By Yasmine
Due: January 9, 2012
D.Daly
The novel Blood of Flowers portrays how women are treated and their rights and privileges. In the novel, Lives of the Saints, the same views are shared. The difference is how their two main characters are using the rights and privileges. In both novels, the women are abused and not supported enough by the main male character. In Lives of the Saints, the father of Cristina, knew what she was doing, should have provided guidance on how wrong these actions were taking. Cristina’s reputation and self-respect was degraded immensely once people were aware of her actions. In Blood of Flowers, the young women in the novel signed a “sigheh”. This means that she would sell herself to another man in order to get money for herself and her widowed mother. When the young girl agreed to do this, she degrading her family status along with her self-respect. Both novels share the degration and both feature main characters whose actions control the actions of the main female character. Another aspect, the two novels share, is the thoughts of the opposite gender that come in contact with the main character. The men in both novels are interested only in themselves, their own rights and the selfishness of their own actions.
In Blood of Flowers, this behavior occurs more often because of the time period and location in which the novel is based on. The male figure, in Blood of Flowers, has arranged a “sigheh” with the young woman. He has the right to do so because society doing was considered a sigheh “acceptable behavior”, and still is, because it is under law that men are allowed to do so. In Lives of the Saints, the male does have a choice but the choice is comparably different. Cristina has the attitude is more accepting when a male takes advantage of her, or dis-owns her. This is because Cristina believes this is normal because so many men have done these actions of hatred towards her in the past.
In