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“‘If there be the remotest possibility of it,’ continued Georgiana, ‘let the attempt be made at whatever risk. Danger is nothing to me; for life, while this hateful mark makes me the object of your horror and disgust,—life is a burden which I would fling down with joy. Either remove this dreadful hand, or take my wretched life! You have deep science. All the world bears witness of it. You have achieved great wonders. Cannot you remove this little, little mark, which I cover with the tips of two small fingers? Is this beyond your power, for the sake of your own peace, and to save your poor wife from madness?’”

Her words now are a complete reversal from earlier, where she likened her birthmark to “a charm”, and expressed a deep (if momentary) hurt when Aylmer remarks that the birthmark shocks him. Somehow, it never occurs to Georgiana that she is not beholden to his opinions or desires, and that what she chooses to do with the birthmark is really her decision to make (or perhaps worse, she does realize, but also recognizes that the legal circumstances of the time mean that she cannot live without him). Instead Georgiana capitulates entirely to Alymer’s wishes, in line with the sexist mantra that a woman should look good for her man regardless of their own preferences, in a foolish and misguided effort that eventually results in her own death.

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“A little whispered word escaped her slightly parted lips. She said it over and over under her breath: ‘free, free, free!’... There would be no one to live for her during those coming years; she would live for herself. There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow-creature”

The author’s message is quite clear—marriage is not a means by which two loving parties form a spiritual and legal union, but rather a patriarchal form of control that seeks to limit women’s autonomy and will. While the days of oppressive monarchs are long gone, women must deal with their own rulers; first their fathers, and then husbands, who wield both economic and social power over them.

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"Hills Like White Elephants" by Ernest Hemingway

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"Hills Like White Elephants" by Ernest Hemingway

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“‘And we could have all this,’ she said. ‘And we could have everything and every day we make it more impossible.’

‘What did you say?’

‘I said we could have everything.’

‘We can have everything.’

‘No, we can't.’

‘We can have the whole world.’

‘No, we can't.’

‘We can go everywhere.’

‘No, we can't. It isn't ours any more.’

‘It's ours.’

‘No, it isn't.’” (Hemingway 3).

Once again, man and woman are shown to have differing degrees of freedom. To the man, the world offers limitless possibilities and endless adventure as evidenced by his claim that “we can have everything”. But the girl sees things differently. For her there are numerous restrictions on what is possible, both due to her economic dependence on the man, and the societal limitations imposed on women. She, of course, cannot have everything—not even a bank account in her name (which comes during the 1960s).

“‘I don't want you to do anything that you don't want to do—’

‘Nor that isn't good for me," she said. ‘I know. Could we have another beer?’

‘All right. But you've got to realize—’

‘I realize,’ the girl said. ‘Can't we maybe stop talking?'

They sat down at the table and the girl looked across at the hills on the dry side of the valley and the man looked at her and at the table. ‘You've got to realize,’ he said, ‘that I don't want you to do it if you don't want to. I'm perfectly willing to go through with it if it means any-thing to you.’” (Hemingway 3).

The man spends almost all his time during the events of the story attempting to reassure the girl that she is free to do whatever she wishes, and that his desires are of no import to her decision. But this is of course not true, since her lifestyle is dependent on the continuation of their relationship with the man, and the continuation of her relationship is dependent on capitulating to his wishes, despite his expressed opinion on the matter. The man holds all the power, and the girl none, such that the only safe decision she can make is to comply with the man’s wants. Perhaps the man is even aware of this, and is using the power imbalance as a way to ameliorate moral guilt without offering a real choice to the girl.

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“Wash the white clothes on Monday and put them on the stone heap; wash the color
clothes on Tuesday and put them on the clothesline to dry;... always eat your food in such a way that it won’t turn someone else’s stomach; on Sundays try to walk like a lady and not like the slut you are so bent on becoming;...this is how to sew on a button; this is how to make a buttonhole for the button you have just sewed on; this is how to hem a dress when you see the hem coming down and so to prevent yourself from looking like the slut I know you are so bent on becoming; this is how you iron your father’s khaki shirt so that it doesn’t have a crease;...this is how you smile to someone you don’t like too much; this is how you smile to someone you don’t like at all; this is how you smile to someone you like completely;... this is how to behave in the presence of men who don’t know you very well, and this way they won’t recognize immediately the slut I have warned you against becoming;... this is how to bully a man; this is how a man bullies you; this is how to love a man, and if this doesn’t work there are other ways, and if they don’t work don’t feel too bad about giving up” (Kincaid 1-2).

As with the previous stories, the female existence once again comes with restrictions. There is the obligation to be pleasant, to avoid whatever it is that makes a girl a slut, with no alternatives presented. The range of acceptable female behavior spans from pleasant to less pleasant, from non-sexual to non-sexual, and from non-disruptive to non-disruptive. Thrown in is the constant mantra of slut-shaming, regardless of actual sluttiness, the assumption of domestic labor, potential undertones about sexual assault, and fortunately a hint of change. Gone is the expectation of staying in an unhappy relationship, and the stigma for leaving one, indicating that while the influence of sexism remains strong, there has been significant change for the better as well.

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“The more girls a boy has, the better. He has a bright look, having reaped fruits, blooming. He stalks around, sure-shouldered, and you have the feeling he’s got more in him, a fatter heart, more stories to tell. For a girl, with each boy it’s as though a petal gets plucked each time” (Minot 4).

In the excerpt above, Minot briefly touches upon one of the facets of contemporary sexism; that for boys, sex makes a player; for a girl, a slut or cheap whore. The short story takes place sometime after the sexual revolution, as attitudes toward sex have become less puritan, but the benefits of that sexual freedom have extended only to men.

“So he gets some long kisses from me, against the refrigerator, before he goes home

because I hate those girls who push away a boy’s face as if she were made out of Ivory

soap, as if she’s that much greater than he is” (Minot 5).

The narrator does not allow this unnamed boy to kiss her because she wishes to, but because she has internalized the notion that rejecting his advances is somehow evidence of hubris and cruelty, and not basic boundary setting. More broadly speaking, for women sex and romance often are not an expression of love or intimacy, but rather a performance, in which the woman is the object of desire, stripped of will and bound by expectations, the self contorted and twisted in order to maximize the pleasure of men.