Gender Roles In Hanan Al-Shaykh's A Season Of Madness

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Hanan Al-Shaykh is an Arab writer, whose stories and novels contain major roles for women in them. (Larson) From her writings, it can be seen that she subtly challenges the patriarchal system surrounding women and causes you to question the gender roles within society. (Al-Shaykh 793) In “A Season of Madness” the main character is Fatin, a wife, who is pretending that she is crazy to push her husband leave her. No matter what she does and what his mother says, he is faithful and unwilling to leave her and will stick with her until the end. This causes Fatin to come out with the truth, that she has been faking her madness all along in hopes that he will divorce her because she fell in love with another. The reactions given from both the step-mother …show more content…
Within Al-Mannai’s (82) article, it is stated that there clearly are large “status gaps” between men and women. The cause of this is culture, which in turn can be considered as tradition. Women are after marriage to become mothers, who are supposed to care for the home and nurture the children(Hilal 86). Fatin in this short story, is a mother of more than one child. She is living the life laid out before her based off of tradition. The power is either carried by the male in the relationship or the matriarch which is the step mother. In this short story, the step mother proclaims that she will find him a new bride after they send Fatin back to her family. (Al-Shaykh 795) This represents that women are considered to only be commodities, and can be swapped if they don’t fit in well. This is showing that in Arab culture, women are controlled. Women in marriage, they are chosen based on their merit, not because of love. It is only to better the families well-being. The wives are not in control for whether they are able to leave or stay in the …show more content…
In this clarity, she reminded her husband of how she used to be, but this clarity is also representing her affair with the man on the beach. It can be analyzed that the only reason Fatin is pretending to be mad is because it is the only way for her to take control of her own life. She was hoping that her erratic behaviour would force her husband to ask for a divorce and leave her. This is because of the culture they are living under, she is unable to ask for the divorce herself. Within the story, the husband and step-mother talk about Fatin’s madness and it being a source of shame, making them unable to choose what they should do about her. (Al-Shaykh 794) In Arab culture there is a negative stigma attached to mental illness, it not only affects the individual but also the family surrounding them. (Dalky 487) This is why in the beginning they did not send her back to her home and kept her inside. If instead of feigning insanity, she had come out with the truth in the beginning, she may have either gotten an angry reaction or have gotten the same reaction as she did in the ending. Because women of Arab culture should not speak out against tradition and the hierarchy the reaction she received was that of pity, from her step-mother “She’s crazy, poor thing. Nothing can be done for her.” (Al-Shaykh 797) After Fatin’s episode of madness,

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