Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Edible Woman, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Gendered Expectations vs. Personal Identity
Consumerism and Consumption
Bodies, Pregnancy, and Food
Language, Meaning, and Alienation
Routine, Repetition, and Resistance
Summary
Analysis
Peter and Marian walk through his apartment building. The construction is almost done, and every time Marian comes over, she notices some new detail. The whole car ride over, Marian has fretted about how to tell Peter that she invited a few friends. Fortunately, when she does tell him, Peter’s reaction is predictably calm and condescending. Now, the only thing for Marian to worry about is how Trevor and Fish might react when they learn she is engaged.
In the novel, the construction in Peter’s building parallels the development of Marian and Peter’s relationship—and so the fact that the building is almost finished adds to Marian’s sense of dread that her wedding is almost here.
Themes
Marian drops her coat on Peter’s bed, and he admires her dress and hairdo and perfume. Looking at herself in the mirror, Marian feels as if every part of her is now artificial, her legs and face and arms made to look like “rubber or plastic.” Peter asks Marian to fix some appetizers, but Marian lingers for a second in Peter’s bedroom, looking in his closet. For a moment, she fears that all the clothes—neatly hung and in place—might still be warm to the touch.
This passage highlights one of the novel’s central paradoxes: just as Marian begins to feel that everything she consumes is too alive to eat, she starts to feel that she is not organic at all, made only of synthetic “rubber or plastic.” This confusion—between the natural and the artificial, the alive and the lifeless—is then furthered when Marian grows fearful of the clothes in Peter’s closet, not knowing whether Peter’s life force comes from himself or his neatly-hung suits.
Themes
Marian comes back to the kitchen, where she notices that Peter has bought new glassware. He has also already made her a drink, a barely diluted scotch and water. When Marian asks for another ice cube, Peter is charmed by her low alcohol tolerance. As Marian preps little bowls of potato chips and peanuts, Peter comes up behind her, playing with the zipper on her dress. Marian asks if Peter loves her, and he tells her, “I love you especially in that red dress.”
Throughout the narrative, drinking makes Marian feel even more paranoid and destabilized—so her barely diluted drink here foreshadows trouble to come at the party. The bowls of factory-made potato chips, like the “red dress” Peter so admires, make Marian aware that everything about this social gathering is grounded less in human connection and more in commodities produced and consumed (“production-consumption” again).
Themes
Peter then calls Marian into his room, wanting her to pose for a picture. Outside Peter’s room, the city is still and covered in snow. As Peter adjusts his camera, Marian feels herself panicking, the muscles in her face tightening. Fortunately, before Peter can snap the picture, a knock on the door interrupts him. Breathing fast, Marian gingerly reaches out a hand to touch the camera, terrified it might hurt her somehow.
In Marian’s state—drunk, with her stomach empty of food—Peter’s camera, long symbolically linked to his love of hunting, now takes on more literal danger. Like the frozen snow outside, Marian fears that allowing Peter to take her picture will trap her, locking her in this terrifying domestic moment for life.
Themes
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