Memoirs Of A Woman Doctor Character Analysis

Memoirs of a Woman Doctor is a first person fiction narrative written by Nawal El Saadawi, an egyptian feminist and activist. Nawal El Saadawi practiced as a physician, surgeon, and psychiatrist, and is currently a radical writer on issues of class and gender for Arab women. The novel begins by actively portraying Saadawi’s understanding of gender structure and roles. Girls and women are treated unfairly in society, while men are viewed as dominant and treated superiorly to women. The narrative then delves into the fears expressed by the narrator as she begins to study medicine and remains as the only woman in the dissection room. Finally, the novel explores the narrator’s journey from a detached and emotionless doctor to one that is compassionate …show more content…
She begins her medical career with little empathy for her patients. She describes her first encounter performing a male genital examination and finds that “the body of a living person lost all respect and dignity and became exactly like a dead body under [her] gaze and [her] searching fingers, and disintegrated in [her] mind into a jumble of organs and dismembered limbs” (Saadawi, 2000, pg. 34). As she advances in her medical career, however, she begins to become more empathetic towards her patients. She meets a sick man who is desperate for her help, and claims that “for the first time, [she] was really seeing the eyes of a person suffering” (Saadawi, 2000, pg. 45). She begins to question how she was able to treat her previous patients with such insensibility. She wonders why her teachers led her to believe that a sick person was nothing more than a collection of organs. For the first time in her life, she feels a deep pain that penetrates her to the core, and she begins to cry “as if [her] eyes had never known what it was to cry” (Saadawi, 2000, pg. 46). The narrator learns to treat her patients mercifully, and her eyes are opened to a brand new world.
Memoirs of a Woman Doctor by Nawal El Saadawi takes readers on a heart wrenching journey through the mind of a young woman as she struggles to become comfortable with her profession, her sexuality, and her emotions. This book is an important contribution to today’s society, especially when gender discrimination is very relevant. As an editor for the Johns Hopkins Blog, I believe that his book can provide insight as to what social injustices women are faced with each day, and help to educate readers on sexism to help alleviate it in the