The image, of which has been ingrained into the western psyche, depicted by the religious imagery of the original ‘sorrowful mother’, The Virgin Mary. And finally I will aim to highlight each author’s representation of gendered roles and their relation to the construction of society as well as to the ideologies of motherhood.Ĭonnie, the protagonist of Marge Piercy’s ‘Woman on the Edge of Time’, can be seen to represent the image of the ‘sorrowful mother’ in the novel. On top of this I aim to discuss whether each book relates to the era with which it was published in terms of social conventions and feminist theoretical development. Within this essay I wish to discuss the ways in which both Marge Piercy and Angela Carter approach and react to this issue in their novels, ‘Woman on the Edge of Time’ and ‘The Passion of New Eve’, both of which were published during the 1970’s.

When looking for answers on the reasons or causes of the inequality between men and women many feminist theorists believe that the answer is rooted in women’s reproductive function and motherhood as a whole. With many feminists of the time wishing to break the silence and ‘rediscover the lost work of women writers while providing a context that would be supportive to contemporary women writers’. The era saw further development in radical and socialist feminism, concerned with looking at the reasons behind female oppression, and the birth of such influential feminist literary theories as Ecriture feminine. However for ‘Second wave Feminism’ and the Women’s Liberation Movement the 1970’s spelt development, especially in the field of Feminist theory. The 1970’s, for Britain and America, can be largely characterised for it’s public un-rest, social upheaval and economic decline.

Piercy woman on the edge of time