Fay Wedons Weekend a Feminist Analysis Essay - 1190 Words

Fay Weldon’s short story ‘Weekend’ is a strongly feministic and satirical fiction about a weekend of a wife and working-mother in the 70s. The story concerns a well-off English middle-class family, at their country cottage. The central focus is on Martha, and much of the writing represents her stream of consciousness as she struggles to ensure that her family and guests are properly looked after. The misleading title soon proves to be an ironic comment on the weekend that Martha has to endure rather than enjoy, while she also struggles with social expectations of women from her husband and other adults. The first paragraph alone serves to set the tone of the story, while also demonstrating a predominant theme, of gender inequality.†¦show more content†¦An example of this is when Martin describes her car as ‘too wide at the hips’ (Weldon, 1988, P.311). Nevertheless these continuous sexist remarks serve the purpose of creating sympathy for Martha, and malevolence towards Martin, all creating creating a strong feministic alliance. Weldon’s use of third person limited narration predominantly from Martha’s perspective is sometimes unreliable, making it unclear whether Martin is really as unkind to her as she believes. An example of this being, when Martha felt ‘she was in danger, Martin implied, of ruining everyone’s weekend’ (Weldon, 1988, P.323). This choice of narration could be seen as a reflection of Martha’s unstable state of mind, and her tendency to paranoia like her mother. On the other hand it could be seen as having feministic undertones by encouraging women not to put up with controlling behaviour from men under the pretence of the women overreacting. Another technique sometimes used is omniscient intrusive narration creating a strong sense of irony when Weldon states ‘they reckoned themselves fortunate’ (Weldon, 1988, P.309). This also allows for highly sarcastic undertones like when Martha tries convincing herself of what a good husband he is to her by whisking her off ‘for holiday weekends’ (Weldon, 1988, P.313). We are all aware however what a multitude of chores it turns into for her, demonstrated by the