Customer Reviews

The Edible Woman

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I will have to admit that curiosity is the prime reason for reading this book. The back cover blurb doesn't give much by way of details of the actual storyline, just that the main character feels like she is being eaten. I couldn't stop myself from reading this book after reading that! However, the story wasn't exactly what I was expecting, although it was still pretty good.

Set in Canada in the late 1960s, the women's role in life is slowly trying to break free from the 50s television version of the housewife that vacuums in pearls and heels. Marian, a recent college graduate, considers herself a pretty independent woman. Even her relationship with her boyfriend, Peter, doesn't get in the way of her independence. She lives on her own with her roommate and best friend, Ainsley, and she makes her own living as copywriter for a survey service. But when, out of the blue, Peter proposes marriage, strange things start happening. Marian begins to feel consumed with making plans, quitting her job, moving in with Peter, and settling down for her role as housewife. All of a sudden she can't eat certain things and she has strange panic attacks that come from nowhere. Her freedom is being threatened, but Marian sees no way out. Or is there?

While Marian's story is the core of this novel, the host of supporting characters intrigued me the most. Ainsley decides she wants to have a baby and begins her search to find the lucky man to help her out. Marian's friend, Clara, and her husband, Joe, provide a stunning example of what married/family life will be like (and not always in a good way). Then there's Duncan, a man who answers the door when Marian is out doing surveys, who has his own issues. All of these storylines are full of feminist symbolism, and I believe it is important to know this before you read the book. It will definitely help you understand the novel more clearly.

I'm a new Atwood fan, having read and loved The Handmaid's Tale just a month ago. And while The Edible Woman is not as exhilarating or fascinating like Handmaid, I still found it to be very well-written with an interesting storyline, despite its heavy symbolism that mostly went over my head (I'm not too good at picking that stuff out!). I have two other Atwood books on my shelf and I'm looking forward to reading them. I believe that imagination and originality is Atwood's forte, and I have high hopes that the rest of her novels will provide a healthy dose.

This is only the third Margaret Atwood novel I have read--having picked them all up at various flea markets and discount stores on a whim. I am a woman who usually does not identify with female authors, most of whom seem too aware of being "female authors" to tell a straightforward story without feminist propaganda. _The Edible Woman_, however, really hit me on a visceral level. Marian is the same age as I and has a similar perspective. She has a kitchen sink with molding dishes and a refrigerator whose innards seem to be growing. She has a college education and a job that she has no emotional attachement to, in fact she is horrified when forced to sign on to a retirement package, feeling tied to forever to an apathetic existence. She occasionally feels invisible when in a room with others, particularly it seems around her fiancee, at one point sliding between a bed and a wall while her friends quaff gin and play with camera equipment, never noticing she is gone until she is squashed under the bed as one of them sits down. She seems to be wandering through life without a purpose and clings onto the idea of being a wife by becoming almost accidentally engaged to an "ideal" man. Soon after this she finds herself slowly being nauseated by different sorts of food.

If the young ladies in this book didn't dress up so much and drink alcohol and smoke while pregnant it would seem very much a generation X novel! Starring apathetic protagonists Marian and Duncan, who both manage to be vivid characters in spite of the fact that they seem to spend most of their time just floating through life. A large part of the novel's strength is its well rounded secondary characters from Ainsley, Marian's single connivingly procreating room-mate, to Clara a somewhat disgruntled mother, to Duncan's slightly deranged grad-school room-mates.

This was a very fun book filled with characters I can imagine meeting among my own group of friends.

I've got a few Atwood books and this is by far the oldest one, so if it's not her writing debut (as opposed to poetry, which I think she did as well) it's pretty close and I have to say that I was pretty impressed with how strong her narrative voice was and how confident the book feels. Reading it you get a sense that the author knows exactly what she's doing and how to go about it. That sense makes the book that much more fun to read, even if it's not going to be recognized as one of her absolute masterpieces. The story concerns a woman named Marian, presumably in her mid-twenties, who after getting engaged starts to lose her desire to eat most kinds of food. But even that description is a tad misleading because the eating aspect doesn't even come into play until almost halfway through the book. Indeed those looking for a feminist version of "Thinner" should probably go the other way right now. Instead it's an examination of a woman's role in both society and marriage and that gives the story more weight, balancing the often silly and humorous situations Marian finds herself in. It's definitely the lightest book I've read by Atwood, it's hard to believe this is the same woman who did the ultra-depressing Life Before Man. But the main focus isn't even on Marian's quasi-eating disorder but on her interactions with her fiancee, her roommate (the subplot with her wanting a baby is absolutely hilarious in a darkly absurd way) and an odd graduate student she meets while out doing a survey for her job. That graduate student and his monologues was my favorite part of the chapter and probably represents Atwood's poke at the academic world, but definitely shows off her gift for words. But be on the look out for metaphors, just about everything means something else it seems, even the switch from first to third person struck me as odd until I realized even that represented something. In the end the metaphors get stretched a bit too far and the only truly silly moment is right at the end. But it's immensely enjoyable for an Atwood novel and one of the few that you'll find yourself laughing more than feeling glad you aren't the characters.

The best feature of this book is its ability to enthrall. Clearly, Margaret Atwood's style in this novel is still green, as she wrote this book when she was only about 24, but I think that it contributed to my enjoyment of this book. While it is slightly reminiscent of some of her later fiction, it differs significantly in the narrational flow, allowing the reader to be gently assimilated into the message of the book without feeling as if he or she should always be "on the lookout" for pithy hidden messages. Some may claim that this book is superficial and a run-of-the-mill attempt at distinctive women's lib literature, but this is not so. It is simply subtle insight into human nature in all aspects--including the aspects of both women AND men. Also be reminded that Atwood actually wrote the book before the brunt of the women's lib movement, but unfortunately, it was not published until 1970, marking it as correlative to the movement. I highly recommend this book, especially, in fact, for those who are dissatisfied with Atwood's prose style and writing techniques. Perhaps this book will equalize your perception of her. Although I enjoy Atwood across the board, this book is one of the most refreshing and engrossing reads I've encountered.

I'd give this 3.5 stars, for the record...

I was pleasantly surprised by this book, especially after reading the blurb which loudly declared "The Edible Woman" to be a book about wild sex. Luckily it actually turned out to have more substance than that: if anything, the sex scenes are so low-key as to be nonexistent. Instead the focus is upon the psychological aspects of Marian's relationships with her fiancee and with Duncan, and most of all upon the way she views herself. While on the surface "The Edible Woman" can be viewed as a feminist rant against marriage and commitment, this would be in my opinion a reductive perspective to take. "The Edible Woman" is primarily the charting of one woman's loss of identity as she attempts to mold herself to conform to the expectations of others.

Despite the serious and even dark undercurrents, this is a light, fun read. The characters are almost caricatures, even the main character, saying and doing things that no one in their right minds would ever do in real life. Fortunately this cartoonish treatment of the characters works in the novel's favor: it makes Marian's strange disorder more believable, and ultimately the message of the book being carried through in such a manner makes it--dare I say--more palatable. Atwood may have an axe to grind, but she does it with such delicate strokes that one can only appreciate the elegant subtlety she employs.

Atwood's prose is lucid and witty, and she takes some playful jabs at academia that are truly hilarious. The assembled cast of characters, even while they are too zany to be real, are also vastly entertaining. This book is not incredibly deep or substantial; though it does deal with some complex themes, it is in the end exactly as it comes across on the surface: a fun read. I probably wouldn't read it again, but I'm glad to have read it once.

I thought I had lost my faith in 20th century writing, but this novel proved just how well a feminist can write. The book isn't even preachy, in fact, it reminds me of a story by Charlotte Gilman Perkins called "The Yellow Wallpaper". It's almost like both characters are literally being eaten, or consumed, by male driven society. Rich in metaphors, the novel illustrates how women can regain control of their lives, not necessarily through the bounds of matrimony, but through the rejection of it. Marian does not seem to have a life her own, but follows paths shaped by other's expectations of her as a woman. I really enjoyed the end of the book, it seemed fitting and makes the book a whole metaphor for the moral crisis that Marian goes through, particularly when her mind is rebelling from the society that influences her daily life. In other words, read this book.

I read this book about 25 years ago. I was working on a master's degree in English in Detroit and had just met the man that I would marry. Sigh! How I wish that I had listened more carefully to Atwood. I would have run from that! The Edible Woman is broadly humorous -- the heroine works for Seymour Surveys -- and very much a girls night out. Funny, perhaps slightly dated, it is a warning to listen to your inner voice. I seldom read more than one or two books by an author. The next book from Atwood's pen that I read, Surfacing, turned me off to her for many years. However, during that time, her reputation as a writer grew. When I finally picked her up again, I was glad I did. Atwood has grown into one of the major voices in 20th century literature and will, most likely, continue to be heard into the 21st century.

I'm a generation (or two?) removed from this book (a single woman having a career in the late 1960's), so I had some trouble relating to the main character's struggles. At times, I wasn't sure if Atwood was telling a matter-of-fact tale or trying to make a feminist point. Marian loses her ability to eat as she faces a decision about whether to stay with a dependable man or date the quirky anti-establishment freethinker she met at random. The female characters all seemed weak and lacking motivation or direction, so I'm definitely missing something if this is supposed to be fun and ironic. I think this can be a tough novel for people so far removed from the late 1960's to read and understand. I wish I was able to relate, because I admire Atwood as an author, but I just couldn't. Definitely try some of her other work, like The Robber Bride or The Handmaid's Tale, if you are interested in experiencing the more accessible material.

It was ok, but I missed a lot of the "irony and metaphor" that the back cover
assures me was in there! Just "whoosh" right over my head, I guess.

Marian McAlpin becomes engaged... and inexplicably, her eating
habits change - first she can't eat meat, picturing the living
breathing animal it once was. Then eggs. Then everything else! She
knows she should eat, she knows she must eat, but food of any sort
revolts her. Mix in a nutty roommate who decides to get pregnant,
and starts looking for an unwitting "donor" to be the father, and
Duncan, a bizarre grad student Marian meets during work (She works
at a survey service, and had to go door to door doing a survey), and
you have a strange yet amusing story about a woman resisting the
loss of her identity when she marries. I guess that was what it was
about anyways.

Cute but it seemed a bit light to me, as if Marian just "felt" these
things but didn't really state them to the reader. There was some
certain shallowness about the book that I can't quite describe.

This is the fourth of Atwood's books I have read. Though I enjoyed it, I didn't find it to be a page turner like The Blind Assassin (I couldn't put that one down).

The symbolism was interesting, but the end of the story seemed anticlimactic. I can't say I cared for the ending; the chain of events was interesting but left me wanting more after I finished. I am not one of those people who needs a tidy ending with all of the issues resolved, but I don't feel like it was strong enough.

I think that the story is slightly more tame than her others, but maybe that is the point. This seems like it could be snatched directly from some young woman's diary. I read it at a steady pace. I would recommend it to others, but might suggest other works such as Blind Assassin or The Handmaid's Tale first.