Summary

Joan and Joe go to the Helsinki Opera house for the Helsinki Prize presentation ceremony. During the ceremony, Joe is seated onstage, and Joan is seated in the audience next to the President of Finland and his wife. In conversation with Joan, the president’s wife confides that she is generally unhappy with her life. During Joe’s acceptance speech, he thanks Joan for her wifely support over the years. Joan is angry, as she specifically asked Joe not to mention her in the speech. Joan thinks about the ways in which conventional gender roles prevent women from following personal ambitions. In Chapter 6, Joan and Joe attend the post-ceremony banquet. Joan and Joe drink heavily. Joan eventually decides to return to the hotel on her own while Joe stays at the banquet. On the ride back to hotel, Joan has an imagined conversation with...