Representation Of Women In Woman At Point Zero By Nawal El Saadawi

Nawal El Saadawi’s Woman at Point Zero is a novel that takes place near Cairo, Egypt and is mostly written in the point of view of a girl named Firdaus. Growing up, Firdaus was physically and emotionally abused by her father and occasionally her mother as well. As she got older, she began to be sexually abused by her uncle along with many other men she would be introduced to throughout the story. However, these forms of abuse are not subjective to Firdaus. Quite a few women are introduced in this text and almost every single one of them mentions or hints that they’ve experienced abuse as well. Early in the novel, Firdaus reflects on her childhood and the relationship between her mother and father: “...he would beat my mother, then have his

Nawal El Saadawi’s tragic yet accurate representation of women in this culture educates the audience about gender inequality in Egypt and what dangers it poses to their society.

El Saadawi’s representation of women as unimportant, silenced, and passive is shown through various characters throughout the novel. While a lot of these traits are shown through Firdaus in the beginning of the book, the author uses other female characters as well to illustrate these characteristics more vividly. The number of male characters in Woman at Point Zero largely outweighs the number of females, allowing the audience to sense, rather than read directly from the text, that women in this culture are silenced and of much less importance than men. Although Firdaus’ uncle’s wife was not a main character in this novel, both Firdaus and the reader gather a lot of information about a woman’s ‘role’ in society through her. On one particular occasion, after Sheikh Mahmoud had aggressively beaten Firdaus with his shoe, Firdaus went to her uncle’s house and

The author is successful in showing inequality between men and women through her use of Firdaus as the main character and her choice to depict the lives of prostitutes. By revealing the sexual, physical, and emotional abuse that Firdaus and Sharifa experience as prostitutes, the author is able to express how the sexual exploitation of women, not only in Egypt but around the world as well, contributes to the idea that women exist for the sole purpose of pleasing men. One of the most prominent ways El Saadawi sheds light on the dangers of injustice towards women is through Firdaus’ thoughts and attitude near the end of the book. In reference to herself, Firdaus reflects, “She no longer hopes for anything or desires anything. She no longer fears anything, for everything which can hurt her she has already undergone” (87). In this part of the novel, Firdaus realizes that for the first time in her life, she is free to do or say anything that pleases her because she does not want to live, nor does she fear death. This shows the audience how being exposed to so much abuse throughout her life has made her apathetic and empty inside. Later on in the book, Firdaus says to the authorities, “Everybody has to die. I prefer to die for a crime I have committed rather than to die for one of the