"The Edible Woman" by Margaret Atwood

The main piece in the novel entitled The nonpoisonous Woman by Margaret Atwood is consumerism. To consume, as defined by The Ameri nooky Heritage dictionary of the incline Language is To divvy up in as food; eat or drink up. To reap; use up. To purchase ( experts or services) for direct use or admitership. To waste; squander. To destroy totally; ravage. To absorb; engross. Consumerism is demonstrated d star reveal the novel in a variety of ways, around more(prenominal) subtle than former(a)s. One of the more subtle, yet almost leash estate ways Atwood displays this theme is through piranha and aim mental run acrossry. Marian subconsciously trip ups irradiation, her fiancé, as closely as certain other people that surround her as piranhas of different types, and often sees herself as the prey. She a bid has an protrudesiders view of her roommate, Ainsley, preying on Leonard Slank in a strategic scheme to produce a child. The most apparent of the predators w ho adopt their sights set on Marian is her fella/fiancé, ray of light. While dine with Marian, Len and Ainsley, Peter tells a story ab bring emerge hunting varment and how he killed and gutted a rabbit. Marian creates an image in her intellect of Peter collected with a group of fri residues, those friends whom [she] had never met...their faces all the way visual in the sunlight that fell in shafts push work through through the anonymous trees, splashed with blood, the mouths wrenched with laughter. [She] couldnt see the rabbit (The alimentation Woman p. 75). She arrives herself crying and goes to the bathroom. Locked in the cubicle, she describes the toilet paper as crouched in there with [her], helpless and white and furry, waiting passively for the end (p. 75). She identifies with the rabbit in the story, and could not see it in her mind because, subconsciously, she is the rabbit. Later on the very(prenominal) even tallying, Peter proposes to Marian. t ane at him , she sees his face strangely dim, his eye ! gleaming ilk an animals in the beam from a machine headlight. His stare was intent, faintly ominous (p. 89). She sees him, subconsciously, as a predator waiting to pounce on her, safe she doesnt truly name the connection in the midst of how she is seeing him at this news bulletin and how he actually treats her. Marian also sees doctors and nurses as predators. She associates Peter with a doctor at times when theyre in bonk to make waterher. She lets Peter run his batch gently e genuinelywhere her skin...almost clinically.... It was when she would begin geting that she was on a doctors examination defer that she would take hold of his hand to make him stop (p. 165). She allows him to go on until she stilltockst alkali it all(prenominal)more. When they go out for a steak dinner, she watches him in operation(p) (p. 167) on his steak. She envisions the cow, alive, with the diagram of cuts drawn onto it. She thus begins to see her stimulate steak as a hunk of mus cle. birth red (p. 167). As Peter finishes his steak, she subconsciously relates to the cow universe devoured by Peter. She is miserable at his finishing the steak, still she doesnt actually know why. The croak straw for Marian is at their involvement party. Peter asks her to stand over there by the guns (p.257) so that he can take her picture. The scenario creates an image of a hunter photographing his kill same a trophy. She feels, now more consciously, that if he takes the picture, shell be wintery there, in that moment, forever. He doesnt get the fortune to take the picture, further later gathers the crowd together for a group photo. She acts like an animal fleeing from its predator. She could not let him snaffle her this time. Once he pulled the trigger she would be stopped, fixed indissolubly in that gesture, that single stance, unable(p) to move or change (p. 272). She associates the winning of the picture with the clout of a trigger and creation caught, clean up spot her real self and being left with the image o! f the fair finish up that Peter complimentss. She also realizes that she wont be able to escape the image that Peter projects onto her afterwards the marriage, so she decides to escape it right away. Marian also falls prey to others in this novel. She allows herself to be use without even realizing it. At work, Marian is the one everyone goes to first to hook up the undesirable tasks. As soon as she walks into the office, Mrs. Withers, the dietician, asks Marian to taste-test the tin rice puddings because none of the other ladies seem very sharp-set this morning (p. 17). When Mrs. Bogue, the head of the department, asks her to fill in for other interviewer because it is a yen weekend and [they] dont like to ask her (p. 25), she precisely gives any protest. Minutes later, Lucy, a co-worker, asks her to write a earn of apology to an unsatisfied customer for her. Not only does Marian do it, she writes three versions. Marian is also used by Duncan, person she met while doin g the survey about Moose beer for Mrs. Bogue. He is stave offefaced of it and doesnt try to hide it. She enters his apartment and asks where they might razz for the interview. He offers the options of the floor, kitchen or bedroom. She immediately says no to the bedroom, only if they end up there anyways. Halfway through the interview, he tells her that he never [drinks] the stuff (p.57), but he actually does and sightly didnt want to finish the survey. All he wanted was her company. raise on in the novel, he calls her at work. She thinks that perhaps he [needs] her. [Needs] to smatter to her (p. 147), so she postpones her dinner plans with Peter in modulate to go and give Duncan most laundry to do. Marian likes to feel needed, which is one of the reasons that she allows Duncan to use her. Later on in the novel, after Marian escapes from her engagement party, she goes to the laundromat to find him. She suggests that tonights the night (p. 274) and they go to a cheap motel. She was under the impression that she was the first ! one hed been with, but when she asks him the next morning how it was, he replies just as good as usual (p. 293) He does, however, repay her in his own self-centered way. He refuses to help her confront Peter, which allows her to take obligate and decide who she really is. It is not only men that can be predators in this novel; Ainsley is also a predator of sorts. She has this idea of being a single female parent and wants to find just the right man to be the father.

She begins collection learning on Leonard Slank, an old friend of Marians that she thinks might be a potential candidate for the father. She hears th at he likes younger women, so she goes to the bar/restaurant dressed in a like summer creation [Marian had] never seen before, a pink and chromatic gingham give way on white with a ruff around the neck. Her whisker was data linkd behind her head with a pink enter and on one of her wrists she had a tinkly silver charm-bracelet. Her fundamental law was understated, her eyes thoroughly but not noticeably shadowed to make them twice as large and round and blue, and she had sacrificed her long oval fingernails, biting them or so to the quick so that they had a jagged schoolgirlish reference (p.72-73). It is obvious the amount of careful planning that went into this meeting. She pretends that Marian invited her, but Marian knows perfectly well that she has come to inspect Len, to see if he is good bountiful to be the father of her child. The next day, when asked what she was doing, Ainsley tells Marian that shes figuring out her strategy (p. 92). She has decided that Len is the one, analyses his disposition and plans her atta! ck accordingly. Marian describes her as [bearing] a chilling semblance to a general plotting a major campaign (p. 92). Ainsley plans to fool it seem accidental. A moment of passion. [Her] resistance overcome, swept off [her] feet and so forth (p. 92). The hale thing is very aforethought(ip) and structured; she even plots it on the calendar. Two months later, Ainsley tells Marian that it has to be tonight because if it isnt tonight...[shell] have to get another one (p. 130). It is obvious that there is no recognize in this relationship at all, Ainsley has just come across the perfect specimen and wants a child. Marian agrees to go out and see a photo while Ainsley seduces Len and when she returns, a tie with green and blue grade insignia [is] hanging victoriously on the closed door of her own bedroom (p. 140), a indication that Ainsley had promised to leave if they ended up in her room. Ainsleys plan has worked, and she just has to wait and see if it ordain all be expense it. Most of the predator and prey imagery is in Marians subconscious. She sees clearly what Ainsley is doing to Len, but doesnt realize that the same thing is happening to her. This imagery is a very hard-hitting way of unifying the novel. Each section is in some way, a predator or prey. The unfeigned personality of each contribution is also revealed through the type they play. Marian starts out weak, then realizes that she must stand up for herself, Peter ends up without Marian because he likewisek advantage of her too much, and Ainsley ends up being pregnant, the goal of her scheme. This imagery underlines the major theme of consumerism because each character is somehow consumed by another unless they check off free, as did Marian. Bibliography Atwood, M. The Edible Woman. Toronto: The Canadian Publishers, 1969. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2000 If you want to get a full essay , order it on our website: BestEssayCheap.com

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