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Example research essay topic: Bodily Harm Margaret Atwood - 1,054 words

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Margaret Atwood in her novels, short stories and even poetry uses a similar style of writing. It is a style that is not only distinctive but also effective. Her sense of description is one of her best talents. It allows her to create pieces of work that constantly reinforce her themes of political chaos and the effect that a patriarchal society has on women. As a feminist writer, much of her work deals with how men not only empower women but how they manage to hurt each other. Using parallelism and symbolism as springboards, Margaret Atwood writes to inform and perhaps warn her reader of the exploitation of women and sometimes even helpless men who exist within a society.

In bodily harm, Atwood develops her thematic concerns in even more global dimensions, in both figurative and geographical senses. This piece of work at times tends to be a very political feminist novel, immediately concerned with such issues as body image, female sexuality, male-female relationships, and male brutality in a patriarchal society. Through her writing of this novel, Atwood seems to project her anger towards a patriarchal establishment and value system that continues to enforce it with excessive privileges and powers, both personal and political. The life of the main character, Rennie Wilcox, is illustrated in the book to demonstrate the victimization of woman.

One type of victimization that Atwood explores is sexual. Rennie returns one afternoon to her apartment to find a broken door through which an intruder has crashed. As she walks into the bedroom she sees, there was a length of rope coiled neatly on the quilt. The rope is also tied in with Rennie's past as her ex-lover, Jake, preferred sex that includes bondage and sadism. Jake would sometimes arrive at Rennie's apartment by surprise and enjoy overpowering Rennie sexually with such perceptions as pretend youre being raped. (pg. 117) Atwood takes careful attempts and goes deep into the mind of men who find victimization of women sexually arousing. Two bullying policemen who appear in her apartment following the incident are another evidence of how the society perceives women, especially single women.

The breaking in of the apartment is automatically connected inside the policemen's mind with her being a single woman. He questions her in such a way that is rather offensive, insinuating that a woman who lives such a lifestyle deserves this. You have men over here a lot? Different men, the policemen said. He wanted it to be my fault, just a little, some indiscretion, come provocation.

The detail of the rope is left almost deliberately unexplained. It comes to assume a variety of meanings, from the echo of rape which the word resembles to the image of something coiled like the original mythical snake, ready to tempt the female into knowledge of evil or good, or to bring bodily harm with its sting. Through many characters such as Jake, who view Rennie as a body whose mind is of little consequence, he makes her feel like a small malicious animal (pg. 199) to match his own anomalistic sexuality. Sexual exploitation of women is very common in a patriarchal society.

Later on in the book, Atwood brings in a character, Lora Lucas, who recapitulates to Rennie her life as continuous victimization. Like Rennie, she suffers from low self-esteem and insecurity about her own rights. Lora is a more obvious victim of male abuse than Rennie however. As a child she was virtually raped by her step-father and more recently, in her job as a cook on boats captained by men, it was understood that she would also be available for sexual pleasures. Atwood seems to be drawing characters that are not too far from the reality that exists in many countries. She gives two characters, Lora and Rennie, both from different parts of the world, much in common.

Atwood uses these two characters in her plot to reflect the theme that as women, regardless of which part of the world one lives in, they will be the victims of male abuse. Ironically enough, both women later on end up becoming cell mates where Lora is raped every day by the policemen in return for more rights in jail, such as a comb. Women are exploited in more than one way around the world. The prospect is understood, but many fail to take any sort of action towards it. Atwood opens the eyes of many by addressing such issues in her literature and perhaps the truth that lies in her themes is the cause of her phenomenal success as a writer. In the collection of short stories, her theme for her novels such as Bodily Harm and Handmaids tale are repeated.

In one story, Loulou; or, The Domestic Life of the Language it deals with womens acceptance of her role as a caregiver of men. The character of Loulou is a women in her middle age who takes care of poets who live in her house but they never have any money so they cannot afford to pay her rent. She also is the only woman who lives there and therefore finds it as her responsibility to cook for them as well. Loulou then hires an accountant to do her taxes, who she finds herself quite attracted to on a mental and not only a physical level. Margaret again uses the reference of sexual feeling to express her theme, however this time sex is not forced. Not to anyones surprise, the accountant finds the idea of her letting the poets live for free to be a very unusual idea to which he responds, you shouldnt let people make advantage of you.

Loulou expresses her sexual desires towards him who doesnt object to the idea of them having sexual intercourse and they go to the next room in his office and carry this out. After their brief sexual encounter, Well says the accountant. Then he sits up and starts putting on his clothes. He does this very skillfully. Loulou wishes he would wait a few minutes-it would be friendlier- but already hes doing up his buttons. (Pg. 63) Atwood uses such a character intentionally to emphasize how men do not attach feelings to the act of sex and having sex doesnt necessarily indicate the feeling of affection towards the person. And...


Free research essays on topics related to: atwood, bodily harm, short stories, patriarchal society, margaret atwood

Research essay sample on Bodily Harm Margaret Atwood

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