The Handsomest Drowned Man Summary

I am currently enrolled in a First-Year Seminar that covers Feminist theory, backlash and development. In this seminar, I have developed my own idea of feminism for the first time. My newfound knowledge has helped me read stories that focus on women and women’s sexuality in an entirely enlightened way. In a similar fashion, García Márquez, having deep roots in Machismo culture, uses his background to reveal his conception of women’s sexuality. Through this contrast, he creates an emphasis on the role women are capable of playing in a male dominated society. Márquez’s work suggests that he views women’s sexuality in the range between sex critical and sex negative feminism, where women live in a state of subordination confusing rape and intercourse

While Márquez does allow the women to feel sexual gratification, it is still coupled with a need for male approval. Women openly experience sexual fantasies; however, they are first questioned for their desires and only accepted when men experience them too. The author uses their attraction to describe the man saying, “Not only was he the tallest, strongest, most virile, and best built man they had ever seen, but even though they were looking at him there was no room for him in their imagination.” (248). This imagined sexual pleasure is shamed by the men: “the men thought the fuss was only womanish frivolity” (251). The men viewed sexual pleasure in a selfish manner as something only they should experience, while it was considered “womanish frivolity” for women. We see the men are allowed to imagine sexual pleasure “one of the women mortified by so much lack of care, then removed the handkerchief from the dead man’s face and the men were left breathless too.” (252) However, in The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Eréndira and Her Heartless Grandmother, the author suggests Eréndira’s sexual pleasures were motivated by freedom, not true desire. Eréndira has two encounters that can be perceived as sexual pleasure: one with Ulises and one with the truck loader. “Eréndira and the loader were relaxing from good love behind the parapet of

There are no children and the people have grown old. The woman in the story says “ ‘Come here you dummy’ ... ‘It’s been years since we did it like rabbits’ ” (246). This sentence is part of a passage that suggests that consensual sex is offered but neither person overpowers the other and that desire doesn’t exist. The phrase, “it's been years since we did it like rabbits,” emphasizes the lack of desire in their relationship. The absence of male dominance throughout the story coupled with this passage suggests that sexual pleasure and gratification can lead to a culture of male dominance. The author is pointing to the idea that sexual desire is part of the foundation of a society that diminishes women and exalts