Gender Discrimination In Notley's The Descent Of Alette

In The Descent of Alette the word flower is used very often, but beyond its literal meaning as the reproductive portion of a plant. However, this definition does tie into Notley use of the word very well, because Notley 's uses of the word flower are centered around a description of women. The use of the word flower to describe women does not occur in the obvious sense in meaning beautiful, peaceful, or lovely but in describing aspects of women that lie beneath the surface and comprise their femininity. This may come across as a sweet notion, but The Descent of Alette is a story that cannot be described as sweet in any sense of the word, mainly because of its setting in a dystopian society run by a tyrant. It is not stated, but it can be inferred

Classics professor and epic poetry analyzer, Tatiana Tsakiropoulou-Summers describes the relationship between the two in this situation by saying, "Women in patriarchal societies have consistently been subject to male authority. Submissiveness to men’s will earns women membership to society, whereas resisting their power has detrimental effects on their life” (37). Summers statement can be seen in the scene on the subway where the mother is trying to scrap together money in order to allow her daughter a night within the tyrant 's "society." The statement, “‘you must give up '"‘to the tyrant '"‘all your flowers" attests to Summers ' in that in order join the tyrant 's world, for only a night, this girl will have to not only be submissive to his wishes but also relinquish a part of her womanhood to him (Notley 5). The added sacrifice the girl must give to join the tyrant can be attributed to the current state of the society, it is a dystopia and everyone is already facing detrimental effects on their lives regardless if they have resisted the tyrant or not. This additional sacrifice that has to be given by the girl to join the tyrant also plays into the gender hierarchy within this story because there are businessmen who can freely bounce between the two worlds and marvel at the poverty and unfortunate circumstances the women

The meaning of this vanishing act is explained when Notley paints a picture of a women 's flowers literally disappearing in the scene in which a baby is pulled from between a woman’s legs. In a similar way to how the system pressured the burning women to enter a partnership with a ghostly man, the woman in this scene is not just being pressured but actually prepared by a group of people to give birth. The people are dressing her, " 'they [are helping] her '" 'slip the clothes on-- '" and finish by placing a flower crown upon her head, announcing her as ready to give birth (Notley 53). After the woman is prepared and pulls the baby from between her legs the flower crown disappears which Alette describes as, "‘The chaplet '"‘of flowers '"‘disappeared '" (Notley 53). According to poetic metaphor transcribers Lakoff and Turner, in Janice Kozma’s literary use of flowers analysis, the inclusion of the withering away or disintegration of flowers typically correspond to the life cycle of plants (379). So the withering away of a flower directly translates to the dying of a plant which in this case acts as the death of the woman 's discretion and independence, the main things a girl acquires when coming into her femininity. The transitions from being subject to another 's choices to making decisions to back to having to live based on another 's choices can be seen in