Abstract

In The Edible Woman Margaret Atwood ingenously and with a great ability penetrates into a young woman's mind, and explores the difficulties women in today's Western society face. Marian MacAlpin, the protagonist of the novel, is one of those who help to create this consumer society by working as a market researcher. However, she is also really confused young woman who feels trapped in the world he is living in. Not being married he refers to herself as "being on the market" (EW244), which indicates an object for sale. Unable to accept the idea of being consumed or consume, Marian rebels against the system, where she reveals her sense of discomfort by not eating. With a feeling of being a commodity, both at work and in her relationships, she experiences an urge to escape from the reality of her life. In fact, the emotional turmoil she undergoes is the basic cause of her developing some sort of Schizophrenia.
This paper examines how the protagonist, being a woman, feels trapped and isolated in a male dominated world, and tackles the different roles the two men Peter and Duncan play in the life of the lady. The concepts of female subjectivity, victimization, objectification and consumption of women in Atwood's novel are studied; pinpointing how the men characters in the novel are seen as the consumers and the women as the ones being consumed. Examining the novel from a point of view combining the feminist and psychological concerns, shows the devastating effects a patriarchal consumer obsessed society may have on a young woman's life in the modern wasteland of the commercial society.