Themes

One of Minot's major themes is the gradual disintegration and devaluation of women's souls as they progress from childhood into puberty. As a child, the protagonist had non-sexual characteristics on which to base her self-esteem. Yet this sense of selfconfidence erodes as the protagonist reaches puberty. She explains later that I could do some things well . . . But the second a boy put his arm around me, I forget about wanting to do anything else, which felt like a relief at first until it became like sinking into a muck.

Sex, even more than a vehicle for debasing women, also becomes a sort of ritualized defeat. The protagonist explains that "certain nights you'd feel a certain surrender." After sex she comments, "you curl up like a shrimp, something deep inside you ruined . . . you open your legs, but you can't or don't dare anymore, to open your heart."

For Minor...