Reference no: EM133221304
Question 1) Ovid's story gives Pygmalion a fairy-tale ending: he will (presumably!) live in marital bliss with his "ivory girl" now transformed into the flesh-and-blood woman (Galatea). There is, however, no "happily ever after" in Atwood's prose poem: the "mud woman" is swept away and her creator -- also her lover - laments her passing ("no woman since then has equaled her"). Atwood's speaker brings the prose-poem to an end with her troubling utterance:
Is this what you would like me to be, this mud woman? Is this what I would like to be? It would be so simple.
Compare the ending of Ovid's "Pygmalion and the Statue" with that of Atwood's "The Mud Woman." Perhaps we could say that Atwood's speaker's final words function to counter and correct the fairy-tale "happily ever after" ending that we encounter in the story of Pygmalion. Think about the implications of this possibility; if the speaker could morph (or be morphed) into the "mud woman," then life could be so simple, so perfect, like a Disney fairy-tale with its "happily ever after." Discuss.
Question 2) From the following excerpt readers confront the feelings of the (male) creator for his own creation, the inanimate "mud woman":
His love for her was perfect, he could say anything to her, into her he spilled his entire life. She was swept away in a sudden flood. He said no woman since then has equaled her.
Explain the significance of these few lines. What does this reveal about the young man and his relationship with his perfect woman? (The reader should notice that his "perfect woman," for whom he felt a "love" that was also "perfect," is simply an object he has created for his own pleasure.) What might this suggest about the young man's attitudes to flesh-and-blood women?