Mme Josserand’s coaching of Berthe on how to catch a husband

Mme Josserand’s coaching of Berthe on how to catch a husband is an episode in Simone de Beauvoir’s analysis of marriage as women’s prescribed social destiny: after Berthe resists a man’s sexual advances, her mother rebukes her not for his behavior but for jeopardizing her marriage prospects. The clock strikes two as Mme Josserand turns her frightened daughter into a paper doll, making the lesson’s cost visible: marriage strategy demands that Berthe yield not only to a suitor’s expectations but also to her family’s.

Context and stakes

The episode illustrates a broader asymmetry in marriage. Although a wife may receive legal protection and a place in the world, her husband becomes the economic head of the household, and she is annexed to his family, class, religion, and home. For a young woman, marriage is represented not simply as one possible way of life but as the means of entering society; celibacy can leave her treated as a parasite or outcast. Mothers therefore feel compelled to marry their daughters off, especially when the daughters have little or no fortune.

Against that background, Berthe’s lack of fortune shapes the instruction she receives. The book contrasts men, who may choose marriage as a way to expand their lives or remain single without losing their social right to exist, with women, whose prospects are narrowed to marriage. Mme Josserand’s urgency is an intimate expression of that constraint: she wants an immediate marriage, and treats her daughter’s conduct as a practical obstacle to it.

The encounter and the rebuke

Berthe recounts that, while she was dancing, she slipped into a small parlor with a man. When they were alone, he kissed and grabbed her; frightened, she pushed him against the furniture. Her mother seizes on that resistance. Rather than affirming Berthe’s fear or criticizing the man’s unwanted advances, Mme Josserand scolds her for pushing him and asks whether a kiss behind a door was worth ruining her chances of marriage.

The exchange turns the meaning of the encounter inside out. Berthe describes being held and reacting in fear; her mother recasts the incident as a breach of courtship etiquette. The man’s conduct becomes secondary to whether Berthe has preserved his interest. Her attempt to defend herself is treated as foolishness, while tolerating his advance is presented as the sensible course for a daughter who needs a husband.

A lesson in performance

Mme Josserand then gives Berthe a practical demonstration. Since she has no fortune, she must attract men by seeming pleasant and tender, allowing small liberties without appearing to do so, and making herself available to be pursued. The dropped fan is part of the technique: when a suitor picks it up, he can touch her fingers. She must also let her waist bend rather than appear stiff, and, if a man goes too far, she should not behave like a simpleton; his excess can be used to catch him.

The advice is not simply a set of manners. It teaches Berthe to convert the appearance of accident into calculated invitation, while concealing intention and suppressing resistance. In the scene, femininity is presented as a performance learned under economic pressure: Berthe must invite male attention without seeming to invite it, and navigate an advance by making it serve the goal of marriage.

The scene’s ending and significance

The clock in the parlor strikes two. Caught up in the long evening and her desire to arrange an immediate marriage, Mme Josserand twists and turns her daughter like a paper doll as she demonstrates how to behave. Berthe is docile and dispirited; she gives in, but fear and shame weigh on her. The physical image of the paper doll gathers the episode’s central contradiction: a daughter is being prepared for a supposedly personal choice by being manipulated into a prescribed role.

The episode shows how marriage’s social and economic pressures are reproduced within the family. Mme Josserand does not need to force Berthe into a particular marriage in this moment; she trains her to adapt her conduct to the marriage market. Berthe’s resistance to an unwanted touch is recoded as a threat to her future, while her mother’s coaching makes accommodation appear necessary for survival. The result is not a free choice of a husband so much as instruction in how to become acceptable to one.