Female Characters In Joyce Carol Oates 'American Appetites'

The prejudice that the author brings forward strongly is the notion of feminism. The author’s main purpose of writing this novel is to examine the role of women played around

Her internal struggle is revealed in this instant when her hedonistic desires cause her to feel conflicted. Mrs. Buchanan tends to act extremely selfish, especially during the moments when she cannot resist the temptation of hedonism. When Daisy impatiently awaits Gatsby’s return from war, “there [is] a quality of nervous despair in [her] letters” (151). Daisy’s egocentric nature ultimately causes her to believe that the world revolves around herself. Her tragic downfall is made clear when she decides to marry Mr. Buchanan and pursue old wealth.

Daisy shows the deadly sin of greed, as she does not appreciate the love Gatsby has towards her, but more the money aspect, through the throwing of the shirts and being able to fulfill her wants .When in reality Daisy really does not love Gatsby, the way she did five years ago. Thus through temptation Daisy was able to achieve her wants, by tempting Gatsby through love. Both men are under the temptation by a women from an affair, to meet the benefit of the women character. The strong power of feminism shines out, as the women try to manipulate the men into gaining love and wealth for their own well-being.

Feminism is the most flagrant theme in the novel; however, other themes such as the supernatural and heritage are also shown through the main character, Clara Trueba. The novel is long with its 432 pages filled with fascinating fiction, but worth the read. Feminism is shown by all the female characters in The House of the Spirits. Nìvea de Valle is the first clear feminist. Nìvea and her friends would bring Clara to “stand on soapboxes and make speeches to the women who worked there while the foremen and bosses, snickering and hostile, observed them from a prudent distance,” (Allende, 81).

To start off, it is known that Daisy chooses to contradict many things going on in her life. In this time period, it was not uncommon for married men to have affairs with other women, while the other way around was not acceptable. When reading this novel, we

After skimming through Volume 1 of The Norton Anthology Literature by Women, I noticed the reoccurring themes of patriarchy, women subordination, and the strength to be creative despite oppression. During the times that these literary pieces were written, women were constantly battling the patriarchy in order to get basic rights. During the earlier time periods, intelligence was seen as a sign of an evil spirit in a woman, resulting in miniscule amounts of literary works written by women. Women were not provided with equal spaces to creatively express themselves, as mentioned by Virginia Woolf. Moreover, they were not given the same publishing opportunities, many women either went anonymous or by a fake male name to have their works published.

In her literary criticism of The Great Gatsby titled “Herstory” and Daisy Buchanan, Leland S. Person Jr. describes the conflict that Daisy comes into with both Tom and Gatsby. Person describes Daisy as a victim of the actions of the men in her life, reasoning that “She is victim first of Tom Buchanan’s ‘cruel’ power, but then of Gatsby’s increasingly depersonalized vision of her” (Person Jr. 250). While Daisy is victimized and objectified by both Gatsby and Tom more and more as the novel wares on, she ultimately has the opportunity to choose the more malleable if not lesser of the two evils. In Daisy’s relationship with Tom, Tom holds the majority of the power and is thus able to dictate her actions much more easily. However, when she is with Gatsby, it is by her own decision.

Conflicts among friends, families, groups, and coworkers are a normal situation which is happen in our daily activities. however, the degree of our conflicts with someone makes us to loss our temper or to give an excuse in our life. The chapter seven of The Great Gatsby has the confrontation among Gatsby and Tom in such a way of love, mistress, and unfriendly that gets them to challenge each other in angry ways. The hidden relationship between Gatsby and Daisy the truth finally comes out in front of their friends and Daisy husband Tom.

Edelman argues that the anger is not all her husband 's fault and that mostly the issue is mutual between her and her husband. She details the one time she got so mad that she went out and bought a tree house for no good reason. She said, “One day I said f*** it, and I took John’s credit card and bought a swing set” (55) This outburst again conveys to the reader that Edelman becomes so frustrated that eventually she breaks down. Her eruptive use of “f***” drives home her final feeling.

George Wilson, a poor car mechanic had been lucky enough to marry a “stunning women” like Myrtle, and he refused to let her leave. He would have given up a part of his life if Myrtle had left, leaving him with the title of a selfish man. He didn’t care whether or not Myrtle was happy, he just wanted her with him at all times. Tom on the other hand had a different perspective on life, but he still was a selfish man. He had been associated with a numerous amount of affairs, and still felt as though it was Daisy’s fault for her wanting to leave him.

Feminist Criticism allows to understand the meaning and importance of literature when relating to the male-female power

The fact that the paternal figure is barely mentioned points to a less-than-perfect father-daughter relationship, possibly made worse by the hunting accident. Likewise, Mrs. Hopewell was unable to provide Hulga with support, as the two women had opposite personalities and beliefs – and this lack of connection between mother and daughter deepened the young girl’s feeling of isolation. Besides the fact that Mrs. Hopewell was unable to provide moral support, due to her shallow character and empty reactions, it was also impossible for her to ever represent a model for her daughter because of her low intellect and false astuteness. Moreover, her mother was extremely self-centered and, ironically, Hulga also adopted this trait, although her sense of self-worth had a certain basis, for it came after years of studying, unlike Mrs. Hopewell’s.

More specifically, gender’s role on women and their positions in the world. Being a young woman, I fall into the intended audience of the book. The rhetoric in the book appeals to the young girls around the same age of the main character

Money, power, and success have blinded people into thinking they are in love and it has led to these women being oppressed. Tom and Gatsby in this book are what is called the patriarchy. According to Revise Sociology, the patriarchy is “The systematic domination of women by men in some or all of society’s spheres and institutions.” In Tom and Daisy’s marriage; they are both having an affair, Tom wasn’t at his child’s birth, and he oppresses Daisy physically, maybe by accident, and socially, by not allowing her to go wherever she wants to go. In Tom and Myrtle’s affair; they are both married, yet they have this affair, she is dependent on him because he oppresses her economically and psychologically, and he also oppresses her physically when he broke her nose.

She unflinchingly fought against the social norms created by men. She was forced to escape into her own imagination and with her novels, he tried to fight against to this issue. The feminism is still an obscure question that influences other writers to deal