to “To Work and to Love”
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I don't think Don "loves" his coworkers, but with his back against the wall, he looks at ways to appreciate them so he can spin his "pitches" to get them on his side. Don is salvaging what he can and has finally had the breakthrough that he can't do it alone, that other skills than his are needed to make the business work. The only thing that seems new to me about Don is his willingness to admit this to Peggy, Pete and Roger.
It's like the Tarot reading is finally becoming "real" to him, but it was talking about work and not his marriage.
“People with insecure, anxious attachment styles are more likely … to form perceived social bonds with television characters.â€
– John T. Cacioppo and William Patrick in their 2009 book Loneliness: Human Nature and the Need for Social Connection, page 258.
PJ Hah!!!
MW speaks of Don as achieving true growth in this episode- (by realizing what he really wanted- work- and going for it) but I disagree. To grow requires love and to love requires self- denial. Everything Don has ever done has been for himself- he can't say NO to himself. I think he remains a perpetual child at best; at worst, a handsome "devil".
Betty- for all her coldness – has sacrificed her career and autonomy to be his wife and the mother of his kids. I truly think if he had honestly and passionately showed her he loved her, she would have stayed. But he has her and his family only because it suits his image; when he wants another woman- he takes her; when he wants his freedom, he disappears, sometimes for weeks at a time.
I was very disappointed at the end of the season because I was hoping for development of an actual moral compass in Don. I think it was hinted at at the end of season 2 after he dips into the ocean and returns to Betty a reformed man. It was such an empty premise; he really couldn't change after all. He triumphed by giving up on his family and pursuing his new company, seducing his coworkers to come along on this venture, and in that universe- that's growth.
@ Roberta #12, I think the "Loneliness" quote indicates that if Don and Betty were alive today, they'd be Basketcases
LOL, ROTF
Archie Whitman was, in part, a result of HIS upbringing and impoverished life experience. Being a child during the Depression was bad; being an adult must have been worse because you were expected to DO something about it, in the face of overwhelming odds.
Don seemed baffled that, with everything she had, Betty wasn’t happy.
From very different positions in life, Roger and Peggy each seemed baffled that, with everything Don had achieved, he was no longer happy.
Of course, Roger was engaging in selective perception and omitting how his choices had impacted Don’s life. Because of secrets they’ve shared, Peggy seems to have more insight into Don than most of his coworkers, but there’s still far more that she doesn’t know.
Don had to be pushed into a corner in all areas of his life before he chose a new direction and a new way of treating his “significant others” …
I just don’t know if I believe that Don loves his coworkers … or anyone, really. Until he learns to love himself, he probably can’t give or receive love effectively. Chicken or egg? Can we learn to love ourselves unless others first treat us in a loving manner? I don’t know.
But I liked the season finale and the growth it implies — and this blog!
Off-topic, but no other busy thread to put this in:
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50% off all Criterion DVDs and Blue-Rays until November 23. Since most Mad Men fans appear to have high expectations for their TV shows and movies, this is a great time to expand your collection or do some early Christmas shopping.
It’s funny that you used a quote from “Shoot” since that ep set up Don’s dislike of McCann-Erickson, which helped fuel his desire to get away before they took over. We all believe this whole finale was set up way back when S2 ended, but MW couldn’t have started planting the seeds well before that….right?
"Sure, what Don said to Peggy, Roger, and Pete were “pitches†intended to get them to do something, but like all his other advertising pitches, it’s both about artifice AND genuine emotion. Whenever Don is pitching, he actually really means it. It’s the storyteller thing. That’s his particular talent.
Whether or not he follows up on his pitches in real life is a different thing altogether, but IMO, the complicated thing about Don is that you can’t conflate “pitching†or “storytelling†with “lying.†If he were just spinning all the time, he’d be pure villain. But he usually means at least part of what he says. Now he has to try to live that way, too."
In some ways, Don has not changed. It seems as if he pulling the same tactic he has with Betty in the past . . . twice. I hope that he will finally be able to keep his word with Pete and Peggy especially. But I fear that sooner or later, he won't.
Excellent points (given my antipathy towards work I now wonder if I am sane
). @1 Peggy Joan I think you are really on point too and really like the last point about loving one’s self first or others loving us first being a chicken and egg thing.
It could be argued that Betty has a bit of an attachment disorder herself. This also leads me to wonder, what is she doing for sanity? She doesn’t work (well she does housework, which counts, but Carla does a big chunk of that so that is more part-time for her than anything else). I hope she gets some growth and peace beyond leaving Don (and hopefully that Henry Francis too, fingers crossed he is Mr. Rebound).
Sure, what Don said to Peggy, Roger, and Pete were “pitches” intended to get them to do something, but like all his other advertising pitches, it’s both about artifice AND genuine emotion. Whenever Don is pitching, he actually really means it. It’s the storyteller thing. That’s his particular talent.
Whether or not he follows up on his pitches in real life is a different thing altogether, but IMO, the complicated thing about Don is that you can’t conflate “pitching” or “storytelling” with “lying.” If he were just spinning all the time, he’d be pure villain. But he usually means at least part of what he says. Now he has to try to live that way, too.
I wouldn’t say that Don “loves” his coworkers (although he does seem to have deep affection for Peggy). Rather, he’s learning some of the skills needed to have healthy relationships; he can translate those skills to his love life someday.
@ Dark Peggy, my twin — Thanks for the wee bit of love. I can relate to antipathy re: work. Do the crazies always end up in charge or does being in charge make them crazier?
Re: Betty’s attachment disorder. I thought it was cruel for Daddy Gene to criticize her so much, considering that much of Betty’s personality is the result of the parenting that Gene and his wife dished out.
Do I recall that Betty reminded their brother how the kids were fined for dinnertime conversation that Daddy Gene found unworthy? I am all for learning to have civilized conversations at dinner, but wow … no wonder she became a housecat. If she opened her mouth, she might be fined.
During her premarital employment, I doubt that anyone encouraged a model to express opinions. Have we ever heard Don ask her what’s wrong or what she’s feeling and then REALLY listen to the answer? I don’t think so. Each of them is a prisoner of the ways they were raised.
@ zg #5
Sure, what Don said to Peggy, Roger, and Pete were “pitches†intended to get them to do something, but like all his other advertising pitches, it’s both about artifice AND genuine emotion. Whenever Don is pitching, he actually really means it. It’s the storyteller thing. That’s his particular talent.
Whether or not he follows up on his pitches in real life is a different thing altogether, but IMO, the complicated thing about Don is that you can’t conflate “pitching†or “storytelling†with “lying.†If he were just spinning all the time, he’d be pure villain. But he usually means at least part of what he says. Now he has to try to live that way, too.
*nods agreement* A lot of what gives Don’s character a poignance it might not have otherwise is just how much of himself is in his pitches. Think of the climax of The Wheel; he is so caught up in his presentation to the Kodak people that he’s convinced himself of its reality, so much so that when he goes home and finds an empty house, he’s crushed.
One of the things I did at my last job (at which I learned a lot) was interview people for feature stories.
One man, who was retiring after 36 years with the company, was a former military man. He was sorry to be going. I remember one comment he made about his imminent departure: “I like to think I’m still useful.”
I think this gets to the heart of what it is about work for many people I know right now. They can’t say they love it, but in a time when work has become so scarce for so many, having something to contribute is important.
For me it’s a little different. I feel a real kinship with Don right now, because I actually do love work. I’ve been working since I was 15, and the one constant through all those years has been the sense of being part of something bigger than myself. I just like to help.
And when your heart is broken — for whatever reason — there really is nothing better than work to fix it. There’s always more. The workday never ends.
We are never so much disposed to quarrel with others as when we are dissatisfied with ourselves.
– William Hazlitt
On the matter of "love, work & sanity," here's something I found on the Freud Museum website in the UK …
Where did Freud say that mental health meant the ability "to love and to work"?
This formula was cited by Erik Erikson but it is not to be found in Freud's works, although the sentiment is sometimes implied. During his long engagement Freud stated that his own ambition in life was to have Martha as his wife and to be able to work (e.g. "Couldn't I for once have you and the work at the same time?" Freud-Martha Bernays 21 Oct. 1885). Freud also referred to Eros and Ananke [Love and Necessity] as the foundations of society. In 'Civilization and Its Discontents' (1930) he wrote: "The communal life of human beings had, therefore, a two-fold foundation: the compulsion to work, which was created by external necessity, and the power of love… ". (S.E. XXI.101)
http://www.freud.org.uk/about/faq/
# 11 – “People with insecure, anxious attachment styles are more likely … to form perceived social bonds with television characters.†– John T. Cacioppo and William Patrick in their 2009 book Loneliness: Human Nature and the Need for Social Connection, page 258.
Well, to paraphrase Freud: "Sometimes a great TV show is just a great TV show."
#15 Idle Hands,
That could be a nice idea. Unfortunately, I have a hard time watching other media these days. MM spoiled me for other things.
(Though I will admit to liking the way they've written Rick Springfield on Californication.)
#19
Huh? Some – many, I would say – movies which are part of the Criterion Collection are of equal or superior quality to Mad Men. I've just ordered Rainer Fassbinder's 1980s series [i]Berlin Alexanderplatz[/i], which is undoubtedly one of the greatest period-piece dramas ever produced.
I don't really understand the second part of your comment, either. Why are you bringing up [i]Californication[/i]? That show [b]is[/b] terrible, just like its spiritual brother [i]Entourage[/i].
Ugh, I don't know how tags work on this site.
@ Idle Hands, #20-21 — Instead of the square brackets [] use the angle brackets, a.k.a. Less-Than and Greater-Than signs. As you tried with the square ones, use "b" for bold or "i" for italic.
Don Draper: What you call love was invented by guys like me to sell nylons.
1:01 Smoke Gets In Your Eyes
I'm not thrilled with Californication, either.
But I am kind of tickled by the idea of a guy I had a crush on in the 1980's making fun of himself for a few minutes every week. It's really funny.
It is all ABOUT the Springfield. He's the guilty pleasure of my week.
Years back, Dr. Joyce Brothers said the main difference between men and women came down to the fact that women can bear children, and contribute something lasting. Men only have their work. She felt that explained why men were so competitive at work and why they would put work before their families.
I see some of that in Don. He's had a long period (part of S2 and much of S3) in which he was disaffected from Sterling Cooper. But for whatever reason — the fear of losing the ground beneath his feet, perhaps, or his marriage crumbling — he has snapped out of it. He knows that on his own, he can't make his mark, which explains his comment that "I can't do accounts." He needs an agency around him. Now, he cares, as Roger said.
Sometimes Sigmund Freud is just Sigmund Freud.
While Freud had a grasp of his meaning of work, his concept of love kept shifting and changing. At different times in his life, he defined love in different ways. He thought it a narcissistic impulse; at times a fusion of lust and affection; at other times an instinctual life force. He often tried to unify these various ideas but not always successfully. Without a specific definition of love, his reference to sanity is just mushy philosophy to me. Sanity is work and . . . something. . . something else maybe.
Don will discover that sanity is work and . . . concern for his children. . . and dependence on his colleagues . . . and fondness for his ex-wife. . . and desire for his next partner . . .and acceptance of his past . . . and . . .
And if Freud had meant love to be all those distinctly individual . . . “ands â€. . . then he may have been on to a bigger truth, but I have my doubts.
To paraphrase Charley Partanna, “if Sigmund Freud is so fuckin’ smart, why is he so fuckin’ dead?â€
What’s “love†got to do with Don’s happiness anyway? He’s the existential human. He knows “love†is an invented construct designed to be anything the adman needs it to be. He’ll be content with the smaller, genuine feelings that come from the material details and actual persons he can see and embrace; the simple joys that can be clearly defined and properly valued. Not the “Loveâ€, but the “Ands†that last.
Love is a shadowy symbol for a loosely defined mega-emotion that is touted to cure what ails ya. Love is snake-oil. Don thought he loved Betty. Don won’t be fooled by the huckster’s sales pitch again. His career requires him to assign meaning to an icon, but to know the icon is different from the actual product. Freud was right about pure sexual symbolism, “sometimes a cigar is just a cigarâ€.
But regarding love, Kipling was realistic and Draperish,– “ A woman is a woman but a good cigar is a smoke.â€
less of me – more of you.
esssssssmaaaaaayyyy! Be patient mon cherie. After Thanksgiving there's usually a few pounds more of me.
I noticed if I anagram "less of me" I get — "esme olfs". What's that mean?? Do you raise birds?
Got another Kipling-Draper quote, "Down to Gehenna, or up to the Throne, He travels the fastest who travels alone." That might well be the old Don's philosophy though, we shall see.
I re-watched Shoot (1.09) this weekend. It was eye-opening.
I think Don kind of LIKED that Betty wanted to model again, even though he was conflicted about the circumstances of her going to work for McCann becuase he knew they were both being played.
But, he was actually INTERESTED in what her day was like after modelling. And he was obviously turned on by her venturing out of her shell — they made love in the living room instead of going upstairs. I think he saw the spark of the old Betty, and he liked it. All in all, he was pretty supportive of what she wanted to do.
But unfortunately, Betty couldn't handle the rejection from McCann, and gave up the dream as quickly as she embarked upon it. She needs everything to be handed to her on a silver platter, I guess. When she came home and told Don she wanted to be a mother and housewife, not a model, I thought I detected a glimmer of disappointment on his face too. But he re-affirmed her choice, and told her what a wonderful mother she was.
I was surprised at how supportive he actually was in this whole endeavor, even though clearly he didn't like the game Jim Hobart was playing. But if Betty had told him "Don, I want to keep modeling" I do believe he would have supported her choice. I think he liked what he saw. He's always been drawn to independent, working women.
And then she went right back into her gilded cage and shut the door tight.
Don takes a lot of grief from fans over his treatment of Betty, but this episode gave me another perspective (not that I've been a big Betty fan by any means). Honestly, I was really anticipating that in re-watching it, having now seen 3 seasons, I would be much more sympathetic to Betty, and see Don for the controlling bastard that I know he can be. But that's not what I saw.
Anyone else have a take on that episode?
lessofmaaaaayyyyyyy!
(btw, A Streetcar Named Marge is one of my favorite episodes ever because Maggie gets to do a Stalag 17 thing from the Ayn Rand School for Tots.)
birds? idontthinkso. you could also be "some self," or le smoefs, a brooklyn version of those lovable little…whatever they ares. and they're blue.
…no way to make that les smoef, le smoefs grammatically correct.
but really, such a nihilist? a smurf nihilist?
what always got me about the Freudian view is its total patriarchal acceptance of female inferiority.
Of course, Karen Horney (yes, I want to make some silly Freudian joke here) Nancy Chodorow and Carol Gilligan, not to mention Irigaray and Lacan all took on aspects of Freud's assumptions – but the fact remains that, in order for Freud to be valid, someone has to operate from his assumption that the penis is all and that women can never have a penis and therefore women have babies and women can never be adults because they can never resolve their lack of a penis and, oh yeah, they also have to not totally break away from their mothers.
So… cigarettes were sold to females because they wanted to have a penis. But, hey, what if they didn't want a penis, but rather the salary a penis automatically conferred on someone? Or the freedom to travel, or drink a beer or choose where to live and work? It's much easier to view females as sick and inferior if, simply wanting to be viewed as an equal adult means her "problem" of penislessness is exposed.
anyway, it's all hocus-pocus, to me. an elaborate and useful renegotiation of the trinity as a secular rather than religious motif, sort of like the christians adopting pagan holidays (yule) and making them mean something else because that was the dominant ideology for power at the time. After Darwin kicked the stool out from under religion and the Enlightenment kicked god in the shins (more than a hundred years before), people in the west were trying to explain the world in a way that made sense… in a patriarchal world.
I guess that squarely pegs me as someone who buys into the idea of cognition, or the stories that we tell to ourselves, as the basis of many realities that compete for power. Freud's view is one of those, but not the only one. when you buy into Freud you get a free set of cultural baggage.
what's interesting, to me, is to step back from the cultural stories we have told ourselves to explain the world and wonder at that story that we are all chemical cocktails shaken in skin, that we are made up of more nothingness than somethingness, yet everyday we wake up and reality remains and our legs take us where we need to be.
when someone has, say, post-traumatic stress disorder, that person is not suffering because he or she has "mommy" issues. that person is suffering because we're made up of chemicals that can get out of whack because of circumstances, like a war zone, that overload the body's ability to respond.
it's like diabetes in the head.
/ramble.
this ramble brought to you by Folger's coffee.
Don not fighting Betty at the end seems typical of how he copes; he walks away and detaches himself from his old life. I wonder if he detach himself from Betty and the children as well.
However, in establishing in the new agency, he finally integrates an old life into a new one, and perhaps this lesson will help him integrate Dick Whitman, and his failed attempt at marriage into new, healthier relationships.
It's the first transformation we've seen where Don includes the old in the new, and that is hopeful.
Hey #30, yeah you. Did I phoneticize your esme wrong?
Wow. Gobsmacked am I. An esme tour de force! How do I begin to engage such a Tasmanian Devil of profound commentary? I’m afraid if I get too close, the residual static charge might be enough to melt my frontal lobe or possibly wither my willy.
Clearly you are positively redirecting all that subconscious “envy†into your writerly Mad skilz.
Brava! Sigmund would be proud of your effort in spite the evident handicap of your inferior gender.
Of course I keed, I keed.
I’m completely with you on calling out Freud for the misogynistic, paternalism crap. I very much liked “ when you buy into Freud you get a free set of cultural baggage.†Viennese Tourister fer sure. (Pete could land that account.) And Freud packs some racy unmentionables in the overnight bag no doubt.
Wait! That’s it. I get it now. Take Siggy’s cultural baggage back to the Draper bedroom, yank Betty to her feet, tear off the flannel nightgown and put her in a Freudian slip and THAT would FINALLY make THAT SCENE fuggin’ HAWT !!1!! for me.
You put so much more quality up there to respond to but my superego Costanza advises me to get out on a high note for the moment so I will take a few minutes now to anagram “penislessnessâ€. lol (I may propose to you again sometime tonight.)
here's a little something to entertain you while you do anagrams.
…are you making fun of me?
smurf nihilist.
I like the links the Lipp sisters have added with commentary on Betty. I can't watch this series with the idea that the characters are going to be anything other than screwed up. I mean, that's sort of the down and dirty definition of drama.
The anagramming is tough sledding. "spin senseless" works.
However, I did research and found that the antonym of "penislessness" is "vaginafularity". It's on the InterTubez somewheres.
I wanted to ask if they serve those chemical cocktails in lobby of the Pete Campbell Cineplex in your head or is there a seperate lounge next door?
I have no idea what fularity means but I can guess it has something to do with Hugh Hefner.
There is no Pete Campbell Cineplex in my head. it's more like the Peggy Joan Club for Ladies. German soccer players (no au pairs) walk around in their shorts offering flutes of champaign while Brazilian soccer players give massages and really cute gay guys wash and cut your hair juuuust right and no one has to have a roomie from Sweden or the surgical unit.
and, I ask you, women, are we not not-Spartans?
This cranium club of yours sounds like a not-so-innocent psychosexual diversion but Germans. . .Brazilians. . . hmmmm.
Aha! Not not-Spartans my arse. It's the rise of teh Fourth Reich!!!1!!
Godwin's Law! Godwin's Law!
However, in establishing in the new agency, he finally integrates an old life into a new one, and perhaps this lesson will help him integrate Dick Whitman, and his failed attempt at marriage into new, healthier relationships.
It’s the first transformation we’ve seen where Don includes the old in the new, and that is hopeful.
I know I'm late to the party here, but I definitely agree with this. In fact, it points to a disagreement I have with Deborah's original post: I don't think Don is rejecting or surmounting his father by throwing himself into his work. I think he's embracing his father in a way he never has before.
I definitely agree that Archie is a man who couldn't love. But I don't think he's a man who couldn't work. To the contrary — I think he's been portrayed, particularly this season, as someone who is unusually industrious, proudly committed to his labors to the exclusion of everything else. Indeed, when Don exclaims in the finale that "I want to work! I want to build something of my own!" he's bucking against the charge his subconscious put into Archie's mouth in "Seven Twenty Three": "What do you do? What do you make? You grow bullshit!"
But, of course, even as he's echoing his father's call to honest labor, he's rejecting Archie's insistence that it's something you have to do alone. That's what killed Archie — not that he lacked the ability to labor productively, but that he didn't value relationships. That he didn't love. And to regain the industrious part of himself, Don has to reach out to other people in a way Archie never did.
So at the same time that he embraces his father's working-class industriousness, he also relies on the vision of family, comfort, and support to which he fled to escape his life with Archie. It's the perfect capstone to a season that saw the walls between his two personae breaking down in ways small and large — for the first time, he embraces the breakdown. He allows himself to be Don Draper and Dick Whitman simultaneously.
Dev, that's a lovely way to express what happened, and I think you're exactly right. That's what made the finale so exhilarating and optimistic for me.
you know, I'm flexible. they don't have to be german and brazilian soccer players.
**poof**
okay, now they're all George Will clones.
…um, I take that back.
the antonym anagram would be senseless nips. ha! I am getting my Darwin on.
anyway, whenever I hear "Godwin's law" my brain feels funny because when I think of Godwin I think of William Godwin, the anarchist, and husband of one of my heros, Mary Wollstonecraft… well, not hero, but someone who was very interesting and ahead of her time in her life and thinking and part of the circle of William Blake and the guy who published all of them and then I think.. godwinlawanarchy?
hey, Godwin wrote a book called Caleb Williams that is a great read, even now.
it was one of the first mystery novels.
William Blake calls out Rudyard:
Do what you will, this world's a fiction and is made up of contradiction.
After one was won for him, The Kipper retorts:
Everyone is more or less mad on one point.
and looking at the clouds, Dougie Adams remarks:
This must be Thursday. I never could get the hang of Thursdays.
LOM reminds them it is now Friday somewhere and there's a really swell restaurant at the end of the universe.
All is well.