Women's Life In The Painted Door

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Yousef. N Mr. Thomas ENG4U1 March, 25, 2013 A Women’s life, from a Feminist Approach, “The Painted Door” In the story by Sinclair Ross “The Painted Door” the main character, Anne, represents a weak, unhappy, selfish and insecure woman who is not pleased with her husband’s life choices. Employing the Feminist approach to “The Painted Door” reveals striking aspects that would otherwise be imperceptible. In society, often times a woman is shown as a person who is incapable of being alone; she will always need someone with her too keep her satisfied. Firstly, one can see this when it shows how Anne feels about being alone and what she does to make sure she is not alone for the night. In addition, one can see how the nature of Anne’s relationship,…show more content…
The reader can see this when John says, “But he is an old man living there all alone. What is it Anne? You’re not like yourself this morning” (Ross, 288) One can see in this quote that Anne’s happiness is starting to change after hearing news about John leaving to see his dad again. She is starting to get aggravated by it, and wishes that John would just stop going. Later on in the story, one see’s in this quote by Anne, ““I mustn’t,” she said aloud again “I married him....”” (Ross, 293) that she is trying to convince herself not to sleep with Steve because of her relationship with John. She repeats it over and over again “I married him” (Ross, 293) to keep reminding herself to not make the bad decision to cheat…show more content…
Due to John’s lifestyle choice to put work ahead of personal matters, he is always out trying to make a good living for him and Anne. Due to this, Anne, does not get out much and lives the life of a stereotypical stay at home woman. This includes cooking, cleaning, chores inside the house and taking care of the men. One can see this when Anne says, “I’ll get them a good supper-and for coffee tonight after cards bake some of the little cakes with raisins that he likes...” (Ross, 291) One can see in this quote that instead of doing something progressive for herself, like painting, she is preparing a meal for the men’s arrival. Like any stay at home woman. The reader can also see that Anne portrays the typical stay at home woman when Anne tries to do the chores in the barn but gets lost, so Steve comes to assist her and says, “There is nothing to be afraid of now, though. I’m going to do the chores for you.” (Ross, 297) One can see how this quote shows that Anne is incapable of doing simple tasks such as cleaning things in the barn due to her character being a simple stay at home woman. For example, how she needs Steve to go out in to the storm to take care of her and to do her chores, because she is too weak, nervous and incapable to do the simple tasks by
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