Leslie Marmon Silko’s novel, Ceremony, depicts women and their struggle with power and control as the oppressed group in various ways through sexual encounters and their relationships to men. However, the character of Ts’eh specifically personifies the opposite: she maintains power and control throughout her relationship with Tayo. In a novel about the power dynamic between the oppressed and the oppressors, perhaps it is no coincidence that Ts’eh does not struggle with power, because perhaps she is simply a female figment of Tayo’s imagination used to help him understand societal issues.
Tayo’s incessant and unrelenting feelings towards Ts’eh, which result in maintained connection with her, demonstrate the idea that Ts’eh is merely a figment