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Lust Susan Minot

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In the story “Lust” by Susan Minot, the author sets forth a point of concern, patriarchy. The voice of the text is showcased through a women who is presumably reminiscing as her older self, conflicted as to how her love and sexual life did not amount to what she anticipated. From childhood to late teens the unnamed narrator reflects back to times in her life wherein hindsight was her subconscious putting pieces together to resemble the everyday women. The stories she shared throughout the book in all ages in her life were pieces to the puzzle. The overall picture is realizing that she is a woman growing up in a male-dominated society. This paper will weigh Minot’s “Lust” against The Nations, “Patriarchy: A Primer for Men.” This article is …show more content…

To get to the most precise root of patriarchy we must fully comprehend by breaking down the definition. In the article by The Nation, they quote Social Activist, Feminist, and author, Bell Hooks. Hooks says, “Patriarchy is political-social system that insists that males are inherently dominating, superior to everything and everyone deemed weak, especially females…”(Nation 1). After meticulous analyzation of the texts, we see that Minot exposes the narrator of this in multiple stages of her life, she simultaneously is taking on the underlying issue of how after each occasion she is falling more and more into the category of symptoms caused by patriarchy. Minot makes it known in her writing that the narrator has had frequent encounters with males throughout her teenage years. The speaker of “Lust” paints a picture of her relationships with them from a young age. Without being aware of the significance of some encounters, they are all taking a toll on the narrator for the worse. Minot writes, When we were little, the brothers next door tied up our ankles. They held the door of the goat house and wouldn’t let us out till we showed them our underwear” (Minot 7).

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