Analysis Of Martha Wolg

Throughout the novel, Martha Wolg is often referencing some aspect of sexuality, one way to interpret this is to assume that Martha lacks in confidence in her sexuality due to trauma associated with verbal abuse. Throughout this paper, I will prove this giving examples of how Martha was verbally abused, analyzing how her trauma influenced her in her dating life, and lastly by explaining how the trauama influences her relationship with her daughter’s sexuality.
In the beginning of the novel, Kolmar writes about a flashback with Friedrich Wolg and his father teasing and criticizing Martha’s sexuality, which is the basis of her Martha’s immature understanding of sexuality. This point is evident in the beginning of the text when Martha’s late-husband,

Having never fully developed emotionally, Martha believes that having a persona who is sexually available is equal to someone who is emotionally available, which Arnold comes to realize in part three of the novel while he and Martha are talking about his upcoming business trip, in which Martha responds unfavorably by walking in front of him, angry. Arnold tells her that he realized that she does not love him and that she was using him for sex due to the lack of emotionally intimacy occurring in their relationship. Arnold goes on to say
“You are a whore. A prostitute, that’s all” (p. 146), implying that their love was artificial. By calling Martha these hurtful names, he is forcing her to confront her underdeveloped confidence in her

On page 106 Martha describes herself as “. . . neither tender, nor attractive, neither voluptuous, not provocative - not at all gently lewd. More droll”. The descriptors she chooses to pick out to describe what she is not range from words such as “tender” and “attractive”, traditionally words that are used to describe a woman to words such as “voluptuous”, “gently lewd”, and “provocative” that are a more sexually erotic way of describing a woman. “Droll”, the one word used to describe Martha is defined as curious or unusual in a way that provoke dry amusement is starkly different from the aforementioned adjectives used to describe Ursula; specially related to the lack of strong and vivid imagery. From this, it can be interpreted that Martha felt the need to cherish her daughter’s sexuality to make up for not having someone close to her to cherish