Feeling sorry for “A Sorrowful Woman”

Gail Godwin I would assume is some what of a feminist. Judging from her past novel titles “A Mother and Two Daughters” and “Dream children”, she probably is a mother and knows first hand how it is raising children. Even before reading the short story “A sorrowful woman”, reading Godwin’s short biography before the passage, gives a sneak peek to what is expected. Godwin creates the story with the intention of making the wife’s refusal to be a traditional wife and mother, absolutely tolerable.

The story revolves around the reader feeling extremely sorry for the wife. Circumstances are given so that even becoming an ungrateful wife and bad mother is given an excuse. The title itself gives off sympathy for the mother previously, “Sorrowful” and the opening line “One upon a time there was a wife and mother one too many times” sides with the wife and mother al...