Who Is Margaret Atwood Marrying The Hangman

Marrying the Hangman by Margaret Atwood, when looked at through the Feminist Theory, is a poetic narration of the cruel and harsh reality that serves women within the patriarchy. The narrator begins with a convicted felon who has been sentenced to death by hanging. The prisoner is sobered when the realization of her fate dawns upon her, “She had been condemned to death by hanging.thus there is no escape.” (Atwood, Lines 1-4). The story also relays that there is an opportunity for freedom, however there is blatant discrimination between the genders that are granted this opportunity. Atwood writes, “A man may escape this death by becoming the hangman, a woman by marrying the hangman.” (Lines 2-3). This allows the reader to understand the constraints women face due to the patriarchal values that are emplaced and how the traditional gender roles of men in comparison to women are perceived.

Atwood closes the first stanza by writing, “...it is history.” (Line 6), allowing the reader to understand the vicious cycle that is constantly enforced and endured by women living within a patriarchal society. The prisoner quickly realizes that she can persuade a man who is her neighboring cellmate to become a hangman and then later to marry her, guaranteeing both their lives and future, “But there is no hangman, first she must create him, she must persuade this man.She must marry the hangman or no one, but that is not so bad.” (Atwood, Lines 15-25). This passage gives the impression that, although her circumstances are not the best, the prisoner must make do with what she has, making her complicit in marginalizing and conforming to the idea of a patriarchal woman. Furthermore, while conspiring to convince the man to become a hangman, the prisoner thinks, “He was not condemned to death, freedom awaited