“Lusus Naturae,” an Allegory for Women’s Sexuality

It isn’t always possible to find the theme of a story within the first reading. That is the case with Margaret Atwood’s, “Lusus Naturae.” At first, we can see it in the possible light of just a cultural resentment towards a monster. When in reality it is an allegory of women’s sexuality. The hidden meaning reveals itself with copious amounts of evidence. Going through reading the short story, there are many implications of how a woman is supposed to be perceived as pure and selfless.

As well as just how women weren’t educated on their own sexuality. The protagonist is deemed a monster throughout the work and the symbolic meaning is one we have to delve into further to understand. Taking many aspects of the work we find how society expects women to play their societal role throughout history.

With the introduction of the story, we are immediately taken into the thoughts of the protagonist. “What could be done with me, what should be done with me?” (Atwood 262).

This is in direct relation to how women had their lives chosen for them in the nineteenth century. She, as in the monster, tells us how she is trying to please everyone without regard to her own feelings. “It was decided I should die” (Atwood 264). She accepts this fate, without a fight, so she would not affect her sister and her need to marry. Her sister then forgets about her after her presumed death, and they can go on living as a respected family.

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This is another implication of how she felt that she had to do what was right for her family, and not herself. She was distanced from her family to feel like she was an outcast, and had not been given any affection from her father due to this disease.

She reads  romances, “blighted love, and defiance, and the sweetness of death” (Atwood 264). This gives us more insight on how she craved for attention and to be seen, but was expected to act as if it wasn’t a bother to her. Yet, once she has “died” she feels freer. In her meaning of freedom, we can see just how the burden of all that was placed upon her affected her, and how she now didn’t have an obligation but to herself. Even in today’s society, women are expected to be homemakers, to take care of children, and work full time without paying attention to their needs.

“I was a thing, then. I considered this. In what way is a thing not a person” (Atwood 265). Considering what is known about the historical treatment of women, it can be correlated into Atwood’s statement with how women were subjected to being treated like possessions. They were deemed as inferior in society. Women were not only supposed to be pretty and wear atrocities to try and do housework in, they were expected to sit up straight, present themselves properly, and do as they were told, etc. During the course of the story, the other characters, have decided her fate for her. As well the villagers see her as something that is different, and that needs to be done away with, since she does not fit into the society. This is another implication of the fact that if a woman acted out of place, she would be disowned. She was accepting of what was to be done with her, but she didn’t have much of a choice. From that time, women have always then fought for their own rights and to be equal in all of society. The right to vote, the right to work any job they please, and the right to make their own decisions.

Implying that she was uneducated of herself as a woman, while she witnesses two people having intercourse in the forest, she didn’t have any inclination of what the act was. She thought that they were turning into someone like her, and that she can join in (Atwood 266). After the women left, she approached the young man, “I bit him on the neck. Was is lust or hunger? How could I tell the difference?” (Atwood 266). Without the correct education, she did not know how to feel towards it. Historical evidence shows that women were subjected to being taught how to have proper etiquette and have a graceful manner. This is where we find more symbolism if we look at the girl as a monster. A monster due to the fact that she does not understand her place, and how one could not have control over the intense feelings of want and desire.

As a woman, she is expected to be pure. “He said I was lucky, because I would stay innocent all my life, no man would want to pollute me, and then I would go straight to heaven” (Atwood 264). The priest portrays how a woman should be innocent until they are wed. Which in those times was to be the only desire for a woman, and not to have a want sexual intimacy. Since she will not be wed, she is to have no desire of fornication. After being found out she readies herself for her demise. “I’ll put on my white burial dress, my white veil, as befits a virgin” (Atwood 266). This coincides with the priest telling her what is expected. She again is accepting her place as a woman with how she tells of her forgiveness of the people who have the best intentions at heart (266).

It is widely known, that woman has always been portrayed as having to be pure beings and if she was polluted by a man she would not be desired. This story shows how in the nineteenth century, that women were seen as someone that needed to be told what to do, and how to act. The monster of this story is a direct symbol as how women are treated as if they are something to be terrified of, and something to have to have control over. If we look at the education, hence forth, we can see the inclination that women were meant to have a feminine manner, and not to have a sexual appetite. Women were supposed to only want to wed to have children and just for that or there would be a disgrace towards their families.